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Comment by disown | Hacker News Reader

Did no one besides you read the article? FTA: "My husband and I said she could have a phone when she turned 14..."

People are arguing about everything from extended school hours, excessive homework to climate change in this thread.

Could it be that the daughter was raised in a highly sheltered environment and once she hit puberty, she had other interests besides collages, jewelry and sewing?

I wrote this in another comment...

"It's a tale as old as time. Every child is a genius, angel, perfect until they hit puberty. Then we find "rock 'n roll", "rap music", "radio", "MTV", "television" or other culprits for corrupting our youth. Today it is social media. Tomorrow it will be VR. God knows what comes after that."

The entire article is about an overprotective and controlling mother complaining that her daughter is now a teenager. Instead of blaming rap music, she's blaming the iPhone.

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That might be true, if electronic gadgets were the same as previous obsessions. But they're different. They change from second to second, providing a level of stimulation unprecedented in human experience.

It's possible we're not going to adapt well to this e-world. There's no reason to think an evolved ape has the wiring to make the transition without trauma.

Imagine if the iPhone were heroin. Would we be so casual in dismissing it?

> Imagine if the iPhone were heroin.

Ah yes. This is your brain. This is your brain on drugs. I remember when the tv ( aka idiot box ) was attacked for being addictive.

> Would we be so casual in dismissing it?

Who is casually dismissing it? There is an entire propaganda campaign against social media. From congress to news to netflix and on, ironically enough, social media itself. Every day we hear about how bad social media is.

But what I was responding to was the article itself. The complaints in the article would exist with or without iphones, apps, social media. Staying up all night talking to friends, waking up at 11 AM, losing interest in childhood stuff, pushing back against the parents, etc are all teenage behavior, not iphone behavior.

I'm not a fan of smartphones as they are and I despise social media. But that's not what the article was really about. I was just trying to stay on topic.

It was what the article was about. This 'drug' is portable, instantly accessible and actually pings you constantly for attention. It's like nothing that came before. And whitewashing it as 'more of the same' is disingenuous.

> Imagine if the iPhone were heroin

Yeah, but its rather obviously not heroin.

"Imagine if X were Y" isn't really an argument to support "We should act as if X were Y, or at least similar". What needs to be presented is a reason to believe that X is, in fact, like Y.

How is it so obviously not heroin? I, a fully-formed and functioning adult, feel the pull in my brain. I was addicted to cigarettes in my 20s and I've had unhealthy relationships with numerous other drugs and video games that I've (mostly) managed to pull myself away from, after years. The feeling of "checking your notifications" and "scrolling through twitter" on your phone are remarkably similar to the compulsion for drugs. This is my personal subjective experience and I believe objective research confirms it as well.

When I was a kid the compulsion to put plastic zoo animals in little enclosures, and build all 151 pokemon out of lego was remarkably similar to the compulsion for drugs. I don't think there's anything inherently bad about this.

Feeding it could be harmful? We don't have to make the object of obsession instantly accessible and available 24-7.

> How is it so obviously not heroin

Its quite obviously literally not-heroin.

If you want to make an argument that it should be treated like heroin because it is in some relevant sense more like heroin or other things that it is broadly accepted should be treated like heroin than it is like other things that it is broadly accepted should not be treated like heroin then...some evidence besides simply stating your belief for the relevant similarity would be a good thing to present.

Sufficient evidence was presented for the metaphor, it seems apt and you seem to be overly obtuse. You seem unwilling to look beyond the obvious "its quite obviously literally not heroin". My god you sound insufferable.

It is really not sufficient evidence for the metaphor, though.

The point may be that it is akin to "drugs" but not all drugs are like heroin and what he is describing is nothing like heroin cravings and withdrawal.

Why not go with something that invokes less emotions in the reader like "caffeine" or "nicotine"?

Because the itch to check on a notification or scroll through the news feed is surely closer to the itch for a cigarette or your vaporizer than... heroin. That's a big jump there just to describe "compulsive desire".

The point you're making may be that it is akin to "drugs" but not all drugs are like heroin and what you are describing is nothing like heroin cravings and withdrawal.

Why not go with something that invokes less emotions in the reader like "caffeine" or "nicotine"?

I'm wondering where it does lie on the spectrum. Do you know? Citation please.

That's my point. Maybe not heroin; maybe cocaine? Personality changes, treasure wasted pursing new highs, panic and hysteria when its denied...

From my personal experiences and according to the subjective experiences of my friends I've had chatted on this topic with... certainly a closer feeling to the reward seeking behavior (itch) that can be conditioned with simultaneous application of nicotine + a monoamine oxidase inhibitor.

Each particular video game gets old and boring really quick. You need a constant supply of new games to stay "addicted" your entire life, which is exactly the opposite of how an addiction for a physical substance works. You never stop taking drugs unless you somehow can taper off the dosage. This is one of the reasons why switching from smoking to vaping and quitting vaping is easier than quitting smoking. You have control over your dosage and a lot of unclean crap is taken out.

Edit:

Not getting access to clean drugs is one of the biggest reasons why addicts suffer from health problems and have trouble reducing their dosage. Small portions of harder drugs and random substances that are optically identical are mixed into drugs and strengthen the addiction beyond what the primary ingredient can do.

Almost everything in history is "unprecedented in human experience". That's pretty much the defining feature of being a human, that our world is constantly changing (because we're changing it). A smartphone is just another distraction in a long line of man-made distractions that we've invented, worried about, and then adapted to. Oh man the headlines that exist from the past worrying about people reading newspapers on trains and how it will be the end of civilization. Heck if you go back to the 1800s, we were worried that novels would make people unable to tell facts from fiction [1].

>It's possible we're not going to adapt well to this e-world

There are very few things humans have ever created that humans are unable to adapt to (and pretty much all of those things are weapons). That's the other side of the unique thing that makes us human: things are constantly changing, and we are constantly adapting to the changes.

For as long as humans have lived, we've tried to distract ourselves from the banality of life. Some part of the population goes down a rabbit hole and stays lost and unproductive: that's not new. The majority of people are mildly productive and then turn to distractions when work is over. And another small group shuns distractions in order to stay as productive as possible for as long as possible. This bell curve has existed through all of human history.

The people who get addicted to apps and social media and phones are the same people who were addicted to novels in the 1800s and comics in the 1930s and TV in the 1950s and video games in the 1990s. Even infinite scrolling isn't new... libraries have existed for a long time, TV just keeps playing forever and ever, and there are more video games than you can play in a lifetime.

When cars and trains were new, people were questioning if evolved apes could survive speeds faster than 30mph. We are not just evolved apes; our specific evolutionary advantage is the ability to adapt, overcome, and get bored even when presented with unlimited stimulation.

[1] https://op-talk.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/09/14/when-novels-wer...

Those things were certainly novel and attractive.

But lets be honest - they weren't anywhere near the level of an instantly-available portable object you can keep in your pocket and pings you for attention all day and all night.

There's may be a threshold beyond what we can manage. A Polly-Anna attitude of "we've survived so far!" is not comforting nor convincing.

And the approach of "lets give ever-more-addictive devices to our children unrestricted until some provable damage occurs" is perhaps a negligent policy.

I think the step from books->TV was much more dramatic that TV->SocialMedia. the delta of stimulation is much greater in the former, imho.

In any case, 1hr of iPhone/day is way too strict for a teenager nowadays. I was lucky to be the 3rd child, and my parents didn’t really paid attention to how I was spending my time. I overdosed on a bunch of things as a kid: TV, videogames, my computer, the internet when I got it (I’m in my late 30s), but then I got over them, except computers, which became my profession.

On the other hand, people my age that were only allowed one hour of Nintendo per day as kids, are still craving the next PlayStation like grown up junkies. Last time I played a videogame I was maybe.. 22.

>On the other hand, people my age that were only allowed one hour of Nintendo per day as kids, are still craving the next PlayStation like grown up junkies. Last time I played a videogame I was maybe.. 22.

This is awfully close to gatekeeping. All hobbies are fine in moderation. One is not inherently 'better' than any other.

Yes, I’ll give you that. I think the point I was trying to make was that being denied some activities ( or have them severely restricted) as a young kid, may have repercussions later in life that ends up being the opposite of what the parents wished for.

Kind of like how TV pictures change from second to second, or city life changes from second to second, or...well, heroin doesn't change from second to second, but it provides a dopamine hit that's even more powerful than things that do. We pretty casually dismiss the Opium Wars now.

Its portable. You can choose your drug with a phone - games, texting, facebook. And it pings and pings and won't let you get any respite. Its different in intensity from all those things that came before.

I just think it deserves some analysis - what's the maximum distracting addictive information rush we can support without becoming disfunctional or chronically obsessed? Isn't it worth finding out, before we give children unrestricted access?

Imagine if water was heroin, would be so casual about plumbing?!

iPhones are just a medium for information. In my opinion it shouldn't matter how you access information, the type of information being accessed is what's most important. "Spending too much time" on a phone shouldn't be the top priority, what they're doing with their phones is what should be looked after.

30 years ago, kids had hobbies, there's wasn't much to compete. Legos, collecting stamps/baseball cards, catching bugs, building models, photography, racing home build cars, sports, even things like just reading the encyclopedia, etc. Even libraries weren't that well stocked, I think I read every sci-fi book at my local library.

Now there's literally billions being spent on "free" games, "free video", "free" social sites, etc and trying every video, audio, vibration, trick in the book to make them more addicting. It's a trap, it encourages vanity, consumerism, poor body image, etc. I think the best thing you can do for kids these days is make sure they have a healthy amount of time offline.

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