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Protecting my attention at the dopamine carnival

amirsharif.com

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Re: Protecting my attention at the dopamine carnival

#31

Post by padolsey »

ch4s3 wrote: post #26
padolsey wrote: post #23

> Using ChatGPT on cognitive tasks can reduce your brain connectivity by up to 50% and reduce your ability to recall information about the task by 8x. Argh people keep referencing this study as Gospel. It has not been peer-reviewed. Its methodology has a number of concerning confounders. It's a tiny sample with a narrow contrived task domain. And the very premise of the study is misframed. The implication that 'brain…

Im never surprised when someone prattling on about dopamine also leans on a bad study to make a spurious point.

Yep it's always a bit cute and funny, when you consider the absolute necessity of dopamine in basically every functionally relevant neural activation. Talk to a parkinson's patient about your 'dopamine=bad' fluff. Ugh. They may as well just have titled it "Protecting My Attention At The {Insert Arbitrary Hormone or Neurotransmission Chemical} Carnival"....

Re: Protecting my attention at the dopamine carnival

#32

Post by dyauspitr »

fnord77 wrote: post #4

> Developers actually take up to 19% longer when coding with AI than without it, but self-report that they were able to complete tasks 20% faster. this contradicts thought leaders in the field like Andrew Ng

Pure nonsense (referring to your quote)

Re: Protecting my attention at the dopamine carnival

#33

Post by leakycap »

unclad5968 wrote: post #14
fnord77 wrote: post #4

> Developers actually take up to 19% longer when coding with AI than without it, but self-report that they were able to complete tasks 20% faster. this contradicts thought leaders in the field like Andrew Ng

What is a thought leader?

The person you are asking gave an example:

> thought leaders in the field like Andrew Ng

If its still cloudy, a "thought leader" is anyone recognized as an authority in their field, whose ideas and insights influence others and shape the direction of the hype cycle.

Re: Protecting my attention at the dopamine carnival

#34

Post by munchler »

jimbob45 wrote: post #2

I can’t abide by that last claim. AI has been able to fetch some dead Microsoft documentation for me that I was not able to otherwise find through the regular channels. The code would have had to have looked very differently if not for AI.

I agree. AI doesn't make me a faster coder, but it helps me do things that I wouldn't have been able to do at all otherwise.

Re: Protecting my attention at the dopamine carnival

#35

Post by lmm »

jampa wrote: post #11

> Having your phone in the same room while doing cognitive work reliably drops your memory, attention, and overall cognitive performance. That is my biggest problem with most Multifactor authentication. I try to leave my phone in another room to focus, but needing the phone authenticator for something always happens within two hours. I still don't know why apps think a device I carry in the streets is safer than one…

> I still don't know why apps think a device I carry in the streets is safer than one I leave at home to do important transactions like moving money, for example. Where I live, there are a lot of cases of people being kidnapped and coerced to make payments (which are instant), yet no Banking app allows you to do anything without a phone.

Muggings and kidnappings, as bad as they are, can't really be done at scale.

That device a) has some kind of secure enclave, hopefully, and more importantly b) restricts your ability to run arbitrary code off the internet to the point that everyday users probably can't do it. I don't like it, but they do it because it's effective.

Re: Protecting my attention at the dopamine carnival

#36

Post by _9ptr »

unclad5968 wrote: post #14
fnord77 wrote: post #4

> Developers actually take up to 19% longer when coding with AI than without it, but self-report that they were able to complete tasks 20% faster. this contradicts thought leaders in the field like Andrew Ng

What is a thought leader?

A Führer for your thoughts

Re: Protecting my attention at the dopamine carnival

#37

Post by lmm »

squigz wrote: post #10
bcoates wrote: post #3

The idea of app timers seems like exactly the weird self-negotiation alcoholics do around booze where they think mimicking the habits of casual drinkers (on what is, to the casual, a bender) will make them not an alcoholic anymore. Yes, normies might have three margaritas on a Tuesday. Like, once a quarter. Not every single day, and also not followed by a whole lot more once you’re loosened up. Likewise, the reaction…

"Normal" people don't react that way to casinos.

Have you walked past one recently? Casinos used to have at least some veneer of sophistication - polished wood, baize, well-dressed croupiers - even if it was ultimately pretty thin. Now the whole room looks like a giant kiddie noisemaker toy.

Re: Protecting my attention at the dopamine carnival

#38

Post by gs17 »

androng wrote: post #7

I think I can obtain a triple benefit by using Cursor "ask" mode instead of "agent" mode. 1) I don't over-rely on the AI so I don't accidentally commit bugs 2) I can just put in a OpenAI API key pay-as-you-go instead of subscribing to Cursor Pro monthly and getting screwed by SaaS fee I don't use 3) I actually learn what the AI says and add it to my long-term memory instead of just having it write code for me in Agen…

The biggest benefit to me (using Copilot instead of Cursor) is that you can make sure that it understands the problem and the solution is what you expected. If I want to see if it can make a big change, I usually flow through "I need X, what are our options" -> "Discuss option N more" -> "Ok, now you can do it".

Re: Protecting my attention at the dopamine carnival

#39

Post by gs17 »

parpfish wrote: post #22
milofeynman wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've found the same. I actually enjoy Instagram ads. I despise almost every other ad I can think of.

You enjoy the ads, but do you enjoy the products ? I’ve seen so many ads that show a nice product, so I click and it takes me to nice polished landing page, which leads to a smooth checkout flow. But then the thing arrives and it’s garbage. I believe that there’s an entire genre of niche-marketed consumer goods that have been broken by Campbell/Goodharts law because they’ve integrated the product design and marketing…

Yeah, I've had one that seemed like exactly something I wanted, turned out to be a scam, and they fucked it up enough that PayPal actually refunded me.

Re: Protecting my attention at the dopamine carnival

#40

Post by cik »

satvikpendem wrote: post #18
jampa wrote: post #11

> Having your phone in the same room while doing cognitive work reliably drops your memory, attention, and overall cognitive performance. That is my biggest problem with most Multifactor authentication. I try to leave my phone in another room to focus, but needing the phone authenticator for something always happens within two hours. I still don't know why apps think a device I carry in the streets is safer than one…

This might defeat the purpose of MFA but I use an authenticator like Ente that works on the desktop and syncs to and from your phone.

Thank you, I really appreciate this. I've been looking for something exactly like this for ages, whilst trying to toss my current solution.
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