Bingeing, Escapism & Modern Addictions - Michael Easter
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- Опубліковано 25 чер 2024
- Michael Easter is a University of Nevada, Las Vegas professor, a journalist and an author who focuses on health and human performance.
Even though we might often feel in control of our impulses, there are regular moments that remind us of our uncontrolled tendencies. From overspending to overeating, there is a secret loop happening inside of our minds that causes our actions and intentions to move further apart.
Expect to learn why moderation is so impossible to achieve, what humans actually want the most out of life, what the scarcity loop is and how it drives your behaviour, if it's possible to become dependent on certainty, whether humans are more likely to chase happiness or avoid discomfort, Michael’s contrarian opinion on first world problems and much more...
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#psychology #discipline #selfcontrol
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00:00 Why Can’t Humans Ever Get Enough?
03:50 Explaining the Scarcity Loop
09:51 Why Are We So Hooked?
17:47 Humanity’s Love for Escapism
21:39 The Wild Story of Captagon
30:25 Are We Becoming More Dependent on Certainty?
39:54 The Evolutionary Pursuit of Status & Influence
52:31 Becoming Addicted to Observable Metrics
57:25 The Scarcity Loop of Food
1:04:26 How to Break Through the Loop
1:10:40 Where to Find Michael
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Get my free Reading List of 100 life-changing books here - chriswillx.com/books/
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Hello you beauties. Access all episodes 10 hours earlier than UA-cam by Subscribing on Spotify - spoti.fi/2LSimPn or Apple Podcasts - apple.co/2MNqIgw. Here’s the timestamps:
00:00 Why Can’t Humans Ever Get Enough?
03:50 Explaining the Scarcity Loop
09:51 Why Are We So Hooked?
17:47 Humanity’s Love for Escapism
21:39 The Wild Story of Captagon
30:25 Are We Becoming More Dependent on Certainty?
39:54 The Evolutionary Pursuit of Status & Influence
52:31 Becoming Addicted to Observable Metrics
57:25 The Scarcity Loop of Food
1:04:26 How to Break Through the Loop
1:10:40 Where to Find Michael
I’d rather eat no cookies then just eat one… no. I’m either gonna wolf down a box of 20 in one sitting and dealing with the 2 days of inflammation pain or going 2 years without eating cookies at all.
Same
Same.
Same.
For real. Oreos are two servings for me. One row at a time. So I don't buy them often or I'll eat em
Same here
To summarize It: everything is against us. It's almost impossible not to be an addict. Cheers from Spain ❤
Well, I'd say the first step is knowing how it all works and admitting that you're vulnerable to it. Then you can start developing personal policies to safeguard yourself. But now is the time because it's only going to get worse.
Great discussion. "Moderation is a fatal thing. Nothing succeeds like excess." - Oscar Wilde
Exactly. But it's a matter of whether that excess is of your choosing, or are you operating on compulsion?
Golden Win 🥇
Sore all over from the gym
388 days No Alcohol 🏆💫
👏
Aw Hell yeah!!
𝕎00₸!! ₩ÖÖ₮!!
You guys are talking about "value and process" vs "cost/price - results". Great show Chris. Man, you are killing it. Another amazing guest. Thanks Michael Easter. I have said it before but, I love the variety of guest you have. Killer Pod cast.
Interestingly, to me at least, I noticed several years ago that if I simply chewed my food and allowed myself to actually taste what I was eating, that I ate less. Now Mr. Easter's comments make me believe that I was simply ahead of my time. :)
I think we’re all just hard wired as a species to pursue novelty. New experiences, new sights, new sounds, new smells, new tastes new everything. The addictive traits we exhibit are just seeking to fulfill that drive in the quickest, easiest method of least resistance.
Exactly, but most of what we're calling novelty is just recycled and reformulated.
Look at Hollywood. All variation on a handful of themes. "There is no new thing under the sun." -Solomon
The unpredictable rewards is also the mechanism that keeps people in abusive relationships as well.
The abusive partner will intermittently give unpredictable positive moments to keep their partner hooked in with that relationship.
Yep I’m all or nothing. Funny thing is I feel free and unconcerned when I’m abstinent (from sugar) but I’m tortured and guilty when I’m eating the junk. Yet I can’t seem to stay off. I can go months then boom I’m eating it again. It’s so discouraging. 😢
Chris, your podcasts are the best! I strive to be as good a conversationalist as you. You make brilliant use of the English language, and I take notes from nearly every episode.
One small point of correction, made as an admiring friend, is that "Mr." Zeigarnik was in fact a "Ms." Zeigarnik. She was the Soviet scientist, Bluma Zeigarnik. The rest of the story and its significance to open loops is accurate. The strength of the effect varies from person to person, and I believe it can play a role in people's success.
I personally feel compelled to finish the things I start to an almost pathological degree. You can see where that can be both a strength and a weakness. I suspect it plays a role for many high performers.
Escaping into anything you can think of to avoid something difficult: Taught myself to read (from being read to, but no one was actually teaching me. My mom thought the preschool was and the preschool thought my parents were. lol) when I was 3. Ever since then reading has been my escape. So many times I just disappear into a book to ignore whatever I need a break from. My son died in Novemeber 2021 and since then I have read approximately 2000 books. It's crazy to think about that as a real quantity. I read so quickly that I can finish a typical length novel in a couple of hours. It is like breathing in the words, rather than merely reading them. I have to use Kindle Unlimited or go broke on books!
Damn, I'm sorry for your loss.
I'm sorry for your loss. Happy to hear you're buying/borrowing books and not getting them for free via libgen....
Thanks, guys. It's rough. Books and my husband, other kids, fam and friends are all there for me. Books are the best escape, though. Totally different reality for a little while.
That's a really good point right off the rip. Were not really engineered for moderation, having excess resources whether its food, money, you name it was never really a thing until the 60-70s. You know it's a really simple concept but it never quite dawned on me like that. I've always been very extreme in anything I do which as fine and well when your young, but after you pick a few years you need to learn to moderate what you do. My parents always preached everything in Moderation, starting to get it more as I get older. Michael hit the nail on the head.
3 hours to go yet listening to his book The Comfort Crisis. Highly recommend ❤
Speaking of moderation, im going for the quadfection today. Quitting vaping, quitting weed vape, quitting coffee and doing a fast. Its been interesting so far, been more hungry than anything.
Gl bro...after day 2 or 3 you will have to start battling your mind
But you have to go from one extreme to the other. Do you think you could drink just one coffee and leave it at that without going to the other end?
The best podcast I have listened to in a while.
"Everything in moderation; especially moderation." ~ZGALA
Who is Zgala?
"Everything in moderation, including moderation." - Oscar Wilde
It is all about anticipation 💯. I have a date tonight that had me excited 😊 for days. If it were a last minute endeavor,, I would probably pass. 😕
Top level, legitimate and positive mentor content. 🌀🌀🌀🌀👏
In my opinion most people who have addictions are escaping emotional pain, namely guilt and shame. Everything comes from childhood. People get addicted to guilt and shame. Brain can't tell the difference between positive or negative emotions and gets addicted to emotions. I came to this conclusion from personal experience and many years researching, observing and helping people.
Fascinating discussion, and your guest has spot on Rich Roll's voice!
Or a more mature kermit the frog!
They have slot machines in Australia at every pub. You can bet up to $10 a hit unless you want to go to the casino and bet more. People get addicted to them using it as an escape from the emotional pain. Same as any other addiction. Many lives have been ruined and families broken from slot machines here.
Excellent talk! Thank you.
Complete abstinence is easier than perfect moderation. Saint Augustine
The comfort Crisis and Fly Buzzing around lol
It’s ironic that as humanity has increased knowledge, it has also proportionally increased uncertainty.
Despite a greater volume of knowledge and limitless access to it, the vast majority of people are unable to or too lazy to exploit it.
Knowledge is useless unless it’s both accessible and understandable by the most basic segment of the population.
The definition of a hypochondriac is someone whose loop can never be closed when it comes to their health.
I think the phrase "Please Drink Responsibly" is marketing genius. Like the addictive substance is going to be consumed in moderation. They just want you to pat yourself on the back for having the first few rounds when you haven't done much damage yet to get you to lower your inhibitions.
Please Drink. 🍻 🍻🍻 🎉 (...responsibly... yeah...)
If you haven't seen it, check out the South Park drinking advert. It's great!
Why does the audience tolerates so many commercials?
Scarcity Brain is one of the best books I've ever read. Cheers to bringing him on 🥳🥳🥳
9:17 Glad he caught that 😌
Its weird i enjoyed listening to this one but when we got to the last few topics, they were very quickfiee and i felt the episode could have been longer focusing on them. Perhaps you could have him back again chris. When you guys started talking about the tribes heart health and calories, i was so engaged i forgot the episode was actually about scarcity and jot food 😂
I just bought a lock box w timer and a jar of almond butter lasts a week now.
This works in gaming achievements as well. I and many would play a game and want to complete everything for my own entertainment and feeling like I really beat it, but then it became about the achievement list and losing interest outside of that list.
It can however make someone who wouldn't have played that much, play more and get more of what they paid for by giving incentive where they wouldn't have on their own. But then that goes into if that's worth the time I'm the first place
Zero self control?...well, when I was a child I guess this was true of me. At this point though, I do nothing in excess...I do not over eat, or drink to excess, or spend to excess, or watch too much TV, or play too many video games, or eat too many sweets, or anything else. When I feel like I might be doing something to excess, I use my self control to stop. Drives my wife absolutely crazy because I won't accept a lack of self control as an excuse for anything. It is control of the self, and it is not that hard to do really, once you get in the habit of being in control of yourself it's easy. And I too was born in Las Vegas, the city of excess and the place makes me sick to my stomach.. the fact that the entire state is wealthy(I mean the state not the people living in it) because it takes advantage of humans as if that's not disgusting and unethical....
I'm guessing the unpredictable reward must also include at least the perceived chance of a significantly better outcome than the predictable reward some of the time. The chance of 'winning big' overrides the appeal of predictable reward, especially if we are not starving.
Habit and the monkey, primitive, brains, is hard to change!
I think what’s behind a lot of the rabbit hole things like “meat is bad is marketing for an opposite product that is based in truth - processed foods and sugar at the amounts easily found today are not good.
We are all touch, understanding and love deprived because society and corporations have replaced them all with hyper palatable goods, porn, UA-cam shorts and deliveroo and it's not stopping.
Nice.
Chris where can i read more about the hidden and observable metrics?
11:47 humans were exclusively hunter gatherers until some point 10 -12,000 years ago. Farming and pastoralism emerged around the same time ca. 8000-10000 BC. Evolutionarily that may as well be last week.
GLP-1 helps a lot
Everything in moderation, except for moderation.😂
"Everything in moderation, including moderation." - Oscar Wilde
Never ever EVER pre-order games especially if they are in alpha or beta hell for months er years
Boy, that fly really bothered him.
Is this a re-upload? I think a heard this conversation already or at least the casino part 🤔
Sorry my bad . He was on the Joe Rogan show that is why it sounds familiar. Great stuff , fascinating
I believe I listened to this earlier and heard him say they made a simulation of a casino to study behavior, but there were no crowds of other participants playing? So how can this be at all accurate. Humans follow suit of behaviors around them which seems to falsely normalize it.
Casinos pipe in cocaine through the air ducts!!😂😂😂😂😂
👌👍
👍
Was he secretly plugging Temu
I like being a 3% pidgeon..
You and Joe guest swapping?
Wine …
Apology accepted - sincerely a Hungarian
As a person who is on a low-methionine longevity meal plan.
(fruits)
Potatoes
Vegetables
The reason that açaí bowls and yogurt needs granola are because fruits,vegetables and other foods need granola or oatmeal to sustain the stomach from hunger within a hour or so.
nowdays we eat too many carbs
I can crush a tonne of boiled potatoes!
First!
What if you just get so bored out of this like really fast. I don't like all these examples of getting hooked on? The only example i have is breadcrumbing of guys. Of they do that i go stalker 😅😅😅😅 but nothing commercial it's waist of money plus i am pretty poor so i have to look for food and stuff. If my money doesn't pay of i don't care its a waist i don't get excited i get bored
I love your show and am a long time watcher/listener, but the way you describe certain things is so unnecessarily complicated it’s almost comical, particularly to an American… and I notice your guests consistently being confused at the same time I am. It’s like “I THINK I understand you, but that has to be the most clunky, odd way I could ever imagine someone wording that…”
Michael Easter 100% read and ripped off Adam Alter’s book, Irresistible: The Rise or Addictive Technology and The Business of Keeping us Hooked. Everything from Easter’s ‘scarcity loop’ and discussion of slot machines to his analysis of gamification is straight out of Alter’s book. If you’re going to read and hijack Alter’s ideas, at least cite him instead of shamefully and pathetically passing his ideas off as your own.
Why is the title of your video a blatant lie?
Maybe you cannot make videos with honest titles in moderation lol
American's focusing on food intake in comments. Typical.
Its all in same basic principle, dopamine addiction
Consist of 3 main aspect
- how big is the dopamine spike
- reward uncertainty
- frequency of the spike
Social media, drug, gambling, smoking, you name it, it all use these three fundamental.
Best not to play at all, no wonder addiction is at all time high now