Troll Math

I hate these kinds of problems.

Movies and Vidya

[some language towards the end]

I was thinking about the plots of movies I've seen v. the plots of videogames I've played.

...

I've been thinking about the plots of movies v. the plots of ANYTHING ELSE.

Is it just me...or does nearly every single movie plot either suck or is a repeat of some rehashed plot?  And, whenever Hollywood 'gets it', and creates an original plot (a.k.a., steals an original plot from a book), everybody loves it and it gets raves reviews.  So, what happens next year?  A focus on originality and none of the same mass produced T.V. drama shit? No.  Fuck that.  Sequels off of the good stuff.

I'm going to describe some archetypes over the next few posts, and you're going to know exactly what I mean.  First up is the "Old Team Reunion".  This is me copypasta'ing stuff I've wrote before to fill up the blog--BUT I DON'T CARE:

The Soviet scientists that made the unmanned Luna rovers were later called upon in their retirement to help out during the Chernobyl crisis.  They retrofitted a bunch of bulldozers as unmanned machines to help with the clean-up.

You know those "Old Team Reunion" movies?  The kind where, some disaster strikes, and the government sets out to recruit the leading experts in the field, of which there are only 4 or 5 and they're all in retirement now?  And they have a short recruitment montage for each of the experts, and of course one of the experts has fallen to the wayside over the past few years, and it takes their old leader to give him a pep-talk to join the team?  Then the rest of the movie is Apollo 13-ish drama?

But I'd like to see a good old cheesy "Old Time Reunion" movie with the scientists from the Lunakhod program building bulldozers for the Chernobyl crisis.  The KGB would go to the leader first, and he'd say something like, "I'm sorry comrades, but those glory days are long behind me.  I've completely forgotten how to build a Luna rover."  And then the KGB agent would reveal himself as the former leader of the Soviet space program, pull out a picture of his dead wife, and say, "Are you going to live in her shadow forever?"  They leave him with the picture, and the next day he calls up the director and says, "I'm in."

The rest of the montage would show the former Lunakhod leader going to all of his former teammates.  Of course the first one he goes to is the 'buddy'-stereotype.  The guy he used to be good friends with but lost contact.  And of course, this usually happens with the 'buddy' stereotype, he's also a danger-junkie.  And he's now no longer doing radio telemetry; but doing something insane like base-jumping.  And the old leader catches him in the act.  They start having small talk and catching up, until the 'buddy' finally says, "Alright, spit it out, why are you here?"  And after the old Lunakhod leader says that he's trying to recruit the old team members to clean up the Chernobyl radiation, the 'buddy' spins his back to him with a disgusted look on his face, starts to walk away...before he dramatically (and cheesily) spins around and says, "You bet I'm in!"

The rest of the recruitment goes fine until they (of course, man, so many cliches with this kind of movie) meet the team member who has fallen by the way side, but has some obscure knowledge that no one else has that makes him absolutely necessary.  He has started drinking and let himself go.  Eventually, the old team leader pins him up against the wall and says, "Dammit Breznokovsky!  Are you just going to let it end like this?  Living alone in some little tenement in Moscow, decaying until the end of your days?!  I know you've still got the brains, and you still got the guts!"  He looks away sullenly before saying that he'll do it...for old times sake.

Then they actually get to work, meeting up at the site, and start requisitioning supplies.  Only, they find that the supplies are either non-existent or will get there too late.  At a late night meeting they start to get frustrated, someone mentions something about the old leader's dead wife, which causes him to blow up in front of everyone and storm out.  The old 'buddy' goes out to talk to him and help him face his past.  After this they start walking about, thinking about what they can do without any equipment, when they notice a bunch of unused bulldozers used for the construction of the radio tower next to Privayt.  They rush back to the meeting room, where almost everyone else has fallen asleep and after waking them up begin talking about whether they can retrofit the bulldozers.

Someone brings up a crucial technical question that makes everyone second-guess whether the idea is even possible.  They all look at the obscure expert since only he has the knowledge that would make it possible to overcome such a technicality.  Everyone stares at him as he dramatically pauses and rubs his chin, mulling it over.  The camera scans over the sweat-stained faces of the other men in the room.  Breznokovsky stands up and beings to pace around, talking to himself.  Then, he stops, and falls silent.  After a long pause the leader tentatively questions him again on whether or not it's possible, in a much softer and less confident voice.  Breznokovsky then dramatically turns around and says, "Yes.  Yes I think it just might work."  Everyone looks at each other, smiles and high-fives abound.

Then starts the construction montage.  Complete with 80's music.  Add in some laugh track clip of someone holding a blueprint upsidedown.

Finally, they begin using the machines to enter the worksite.  There is some tension as they get closer to the reactor as the technicality earlier mentioned is brought up again.  They ask Brez. whether or not he wants to stop, "Dammit!  It's too late to turn back now!"  The entire team is on edge.  Suddenly, there's a collapse in the reactor wall that damages some of the relay equipment on the bulldozer.  If they can't move it, then the bulldozer has effectively blocked a crucial entrance and threatens to let out a large radioactive pocket for some reason.  The team starts to break down as everyone begins yelling at each other and blaming each other for various parts in the project.  Then, Brez. yells, "Switch the rotor to AUX" (a reference to an obscure command that someone in Mission Control during Apollo 12 yelled out that saved the mission).  At first, no one even knows what this means, and after Brez. explains the 'buddy' immediately mentions how risky this is.  The room goes silent as leader and Brez. look at each other with cold glances.  Brez. gives the leader a steely nod, to which he replies in kind and then gives the order to switch to AUX.

There is a long, tense pause as the camera pans over each of the team members during the long radio silence after the switch.  The bulldozer is able to complete its mission.

Fade to credits.  Bring up more 80's music.

Likewise, every action movie follows along the same premise:

• Bad guy is a stereotypical drug dealer (or some criminal) who
• Kidnaps the guy's family (or threatens them, or he's fighting to see his family again, or has the girl of his dreams)
• Guy goes on a fucking rampage
• Tough guy kisses his wife/wife-to-be while explosions/ruins lie in the background

For example:

There are so many fucking movies like this I don't even know where to begin.  I don't think it'd be an exaggeration to say half of all movies are this one action movie.

Let's compare to some videogames.

Hell, let's compare these movies to SOME GODDAM CARTOONS.

Shit, how about some goddam T.V. DRAMAS.

MOVIES HAVE BILLION DOLLAR BUDGETS!

THEY SPEND YEARS IN PRODUCTION!

WHY THE FUCK CAN'T THEY COMPARE TO THIS SHIT?!

GAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I know every once in a while they do, but for all the resources involved you'd think it'd be better than the piss-shot they have now-a-days!

'Trivial' trivialities

I am slowly coming to the conclusion that...mathematicians should really stop saying that things are 'trivial'.

As a cultural phenomena, it typically engenders some pretty bad actions--namely, continually negative self-talk and derision.  It is really more a source of punishment, although most people in mathematics, including myself, do it with good intentions by hoping that we are really conveying the message, "Don't worry, this isn't too bad."  If you constantly berate yourself and others that stuff is simple, then when you do find a beautiful--elegant--proof, it will initially be a source of great displeasure.

It also encourages fairly one-sided thinking.  I.e., the slick proofs are typically the proofs that show something in a few lines.  If someone mathematically matures with such proofs, and creating such proofs, they tend to think more like every other mathematician (i.e., it creates a lack of creativity), and the harder, longer proofs will be less frequently come by.

Think, for example, of Posa's Soup Proof.

That proof is absolutely trivial!  Why didn't the mathematical community do this?!  How could we be so stupid?!

^Tl;dr, the above is not helpful.

Mathematical notation....and mathematical NOTAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAATION

There's mathematical notation.

And then there's mathematical notaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaation.

'Mathematical notation' includes all kinds of notation.  '+' is a symbol to denote addition, or 'e_i' refers to basis vectors, or even the picky stuff like 'capital letters refer to matrices and lower case letters refer to scalars'.  And, unfortunately as I'll get into, the VAST vast VAST VAST...vast?...VAST VAST VAST majority of 'mathematical notation' is what kind of letters stand for what (f,g,h are typically reserved for function, x,y,z for variables, etc.).

But then...then there's notaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaation.

Notaaaaaaaaaaation is the really big, fundamental stuff.  It's when some mathematician realizes that when you write something in a different way, it completely changes your conception of the world.

Here is an example:

'x+y'

This is a standard, basic, operation.  But the point is that if this is the notation you have, while analysts can use it quite well and all, it is really suited more for algebraists.  However, rewrite the above as:

'+(x,y)'

And now just writing it so differently has changed the conception completely.  Now instead of thinking of it as an operator, it is a function.  It certainly made sense before to think of '+' as a function and to say it is continuous.  However, simply writing it in this form greatly pedagogically clarifies the matter.  The notation is reflecting the paradigm of thought.

When notation can do that, then it's notaaaaaaaaaaation.

But, then there's even bigger notaaaaaaaaaaation.  This is stuff like...the guy who first thought of writing:

A->>B

Meaning A maps surjectively into B.  Modern module theory would not have been possible had someone not thought of making these arrow-chasing diagrams of modules, with each arrow representing a different kind of map (surjective, injective, etc.).  Notaaaaaaaaaaaaaation also involves a way of just being able to even represent certain things.

To a certain extent, I suppose this is time dependent.  Whereas now-a-days saying 'x' stands for a variable is just notation, when the first mathematician thought of representing algebraic equations by x's and y's, that was first class notaaaaaaaaaation; although now-a-days it's rather taken for granted.

Often, I think now that mathematicians have a few stages:

-Average mathematicians slightly generalize a result, or show a certain, VERY specific counterexample.
-Good mathematicians create new results, or completely pathological counterexamples.
-Great mathematicians develop amazing notation and definitions.
(FWIW, I'm a bad mathematician :P)

I suppose for possibly this reason, I might controversially say that Leibnitz was a better mathematician than Newton.  He developed first-rate notation that enabled calculus to really get going.  (nonetheless, Newton was a great mathematician as well by this criteria, as he did invent some notation that caught on at least in physics (the dot notation)).

FWIW, I remember talking to Charles Von Loan, and he very much thought of tensors and tensor product as notaaaaaaaaaaation for the upcoming generation.

Halmos is Batman

I suppose you can find me saying something similar to this at amazon, but either way....

PRAISE FOR HALMOS.

Something I like about Halmos is that he actually details his FAILURES (gasp!).  He detailed when he failed from graduate school in philosophy, his hardship in becoming an assistant or getting a job. I certainly learned a lot from Halmos' successes, but I felt I learned a lot more in his detailing of his failures.
The reason I am pointing this out in such detail is because if you read other biographies of other famous scientists, you get the feeling that you have to have been doing hardcore science since you were 15, have excelled in every path you came across, and finished your PhD by your 21st birthday; and if you don't you're a miserable failure of a human being. Halmos is the antithesis of these stories. Halmos story shows that you can do math if you thunk around everywhere, so long as you keep your nose to the grindstone and like what you're doing, and gives valuable advice about HOW to do this. Halmos wasn't born with some superhero genetics or superpowers.

Halmos is the Batman.

Siesta

Argentina has this tradition of siestas.  The town closes down and everyone goes to bed in the middle of the day.

I love siestas.

The "Let's Have Fun" Urge

One more thought.

Connected with the experience of boredom, is a reaction to this experience--something which I like to call the "Let's Have Fun Urge".  Whereas boredom, in my experience, always comes before LHF, there are instances in which one can be bored and not have LHF.  Also, although a Behaviorist would/should argue that LHF will eventually die out, in my experience it does not.  It can continue for endless hours or even days if you let it.  Really, psychologically, it is very similar to the physical pain of, say, a canker sore.  It will remain omnipresent and constantly grate at your attention until you do something about it.

I very much like the analogy to a canker sore, it seems to suit the emotion very well...

However, while with boredom there might be a possibility of a cognitive shift of such an emotion to something more akin to 'mono no aware' or something similar...I have not found a similar strategy for LHF.  It is constant, annoying, and does not go away.  Now, the common response to this is, typically, to not let it go away.  And, instead, to succumb to it.  I really dislike this response.  I like to think that I'm not an automaton, that I'm not a slave to my desires.  And, at the very least, personal freedom is the most immediate aspect of one's self that remains readily amenable to be worked upon.

The Science of Boredom

As I may have indicated, I think of things in a rather Behaviorist manner.  As such, the reaction of anxiety is that as an emotion to drive an escapism against perceived future punishment.  Given that, in my previous post, I expressed boredom as a form of anxiety, this more or less paints the picture of my perception of boredom.

The 'Phenomenology' of Boredom

In a word, anxiety.  I think that all boredom can essentially be described as a manifestation of anxiety.  At least, whenever I experience boredom, it is as a trade-off--it is as a desire to be doing something else--usually, something very explicit that I can indeed explicitly name.  It comes as an emotion of the incongruence of actions to desires.  Moreover, there is a set impermanence to its character.  It is set as a constant urge to be doing yet some other action.  And, furthermore, the only set difference between boredom and anxiety is, I submit, a difference only in degree and not in kind.  That boredom is merely the most mild form of anxiety is readily apparent at the thought experiment of increasing the supposed need of the desired action.  That is, if the same thing desired during boredom should suddenly become more urgently needed, say desire to write a paper in leisure v. desire to write it under a deadline, then we would suddenly feel anxiety.

With that said, all that we find in the state of boredom is that which we find in anxiety; and of that only of the most mild character.

Husserl v. Descartes

A lot of what goes into this post is borrowed from the following video of an interview of Barrett, which I would highly suggest myself both because this is pretty much where all of my information on the subject comes from, and also because...I don't know, maybe you'd like to follow along:

I want to bring up phenomenology, in part because of the vague interest in intellectual masturbation over armchair philosophy--with all of the negative connotations of those words brought up on purpose for the purpose of some self-indictment here--but also to get into some self-rumination as to the meaning of 'boredom' and the different takes based on these philosophies that one can come to.

Coming at existentialism via differentiating it from the idea of a Cartesian split I find to be an interesting and fruitful starting point--although, supposedly, it is inherently wrong in some sense (insofar as I gather that Sartre was a Cartesian (as are all good Frenchmen), but, to be honest with you, I'm not an expert in this stuff, I'm a random douchebag on the internet--take what you're reading here with a grain of salt).  In the Cartesian point of view, there is a mind-body problem--the mind and body as separate, with the body symbolizing the external world.  Whereas, I think the key evidence from our own lives that indicates that there is something wrong with this is, for example, the experience of 'spacing out'.  I suppose the Cartesian would explain the lapse in consciousness via some sort of Maxwellian Demon, but we can trace back our having existed in some sense.  The lapse of thought not necessarily being indicting of the lapse of being, and that therefore existence is prior to being as opposed to the alternative.  This is what I think is primary evidence--or at least heuristic justification, for the support of existentialism.

Now, with this idea, I'd like to bring up some ideas regarding Husserl and phenomenology.  Likewise, for those who like to follow along with where most of my thoughts have come from:

I'd like to recall the idea of bracketing, or phenomenological reduction, that instead of asking about whether an object exists or not, we at the very least accept that it is an object of our consciousness, and treat it as such and explain the object as such.

This, is the introduction to which I would like to treat the question of boredom.  As an object of consciousness.  What is boredom insofar as an object of our experience, and how do we _experience_ it?  That would be the phenomological reduction of the problem, I believe.  Whereas, if I were to treat it in a more empirical sense, as I suppose might be further possible in a Cartesian framework (although technically in both), I could ask what are the physiological influences _of_ boredom?

And, with this introduction, this is how I hope to explore boredom in the next two posts:  as an object of consciousness, and as an object of external reality.

The Pedagogical Nature of Constructivism

Errett Bishop is said to have 'gone religious'.  Referring not to some act of theosophy, but rather to him becoming an intuitionist.  One of the interesting features of the intuitionists is the rejection of the law of excluded middle (and of the axiom of choice, which Bishop himself rejected that he rejected that, but insofar as I've seen it in practice, he never uses it and shies away from it).  The philosophical ramifications of accepting such a position are interesting, although, for various reasons that I won't go into here I find wrong.  Yet, more importantly, I still appreciate this school of thought--not for the philosophical import, but rather for their pedagogical import.

That is, a theory that is devoid of proofs of contradictions, tend to make a more cogent theory that is easier to understand, and easier to see how the theory is fully developed and why certain theorems/etc. are needed.  As opposed to the shorter lickety-split proofs that provide quick answers, yet, in my opinion, lacking insight.

Low Cee Intro

Sorry for the lack of posts from me lately. Luckily Feppy has been carrying the blog pretty well.
Small updates on what's going on.
Been getting to know this girl from church and everything seems to be going well. I'm always nervous I'm going to ruin everything and make things awkward. But that's just who I am.
She's really cute and attends church regularly. As it turns out those are two very big pluses for me.
The downside is that I think she's a bit of a party-er. For most people that wouldn't really be a problem but it is for me. I know it sounds really picky but I've always dreamed of having a straight edge girlfriend.
We aren't going out but I'm hoping it eventually leads to it. I'd love to be able to cuddle up next to her and watch a movie. OH GOD THERE'S THE HOPELESS ROMANTIC TUWIND.
We'll see where it goes but I'm actually kind of scared of it. If we do go out we'll be watched like a hawk at church and if we break up I'll be the asshole who broke up with the girl at church.
THESE ARE ACTUAL THINGS I WORRY ABOUT.
And there's the part of me that thinks I'm going to be a part of the biggest friendzoning in the history of relationships. I can handle it but I won't be happy about it. I'll start listening to all my old emo music. THANKS ZEHOS.
And Zehos, I'm sure you'll never read this but I want to say thank you. You saved me in high school. If it wasn't for the Silverstein cd's I probably would have lost my fucking mind. (LOL AS IF I DIDN'T ANYWAYS, AMIRITE?) But really, you did a lot more than you think.
THAT'S ALL FOR NOW FOLKS.
I HOPE YOU HAVE CHAMPAGNE WISHES AND CAVIAR DREAMS.

Musical Progress

Something I often hear, typically from older generations, but now even from people my own age, is how 'modern music' and 'this stuff these kids are listening to now-a-days'...to put it politely, sucks.  And, you know, I would like to make a counterargument to this, even though I don't like some of this music much more than Simon and Garfunkel.  I think, even with rap music, there is evidence of musical progress; and it doesn't really suck all that much.

First, before I present some actual arguments, I'd like to point out what I think are the biases prevalent before us (content warning, some mild nudity and, of course, lots of cussing):

I think, somewhat obviously, we have an inflated view of our own preferences and our own past.  And, honestly, I think this is what is going on when people say 'music these days sucks'.  True, you'll have the gangsta rappers doing there rendition of (yet another content warning, excessive cussing):

Among other songs very similar.  But hey, remember this guy?

My point isn't that Helter Skelter was a worse song, but rather that every harvest has some bad apples Moreover, to be honest, the discussion of absurd content or 'moral quality' is really a red herring.  I feel I should note that the moral quality or the strong content of a song is not necessarily linked with the aesthetic quality of a song.  To give an example, my father has a copy of Picasso's Blue Guitarist:

It's kept, hidden away, in the back of his garage.  I asked him why he keeps a Picasso, even though it may not be original, stuffed in the back of his garage.  And he replied, "Look at it."  And, when I look at this painting, I can see why you might not want to have it hanging in the middle of your living room for you to look at every day.  Now, does the fact that we don't want to look at it indicative that the painting is a bad painting?  I would argue for quite the opposite.  Since, in order to have that profound of an emotional reaction is indicative of some high quality artwork.

Another example (content warning):

Click here to go to the painting Saturn Devouring His Son

This is a very classical painting.  It is also one of the most grotesque paintings I've ever seen and I can't stand to look at it.  To me, that's indicative of high quality artwork, even though I personally hate the painting.

With that said, another one of my points to put alongside the fact that we have biases to what we have accumulated experiences to, is that modern music--by nature of its modernity--will strike at themes overtly which making older generations uncomfortable.  My point, however, is that there should be a 'Hume's Guillotine of aesthetics,' if you will.


Now, that I've gone over some common logical fallacies and preconceptions I feel I've faced in hearing such arguments, allow me to give at least one actual argument (which, as usual, is the smallest part of my post).  And, like any good discussion, I'll quote Chomsky (this one actually is SFW):

(the full interview is fascinating, but I post this segment here regarding the cognitive development and argument for progression in music)

My argument that there is progression in music is basically lifted and copied directly from Chomsky in the above video.  The brain has this unique ability of a musical apparatus, the brain cerebrates at a high level when using this apparatus, and moreover, we can communicate various emotional intonations to others using it.  The notion of communication is key, and just like how communication of ideas begets intellectual progress.  I would posit the same for music.

As some evidence of this claim, I would suggest the reader to go back and start listening to a bunch of classical music; and, I hope you'll find (as I certainly did) how:

-Many of these same themes encountered in classical music--the counterpoint, matching harmonies, or even directly copied passages (the modern remix of Beethoven's Fifth comes to mind)--comes up in later music.
--This, of course, isn't simply limited to classical music.  The jazz of the 1920's can be traced back to the Creole music of New Orleans prior to that.
-How often this music is directly used in canon.

As an example of the later point, I'd like to point out the following piece (SFW):

I am convinced you've actually heard this piece before.  This is a very common piece to hear in a movie, usually when the protaganist is whistful and there's snow falling.

To back this up, I'll end with the following, listen to the background at 2:25:45 :

The evidence of the use of old themes, and the continual progression and building that we do upon them is ever present if we choose to notice it.

Applying

There are a lot of ideas I have that I'd like to do.

If I could just remember to apply them.

For example, I want a commonplace book.  The modern equivalent of this is a personal wiki.  Which I have, but I do not update as much as I want to or plan.  Mainly because I realize after the fact how something could have been incorporated into that framework, instead of how I originally did it.  I suppose, keeping with the example of the personal wiki, sometimes the idea I have is a good idea to apply, but in practice hard to apply.  The biggest case I have with this is any idea I have combined with the effort of traveling (which I mentioned previously).

I suppose the biggest example almost anyone I've talked to has, is that they have plenty of good ideas about how to stay healthy--that work buggerall if you're traveling (again, I mentioned this last time).  Likewise, I'd like to update my personal wiki all the time, but the amount of times in the day I honestly have access to it is stifling.

....

Perhaps my problem is not that I forgot to apply, but that the means to apply are more scarce than I realize?

This is a somewhat lengthy way of saying, "Updating things like my personal wiki seem to be incredibly useful, and they aren't hard work and are somewhat enjoyable, so why are these things never done and what can be done about it?"  Keeping in mind, the previous framework that I've developed over the last series of posts.

The Problems of Portability and Traveling

A small complaint.
I would like the ability to do a lot of things that I do on the go (90% of the time this is "On the bus" or something similar).

The best way I have of doing this so far is a little "Hipster PDA" of sorts in my back pocket.  However, as I've mentioned in "Idea Capture Upkeep", I have problems with this.  That, and, I'd like to keep a more permanent long-term journal or something similar.  For example, if I want to flesh out a post while writing "on the go", I inevitably have this 'transfer phase' that makes the upkeep somewhat irritating; i.e., if I succeed in getting myself to use the "Hipster PDA" for everything, I would still have extra upkeep (and thus extra problems in a behaviorist sense) by way of transferring this to a computer.  Most handheld computers, however, don't have functional inputs, or have this problem (for me) of portable internet access that comes with the device.

This gets to a more general point, which is that often when we are shifted out of our normal environment temporarily, we lose a lot of our previous reinforcement chains, which causes a load of new positive habits or negative habits to form.  The classic stereotypical example of this is someone gaining weight over a vacation.  But it can also occur that someone suddenly isn't an alcoholic anymore when they're forced to move.  Or, there were quite a lot of mathematicians that became amazingly reinvigorated when they moved (like when Sylvester moved to the U.S., and again when he moved back to Britain).

Idea Capture Upkeep

I have a "Hipster PDA", it is a wonderful idea and suits me fairly well.  I am horrible at organizing and upkeeping it though, and in what follows, I'm going to complain about a fairly simplistic phenomenon in a part to beg for some simple solutions, as I hope some of the previous posts gives some indications to how my mind ticks; and hopefully they make sense.

I tend to have the following system:

-One card dedicated to logs.
-One card dedicated to random thoughts.
-One card generated to ideas for conversations I want to propose to various people/e-mails I want to send/things I would like to do on the internet in bulk.
-One card for schedule appointments

I think I have two basic problems:

-Optimal transferring
-Access

Optimal transferring refers to the fact that I, annoying, have to double up on how I update the device.  I.e., I tend to like to keep a running log total on my computer.  This requires me having to go through the Hipster PDA and manually input the data.  This isn't long, but it's sometimes annoying.

And it somewhat adds up.

Because I have to do the same for the e-mail ideas, the random thoughts, the appointments, etc..  Eventually, I sit until one of my cards is full, and then the thing turns into a device that seems more appropriate for Columbo (or, at least, looks like a version of George Costanza's wallet) than a nifty organizational device.

I'm not exactly sure how to solve this problem either.....

Cognitive-Behavioral-Needs Model

The following are some personal thoughts on what I consider to be (FWIW) all the important elements of needs/physiological/behavioral/cognitive models into one giant stew and point out the neuroscientific underpinnings.

A lot of these are based on various studies that you can find in references that the references link to (that was not a typo, I meant to say references twice like that), you can look at the references at the bottom of this post, and there are a few that I highly recommend and might do later posts on.  I would ideally like to make a thymological framework based on methodology of performative contradictions; however, baring that, I can accept one step down in the methodological ladder (the fairly widely acceptable empirical approach (yes, this brings up a whole other can of worms about the base methodology I work under, which I won't get into here)).  Regardless, I still view this as a sort of personal thymology (hopefully, the previous post set down some background for what thymology is).

EITHER WAY, ENJOY.

Introduction

My major claim is that all problems of self-control are problems of emotional regulation.  By treating issues of akrasia as a contradiction in emotional state to a goal to its intellectual desirability, we can hopefully use emotional regulation techniques to balance this out.

THE COGNITIVE OUTER LAYER

The cognitive thymological model for self-control is expounded in pretty much the same format in every book I've read on the subject [1] [2] [3] [17] [21]:

*Situational Selection/Modification
*Attentional Redeployment
*Cognitive Reappraisal
*Response Modulation

The model is not completely arbitrary, but is a set of definitions to techniques dependent on what time in the emotional state one is present in.  I.e.:

Before emotional state-Situational Selection/Modification
At Recognition of emotional state-Attentional Redeployment
During emotional state-Cognitive Reappraisal
After emotional state-Response Modulation

We will go into each part in detail and discuss the neuroscientific bases involved.


Situational Selection/Modification

This is a technique that takes place before an emotion takes place.  You know beforehand through various experience or thought or information garnered through the final stage (Response Modulation) about what are your emotional triggers, and wish to get around them beforehand.  Furthermore, beforehand, we can either decrease the cognitive strength of emotions, or increase our aptitude to handle strong emotions.  The former requires manipulation of the limbic system (as this is where emotional states are derived from), and the latter requires manipulation of other physiological factors that increase our cognitive capacity.  As such, the techniques deployed here are either based in:

1-Limbic system manipulation
2-Physiological manipulation

We go into each one in detail.

Limbic System Manipulation

We first describe what the limbic system is, how it influences emotions, techniques for manipulation, and finally give some examples.

Neuroscience 101:  A short outline of the Limbic system

A lot of the things here is just for general knowledge's sake.  And over part of my interest in seeing the evolutionary connection between the brain and the triune model.  The key idea for the purposes of this write-up is that the limbic system is the classic behaviorist part of the brain.  It regulates the reward/punishment connection of Premack's Principle (high frequency behavior reinforce low-frequency behaviors) to the behaviorist model of the brain.  Various parts of the limbic system relate to the four F's (fear, flight, fight, and...fuck) and release various neurotransmitters (dopamine, norepinephrine, seratonin, etc.) that regulate whether a behavior should be positively or negatively reinforced and this information is appropriately stored.

With that said, if you're still curious about some neuroscience, here are some major parts of the limbic system and what they do:

*Amygdala-Controls Fear
*Hippocampus-Creates New Memories
*Thalamus-Processes pain
*Ventral Tegmental Area (VTA)-Controls manufacture of dopamine
*Nucleus Accumbens (NA)-Controls release of dopamine.
*Insula-Controls the bodies reaction to emotion (heart rate, breathing, etc.)

And, also, as a refresher, the following is a description of various neurotransmitters; and their role in behavior function:

*Dopamine-Reward, Cognition, Endocrine (positive stimulus more or less)
*Noradrenaline-Fight/Flight (negative stimulus more or less)
*Seratonin-Mood, Satiety
*Gabba/Glutamate-inhibitory/excitatory
*Cholinergic-Learning, Short-term memory, arousal, reward

Something that's probably relevant to you-the limbic system, on its own, does nothing.  The entire goal of the limbic system is to eventually manipulate hypothalamic function (hormone/endocrine (seratonin/dopamine (i.e., creation of reward pathways)) secretion).  E.g., if hormonal control is out of whack, then what manipulation occurs with the limbic system is neglible.

[4] [5] [6] [17] [21]

Limbic System Manipulation:  Behaviorism

Given that the limbic system relies on a carrot/stick paradigm, a behaviorist approach is one that follows in this paradigm.  The idea is that by providing a schedule of presenting or removing positive or negative stimuli after a behavior (called reinforcement), one can create a schedule of reinforcement that induces certain emotional reaction (or at least mitigates or lessens these reactions) for certain behaviors.

Because of the long-term consequences of various types of reinforcement, it is helpful to set up some definitions for the various kinds of reinforcement:

*Positive Reinforcement-Presentation of a positive stimulus.
*Negative Reinforcement-Removal of a negative stimulus.
*Positive Punishment-Removal of a positive stimulus.
*Negative Punishment-Presentation of a negative stimulus.

The use of punishment has been noted by Skinner, Fester, et. al. to have various problems:

* Leaves behind strong emotional precursors, such as anxiety, which lead to excessive avoidance patterns.
* Only represses the behavior.  Does not eliminate it.
* Can have unmitigated tertiary effects by providing negative reinforcement to unintended behaviors.

However, most importantly are the long-term consequences, namely, using punishment to avoid occurrence of a behavior can not last in the long-run for the following reasoning.  Any self-inflicted punitive behavior needs to either (indeed, any behavior, should it hope to continue to occur):

-Be initially motivated (either by a previous sequence of reinforcement, or through sufficient volition and other means of motivation).
-Reinforce itself

The second is a contradiction.  If a punitive consequence were positively reinforcing itself, it would not be punitive.

As such, a self-inflicted punitive behavior needs to be initially motivated.  This, I claim, is what initially substantiates self-punitive behavior to work.  However, as the punishment is continued, because of the previous paragraph, the initial motivation is continually countered by a progressive sequence of punishing consequences.  I.e., the initial motivation is self-punished enough until it no longer exists.  At which point the self-punishing behavior no longer takes place, whereupon old behaviors are established up until the point where initial motivation is restored, and the cycle continues again.

A final useful concept are some definitions relating to various reinforcement schedules, i.e., at patterns determining how reinforcement should be meted out.  This distinction is useful in designing highly reinforcing schemes with minimal effort:

*Interval Schedule-Reinforcement is meted out on a routine schedule (every so many minutes of behavior, reinforcement is provided)
*Ratio Schedule-Reinforcement is meted out per occurrence of behavior (every so many times a behavior occurs, reinforcement is provided)
*Fixed Schedule-Reinforcement is provided on a linear schedule (_every_ X minutes or X times)
*Variable Schedule-Reinforcement is provided on a stochastic schedule (every X minutes or X times there is a Y% chance)

Although both interval and ratio schedule do as intended, interval schedules tend to provide better long-term behavior.  Since in providing ratio schedules, immediately after the occurrence of a behavior there is low probability the behavior will occur again.  Whereas this does not occur as markedly in interval schedules.  To put into common parlance--interval schedules reward the journey whereas ratio schedules reward the product.

Variable schedules also tend to reinforce behavior much more efficiently than fixed schedules.  This is the principle behind casinos, and the rationale is essentially the same as interval v. ratio schedules.  On a fixed schedule of reinforcement, procrastination tends to be rewarded (i.e., waiting until just before the deadline before doing all of the work), whereas this behavior is fairly dangerous in a variable schedule.

Finally, to create an optimal schedule of reinforcement, the alloted ratios or intervals should not remain fixed; but should rather be increased slowly over time (or decreased slowly over time if you are trying to overcome an addictive behavior) to avoid extinction bursts.

In this way, many psychological 'needs' can be viewed as a historical reference to some ingrained reinforcement schedule.

[7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12] [31]

Specific Behaviorist Techniques

As per the previous section, all behaviorist techniques essentially amount to either positive reinforcement, negative reinforcement, or punishment.

Even though this is the case, there are still techniques that are general enough to not be immediately recognizable as one of these three, nor as specific examples.

As such, we immediately follow with some examples after each technique.

Positive Reinforcement Techniques

Bundling Reinforcement

This is basically the "Mary Poppins" technique:  a little bit of sugar helps the medicine go down.  One associates others positively reinforcing things with the desired behavior by making them run concurrently.

*Basic Bundling-Taking a positively reinforcing stimuli and placing it in the background of a task or behavior.
*Feedback-Displaying encouraging feedback upon completing behavior.
*Gamifying-Basic Bundling of a task with game mechanics.

Some aspects of game mechanics include a meaning/autonomy/purpose dichotomy, but explain why these are reinforcing in a behaviorist viewpoints.  The following are tips to enhancing these and providing a behaviorist explanation of games.

Features that provide Meaning
-Customizable goals:    tap into personal goals, things that already have positive reinforcement
-Status/Community Updates:  tap into social positive reinforcement
-Story:  create positive reinforcement by tapping into something else that already provides positive reinforcement by means of a narrative/poetic idea.  C.f. LiteratureReinforcement
Definition of Meaning in the context of positive reinforcement:  reinforcers that are created by virtue of connecting with other things that are intrinsically motivating.

Features that provide Mastery
-Rule impositions:  golf is made interesting by using a stick and having all these strange rules.  It wouldn't be that interesting if it were just about picking up a ball, walking over, and placing it in a hole (inb4 you tell me that this is basketball).
-Goal scaffolding/paced/varied:  the goals placed on a user should be staggered and balanced.
-Provide feedback.  (be wary of punishment in feedback!)
Definition of Mastery in the context of positive reinforcement:  the aspect of influencing the quality of the positive reinforcement by optimizing the reinforcement schedule (e.g., choosing variable ratio schedules)

Features that provide Autonomy
-Eliminate extrinsic rewards:  extrinsic rewards diminish autonomy/meaning.
-Unexpected awards
Definition of Autonomy in the context of positive reinforcement:  the degree to which something is a positive reinforcement v. positive punishment.

Furthermore, these things determine the quality of positive reinforcement directly in the game.  The aspects of points/badges/leaderboards that are found in many games are simply aspects of token economies from a behaviorist perspective.

[13]

*Metering-The classic modus operandi of positive reinforcement.  Allowing treats after behavior.

Examples

One example of each appropriately:
*Playing music while running/working.
*Using logs that are designed like EXP bars--they only increase upon behavior.
*Chore wars.
*Breaks are a classic form of positive reinforcement.  It may be frustrating to stop work, but in the long run it induces motivation to the task.

Covert Reinforcement

Covert reinforcement entails providing positive reinforcement by imagining the contigent scenario and subsequent positive reinforcement.

[14]

Examples

*Some Literature Reinforcement is coincidental with this technique.  E.g., making imaginative literature than entails such a covert reinforcement schema.
*Another example (that is currently being tested), is creating a MUSH environment to provide the covert reinforcement within.  This then connects covert reinforcement with aspects of Gamification Reinforcement.

Delaying Reinforcement

If one is trying to stop a certain behavior that has naturally occurring positive reinforcement that can be delayed, there is great benefit in doing so.  By delaying the positive reinforcement received by a behavior, one induces hyperbolic discounting, thus reducing the net effect of positive reinforcement the behavior metes out.  If the positive reinforcement can be delayed until the behavior ends, then one is reinforcing stopping that behavior and continuing whichever behavior immediately follows doing so.

Examples

*In response to internet addiction, offload everything that is positively reinforcing (download it to a USB stick):  e-mails, pages that I wanted to look at, etc..  Then instead of looking at it in the computer lab, only look at it once leaving.  I.e., positively reinforce leaving the lab (to look at what goods have been obtained).

Literature Reinforcement

Using aspects of literature or art to make a behavior more positively reinforcing.

Examples

* This can be as simple as trying to make poetry of what one is doing.  Literally or in a figurative/existentialist sense.
* 'Cultivating an aesthetic appreciation of the subject'.  I.e., by realizing the mimetic qualities of the subject at hand, one induces the mimetic factor of artistic appreciation in the subject at hand.
* * Make analogies
* * Recognize applications
* Make propaganda

Social Reinforcement

Social reinforcement entails providing positive reinforcement by incorporating (bundling) a social aspect into a desired behavior.

Examples

* A classic example of social reinforcement is the study group, which is also fairly self-explanatory.
* Another example is Rothbard's salon-like atmosphere, or many of the teahouses of Europe during the enlightenment.
* * Or the Vienna Circle.
* (Really, though, these are all variations of more 'socially acceptable' (ironically) versions of the study group.)

[28] [29] [30]

Negative Reinforcement Techniques

Creating Negative Reinforcement Contingencies

Setting into place some other contigency that automatically induces an aversive stimulus in the environment until a behavior is stopped.

Examples

*A major technique is schedule blocking--when one uses another important item in their daily schedule to use as a barrier.  (this is negative reinforcement because one is extremely anxious and uneasy (especially as the date nears) up until the behavior is stopped so the normal schedule can continue)
**You need to use the internet to check your e-mail, and you have class at 10:30.  So, you check your e-mail at 10:20, thereby necessitating that you'll only be on the internet for 10 minutes at most.
**By creating and maintaining a daily routine, you'll have more 'points' at which to schedule block.  E.g., if you've taken the bus at 17:30 every day for more than a year, then netting at 17:15 would probably be another ideal point to use schedule blocking.
**You can use other people's schedules to schedule block with.  E.g., use empty classrooms before classes begin.
*Eat foods that stick to your teeth for breakfast so you want to floss your teeth.

Reducing Negative Stimuli

Reducing the amount of negative stimulus inherent in a task to make it more likely that a behavior will occur.  This comes in two forms:

-Delaying the negative stimuli by delineating a number of steps needed to be done in an aversive behavior over time.  Breaking something into small manageable portions of negative stimuli.
-Removing the negative stimuli entirely.

Examples

*Chunking tasks.  Instead of looking at a paper as "Write a 10 page paper".  Look at it as "Write an outline", and delay the negative stimuli of the thought of the rest of the task until that is completed.  Then work on the next step, and the next step, and...
*Create routines.  By subitizing a common routine and making something a non-thinking habit, one reduces the cognitive load and negative stimuli associated with it.
*Making Memoranda and situational cues to reduce cognitive load (a negative stimulus) even further. [27]

Punishment Techniques

One-time Environmental Modification

Technically, abstention is punishment based technique.  However, as in the reasoning above, the major issue is continued adherence to a punitive standard.  Thus, if there is a one-time change that can be somewhat permanent, then the problem of long-run acedia can be mitigated.  Therefore, performing one-time environmental modifications could potentially work in the long-run.

Examples

*Removing internet from house.
*Removing chocolate cake from fridge.

[7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12] [31]

Physiological Manipulation

We first describe some components of the brain that lay on top of the limbic system (quite literally--as they are a distinct components of the brain evolved after the creation of the limbic system and are found in primates (humans) and dolphins (if you are curious, McClean's Triune model of the brain.  The stem came first and is pretty much the same and is visible in all vertebrates (controlling movement, reptile brain; brain stem, hypothalamus, pituitary), next comes the limbic system literally on top of this (controlling emotion), and (I don't think this vocabulary is standard at all, but this will be between you and me) we will call this the 'cognitive layer'.  I.e., the collection of brain components that outer-regulate limbic system behavior.  We then describe what sort of things affect the processing of these components, then give some specific theoretical techniques, and again end with some examples.

Neuroscience 101:  A short outline of the Cognitive Layer

Again, this is mostly here for knowledge's sake.  The key thing to take away is that the cognitive layer lays on top of the emotional limbic system, and is concerned with long-term planning and emotional regulation.  Moreover, this cognitive layer is not a behavioral system and includes complexities (like, in the cortex proper, language) that behaviorism does not fully explain (i.e., behaviorism explains a proper subset of activities from the brain) ([26]).  Two such key areas of the brain to consider are:

*Pre-Frontal Cortex (PFC)-Deals with planning, processing consequences, executive function.
*Anterior Cingulate Cortex (ACC)-Deals with focus, attention, and emotional awareness.

[4] [5] [17] [21]

What's particularly important about this information, is its limited nature.  Because the brain tries to be efficient with its use of metabolic resources, there is a limited amount of energy at the disposal of the PFC and ACC; this determines a limited nature in willpower.

[17] [25]

Specific Physiological Techniques

Taking care of specific physiological necessities, by the previous, really serves as means of optimizing the functioning of the cortex.

Exercises

"What's good for the heart is good for the mind".  In general, the name of the game is improving blood flow.  This helps to make sure the brain gets the nutrients necessary.  That really is it.  So long as your heart pumps efficiently and you don't have any weight-related health problems and engage in mild caloric restriction you should be in the clear.

Thus, aerobic exercise can reverse executive function and cognition loss.  Aerobic exercise.  Aerobic mfing exercise.  Lifting weights does not help ([16] in particular).  20 minutes over the course of the day, 3 days a week, is all that's needed.  If you don't exercise for even as little as 6 days, the cognitive benefits immediately reverse themselves

[15] [16]

Also, simply practicing focus significantly trains the ACC and the mounting evidence at least pointing to this is kind of hard to ignore.

[17] [18] [19] [32]

Sleep

The rule of thumb '1 hour of lost sleep=2 hours of lost productivity' seems to be backed up.  In general, get _more_ than enough.  I have not seen much research of very negative effects from getting too _much_ sleep.  Insomnia is defined very loosely as simply 'waking up tired', and the cognitive effects of it are pretty severe.

[15]

Nutrition

All I know of is stuff from the book "Think Smart"; e.g.:

*Leafy vegies
*Anti-oxidant
*Trans fats are bad.
*Omega-3s/farmed fish/walnuts

[15] [16]

Examples

Aside from following the general advice above, one additional idea is the following:

Blood-flow Boost

Once every hour or so, try to move around, do a small set of exercises.  Not running around the block, just like 10 squats or something.  The point is to get your heart-rate up for a little bit.  By doing so, this increases blood-flow in the short-term, which increases blood-flow to the brain, and in particular to the PFC and ACC.  This can ensure continued emotional control.

Practice Focus

Every day, for just a few minutes, try to clear every other thought (EVERY other thought) and only focus on one thing.  When you get interrupted, return the focus to whatever you are practicing focus on.

This helps to build up the potential of the PFC and ACC.

[17] [18] [19] [32]

Attentional Redeployment

This is the technique itself.  Namely, upon immediately noticing an unwanted emotional state distract yourself.  Try to use the ACC to overpower the limbic system.  Throw your attention elsewhere.  I know of two techniques directly to do this:

*Use the focus exercise described in the previous section, and try to continue it until the emotional state is weakened or has passed.
*Always keep a large list of things you can switch to at hand (emphasis on the word _large_). (There is an expected value argument that one could give here.  Simply speaking, if each task present a 1% chance that you'll do it, then if you keep around enough tasks...)

[1] [2] [3] [17] [21]

Cognitive Reappraisal

This is a very tricky technique and comes in various forms depending on the emotion at hand.  Moreover, they are best applied during the throes of a particular emotional state.  However, they are all mainly psychotherapeutic, rely completely on the cognitive layer (although there are some behavioral techniques in here; namely using covert stimuli and the non-punishing authority can be interpreted as part behaviorist/part cognitive based techniques), and rely on Marcus Aerilius' Dictum "The pain is not due to the thing itself, but to your estimate of it." [20]  During an emotional state, try to identify the cause and reappraise it to reduce or eliminate the emotional influence.  For example, if you are are anxious because you think someone was ignoring you at a social event, simply finding out that the individual had a lame eye that night (just as an example), could allow you to reappraise the event as 'He wasn't ignoring me--he simply just didn't see me'.

At the moment, I'm still working on some organizing framework here, so the following is just a haphazard list of techniques.

Non-Punishing Authority

By consistently having a person or covert entity act as a nonpunishing audience, patterns of negative reinforcement can be broken down to reduce anxiety in a given situation.  It can also be viewed as a reappraisal--viewing an alternate individual as an authority--as opposed to the individual likely to be causing the anxiety.

Block-quotation from Skinner:

"There is a second stage in the therapeutic process. The appearance of previously punished behavior in the presence of a nonpunishing audience makes possible the extinction of some of the effects of punishment. This is the principal result of such therapy. Stimuli which are automatically generated by the patient's own behavior become less and less aversive and less and less likely to generate emotional reactions. The patient feels less wrong, less guilty, or less sinful. As a direct consequence he is less likely to exhibit the various forms of operant behavior which, as we have seen, provide escape from such self-generated stimulation."

[11]

Covert Stimuli

This involves using covert reinforcement in the act to try and directly manipulate reinforcement states that may be activating the given emotional complex.

Montaignes

This works primarily for embarrassment when dealing with your own embarrassing memories of life, remember the embarrassing details of life that other have lived through.  (one that I particularly like is this young 17 year old snowboarder for the U.S. at the Olympics--she lost the gold medal because she tried to show off by doing a trying to do a trick on her last jump; she fell flat on her face on national television and her mistake was broadcasted on mainstream news networks everywhere the next day...it's really hard to beat that level of embarrassment.)

Senecans

This works primarily for anxiety.  By envisioning the worst possible outcome of an event inducing anxiety, and creating a contigency for it, one helps mitigate the original reason for the anxiety.

REBT

(side-note:  I am dubious of this one, which I will follow up with another post about hopefully)

REBT acts under the following model:

Situation(A)-> Automatic thought->Emotion/Reaction (C)

Where the Automatic Thought is derived from Core Belief->Intermediate Belief(B)->Automatic thought

Where:

A-Activating Event
*There is an extual event A and implied event A.
B-Belief
*Most beliefs are flexibile.
*There is an underlying assumption that most beliefs are not of the extreme variety.  I.e., some form of 'must' suggested as:
**'Awfulising'
***'This is _absolutely_ terrible.'
**Low frustration tolerance
***'This _will_ cause frustration'/'This _isn't_ worth it'
**Depreciation
***Part-whole fallacy, 'I _will_ be a complete failure because of aspect X'.
C-Consequences
*What happens due to B.

Solutions: (using the example above where you are upset over someone ignoring you)
-Change implication in A. (he just didn't notice me, he didn't ignore me)
-Change B with rationalization. (he doesn't have an obligation to talk to me all the time)
-Change to more constructive C. (maybe I should talk to him about it instead of moping about)

[22] [23] [24]

Socratic Questioning

Use socratic questioning as an introspective tool to uncover and induce some form of cognitive reappraisal of the events that led to your emotional state.  (dubious)

Pros/Cons List/Labeling

Simply labeling and listing out the details (like pros/cons) of a situation has an incredible cognitive effect (even simply saying to oneself "I am upset", helps).  It may not eliminate the emotional state, but it does help reduce it.

[17] [23]

Response Modulation

This can be thought of as a meta-cognitive reappraisal (after emotion has died down).  The goal is to create long-term plans for when the situation occurs again, gather info to help enhance previous stages.  For example:

*The situational selection/modification stage
**Alter reinforcement schedules appropriately
*Attentional Redeployment
**Practicing focus can help the attentional redeployment stage
*Cognitive Reappraisal
**Pre-creating Senecans (make a plan in advance for the worst likely outcome of things that commonly give you anxiety, thereby mitigating a large source of the anxiety) helps for cognitive reappraisal.

[1] [2] [3] [21]

Conclusion/tl;dr

*Situational Selection/Modification
**Limbic Manipulation
***Positive Reinforcement
****Basic Bundling-Taking a positively reinforcing stimuli and placing it in the background of a task or behavior.
****Feedback-Displaying encouraging feedback upon completing behavior.
****Gamifying-Basic Bundling of a task with game mechanics.
****Metering-The classic modus operandi of positive reinforcement.  Allowing treats after behavior.
****Covert Reinforcement
****Delaying Reinforcement
****Literature Reinforcement
****Social Reinforcement
***Negative Reinforcement
****Creating Negative Reinforcement Contingencies
****Reducing Negative Stimuli
***Punishment
****One-time Environmental Modification
**Physiological Manipulation
***Aerobic Exercise
***Leafy vegies
***Anti-oxidant
***Trans fats are bad.
***Omega-3s/farmed fish/walnuts
***Sleep more than enough
***Focus training
***Blood-flow boost
*Attentional Redeployment
**Focus training
**Switch tasks
*Cognitive Reappraisal
**Non-Punishing Authority
**Covert Stimuli
**Montaignes
**Senecans
**REBT
**Socratic Questioning
**Pros/Cons List/Labeling
*Response Modulation

=Questions/Tasks Remaining=

Here are some final questions I have, given all of the above:

-How much more or less effective are the physiological techniques as compared to any of the other techniques?
-How reasonable is the research of practicing focus?  Is it really worthwhile?
-Do we have a reasonably fixed cognitive capacity?
-What are the physiological effects of punishment, if any?
-Can abstention be viewed as one-time punishment?
-Does one-time punishment still have negative effects--enough to preclude avoiding using such methods?
-How can the Cognitive Reappraisal stage be better organized?
-How can these habits be better committed to memory?
-What is the overall effectiveness of...any of this?

References

[1] "Handbook of Emotion Regulation"
[2] "The Rational Emotive Behavior Approach to Therapeutic Change" by Dryden and Neenan
[3] "Cognitive Therapy Basics and Beyond" by Beck
[4] Sapinsky's Neuroscience Stanford Opencourseware Lecture 14, "Limbic System" (highly recommended)
[5] Wikibook on Neuroscience
[6] "The Neurobiology of Motivation and Reward"
[7] "Changing Human Behavior"
[8] "On the Self-Regulation of Behavior"
[9] "Handbook of Mental Control"
[10] "Intrinsic Motivation"
[11] "Science and Human Behavior" by B.F. Skinner
[12] "Behavioral self-control" by Thoresen (highly recommended)
[13] Deterding's Google Talk
[14] Any research done by Cautela
[15] "Think Smart" (highly recommended (this one grew on me))
[16] "Brain Rules" by John Medina
[17] "Your Brain at Work" Google Tech Talk by David Rock (highly recommended)
[18] "Transform Your Mind, Change Your Brain" (recommended, a nice compendium of information about practicing focus)
[19] Sam Harris
[20] "Meditations" by Marcus Aerilius (about the only interesting thing I found in there)
[21] "Neuroscience of Emotions" Google Tech Talk by Philippe Gordon (highly recommended)
[22] "The Rational Emotive Behavior Approach to Therapeutic Change" by Dryden and Neenan
[23] "Cognitive Therapy Basics and Beyond" by Beck (recommended)
[24] "Three Minute Therapy"
[25] "Procrastination" http://youarenotsosmart.com/2010/10/27/procrastination/
[26] "On Chomsky's Review of Skinner's 'Verbal Behavior'" by Kenneth MacCorquodale
[27] "Enjoy Old Age" by B.F. Skinner
[28] "How They Succeeded" by Orison Swett Marden (highly recommended)
[29] "Men of Mathematics" by E.T. Bell
[30] "My Years with Mises" by Margit von Mises
[31] "Self-Regulation"
[32] "Way to Willpower" by Hazlitt (highly recommended)

Skinner, Behaviorism, and Me

Henry Hazlitt started off his book The Way to Willpower by boldly stating in the introduction, "There is no such thing as Willpower." However, I will mean it in a different sense than he did. My thesis is that Willpower is that you have an innately puny amount of willpower. So that, if you think you are doing something out of willpower, it is my thesis that you are doing it subconsciously out of clever self-manipulative tricks or clever cognitive rephrasing. To back up this claim, there is some research I'd like to bring up:
-Check out this Google talk:

The speaker talks about the incredible limitations our pre-frontal cortex have. And that, when the subconscious limbic triggers, we literally have seconds to respond.
-Check out this article on procrastination. Specifically, they give a nice summary of the classic marshmallow experiment which I will allude to later, but now I just want to focus on the fact brought up in the article that willpower qua willpower is not the issue.
-If the opposite of the claim is accepted (i.e., by way of contradiction), then this runs into logical contradictions. (the outline of this argument runs along the lines: If we had complete free will we would be able to control our own free will.)
-If the opposite of the claim is accepted, then this runs against a LOT of common experience out there. The vast number of AA chapters, rehab clinics, and cyclical diet phenomena seems to suggest that if this were apt to a "brute willpower" motivation, that if people have enough motivation to start these social groups and try these various things, that that kind of strategy would have worked. tl;dr, "brute willpower" is the DEFAULT strategy that pretty much everyone starts with doing, thus, this seems to indicate that something else is going on here.
-Third of all, it's kind of insulting. Some guy is and has been on and off trying to get off of alcohol for 20 years. And someone comes along and says, "Man up, just use your willpower dude." He has twenty years of experience to the contrary.  Perhaps people have different modes of willpower and we should respect that. Or perhaps there is a different thing going on here altogether that we should appreciate.
That's my evidence that willpower is not the way to beat procrastination.  That's my argument against "MAN UP", and I'd like to give an alternative approach.  It was, for the most part, discussed in my previous huge post on thymology, so this will be retreading some old ground found there.

What I find as the alternative, that has worked for me so far, is implementing the ideas of Behaviorists (which is a subset of all that I would suggest), which I will get to in....THE NEXT POST.

Thymology v. Psychology

I don't want to get into economics here, but rather psychology.  And as Rory Sutherland has pointed out, psychology and perspective is fairly important.  Furthermore, one of the things to ponder about is what _is_ psychology?  As opposed to the usual classification of psychology, there is another term called 'thymology' that might be useful (you're going to see "Mises" come up, I'm not going to go into his economics here, I just think the definitional distinction is useful; so if you hate Austrian Economics, hold onto your pants, I'm not going down that road), the following is the only solid written definition I've seen given by Bettina Bien Greaves:

'Psychology is concerned with the minds of men. It has two major meanings. The sciences of human action are not primarily concerned with the physiological meaning, sometimes known as natural or experimental psychology. Whenever Mises refers to psychology in economic studies, he has in mind what some call "literary psychology" and which he has called Thymology in Theory and History and The Ultimate Foundation of Economic Sciences. In this sense, psychology "is on the one hand an offshoot of introspection and on the other a precipitate of historical experience. It is what everybody learns from intercourse with his fellows. It is what a man knows about the way in which people value different conditions, about their wishes and desires and their plans to realize these wishes and desires. It is the knowledge of the social environment in which a man lives and acts."

It signifies the cognition of human ideas, emotions, volition, motivations and value judgments which are an indispensable faculty of everyone. It is the specific understanding of the past which gives men an insight into the minds of other men. Psychology, like economics, starts with the individual. It concerns the internal invisible and intangible events of the mind which determine man's value scales which result or can result in action. Economics begins at the point psychology leaves off."' [http://mises.org/easier/P.asp#61]

For the most part, when I talk about psychology here, I think of it as a thymological enterprise.

A Borderline Follow Up

Yesterday while hanging out with my friend and asked her a question that just popped into my head.
Am I a likeable person? It's really a set up question. I already knew the answer. Of course I am. I'm a chameleon. But this set up question number two: Am I too likeable? There's a part of me that thinks that I am too likeable. Or perhaps, too flirty? Or maybe people just give me too much of a chance to make them fall for me.
Don't get me wrong, I don't intend on having people fall for me but I think that I think if given time I can do it. That sounds horrible, but to be honest when you study people for so long you start to pick up on what they want to hear. This goes back to the chameleon thing. I think perhaps I try too hard for people to like me. That leads to me becoming too flirty and ultimately too likeable.
I know that there are people out there that would want to be more likeable but I worry that in my case I'm taking advantage of people. Not in a sexual or monetary way, but in an emotional way. I think I've gotten to the point where making friends is less about what we actually like but manipulating them into liking me.
Maybe I'm wrong and over think the idea of making friends but it seems like that's what I do. Maybe that's what everybody does to some extent and we just don't realize it. Take going to the bar for example. You don't go into a bar planning on just being yourself. You go in with the intention of having a good time and meeting a few nice ladies (or dudes if you're into that). I've only been to a bar a couple of times in my life because of my stance on alcohol, but in the short amount of time I've been in them that's what I noticed.
That's not how people are going to act on Monday morning. They're not going to be so outgoing and free about everything. That's before they've even begin drinking. They make this connection in their brain that that's a place of openness and that they can be anything they want. But what they want to be the most is liked, so they end up changing who they are. Or if they aren't that good at it they let the beer do it for them.
Now, I'm not sure that a lot of people would even notice their change in personality. In fact I don't think any of them do unless they do something wrong. Most alcoholics don't recognize the problem until something happens and it makes them stop and look back on their life. The same with people being a chameleon. It's not until we do something stupid or something we never thought we would do do we start to recognize what we're doing.
I'm not sure exactly when I realized that I was a chameleon but I have a few guesses. It's probably when I noticed that I was willing to do anything to make one person happy, even if that included smoking or spending all my money on them. I've gotten out of control before and it's gotten me into a lot of trouble. It's still a problem for me too. The problem is that when I realize that I'm doing it again it's already too late and I can't stop it. It's like watching myself being piloted by someone else and I'm just a passenger. It's scary sometimes how far I can let things go. Really scary.
Don't be a chameleon, be gecko. Those are the unique ones.

Boiling Water

Ugh, boiling.  Boiling water.  It took humanity so friggin' long to realize that simply boiling water solves so many health problems.

Chameleon Personality

Lately I've been wondering how I can get people to like me. Not in a "Man, I wish I had more friends" kind of way but more of a "How the hell do these people like me?" kind of way. I'll be perfectly honest, I wouldn't be my friend. I generally regard myself as kind of a tool. But I think I've finally figured it out.
I'm a chameleon.
I change my personality depending on who I'm with. Now, I'm not saying I'm hiding my true self from certain people. It's more like I'm compartmentalizing my personality. Certain parts come out during certain situations.
If I'm with my friends who like Magic, Doctor Who, Star Wars, etc. I'm more of a nerd around them. If I'm at church I'm more of a theologian. With a girl? Charming, flirty, and a small amount of asshole.
But there's always one thing that connects them: comedy. I like to pride myself on my God given talent to make people laugh. I think deep down that's what everyone wants, a friend who can make them laugh. And that's how I can get people to like me.
In the movie Beer League Artie Lange has line that helped me realize all this. "You know who gets laid less than funny fat guys? Serious fat guys, and I feel sorry for those assholes." While I don't focus so much on the "getting laid" part of the dialogue I do think he has a point. The nice guy is going to have more friends and in turn have more luck with the opposite sex. The serious guy will have friends too but they won't be able to connect with them. He's always serious, he never wants to joke around or open his mind to others ideas.
Take my friend, who we'll call Jared, for example. Jared just turned 23 and has never had a girlfriend or even a first kiss. He's the serious guy. Kind of. He'll make a joke but not right for the situation. He'll listen to other ideas, but only to disregard them immediately. He acts nice to a girl but then feels he's owed something for it. He doesn't get that you become friends with people to be their friends, not to just find a significant other. It's not an easy thing to accept but once you do it makes being friends a lot easier with people.
A few years ago he really liked this girl who he would smoke with once in a while and one day I came to visit and met her. I watched how he acted with her. He barely talked to her at all. They talked about a movie and that was the one conversation I saw in the two hours she was there. It was kind of weird. The next week he called me and said that he was going to ask her out on a date. She said no, because she wasn't looking for a boyfriend at the time. What was Jared's reaction? To stop talking to her. Completely. He hasn't mention her in three years. It's too bad that he couldn't just try being her friend but that's what happens when you're the serious guy.
Now, I'm not going to brag about my relationships but I at least recognize how to talk to people, usually. That's what gets me into trouble sometimes. I know what people want to hear. I've gotten into some relationships that were a mistake and it's because I didn't turn off the funny guy routine. Because eventually you come to the conclusion that you can't be funny all the time. You have to be serious every now and then. The less you do it, the harder it gets. Recently I had to break up with someone for the first time. It was hard going from the funny guy to the "I'm sorry, it's over." guy. I hated it, but it's something that I had to do.
But there is one thing that makes up for it. Hope. I have hope that one day I'll find love. Jared doesn't. He honestly thinks he'll die alone. As much as I hate to say it but if he keeps living with that attitude he probably will. He never goes out and meets people. He sticks to the same friends year after year. I love my friends dearly but they're not the only ones I'm going to have for the rest of my life. I know I'll meet new people over the course of my life and I'm glad. Don't get me wrong, I still want to hang out with my old friends but I still want new friends too. I actually miss my friend a lot. Feppy, MH, MP, El Sid, and Zehos. You're always going to be some of my best friends and I love you guys.

Wow, this got way off topic really fast but whatever. If you actually read this whole thing give yourself a pat on the back. Until next time, I hope you have champagne wishes and caviar dreams.