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That's good for you. Now do teenagers spending 6+ hours per day on average taking notes and looking at the time ? or is there something else going on for _most_ people

> Looking stuff up saves money and time if you use it correctly.

Living in a pod like in Matrix saves money and time too, if anything it's the most optimal way to live

How’s it different from getting home from work and watching TV all night? Except that TV is censored for thin skinned sensibilities by the networks?

People been complaining about walkmans, comic books, DND, rock music, rap…

Raise your hand if you’ve blown airplane smog in others neighborhoods from flying lately. Going on road trips?

Being sedate on a phone might actually be good for the planet and thus future of the species.

Is it social media screwing people up or the meta awareness of how shitty existence is and how few fucks we seem to give despite all the rhetoric about caring?

Yep, i agree, it is a universal tool, a swiss knife, so to say. That is what i pay for.

Yet, many apps on it are addictive, that i would prefer not to be. Those things I don't want in my life, just like access to drugs. But it is tough, as these apps are mostly connected with other people, friends mostly... and i want that too.

I've taken a more subtle approach:

- In my daily commutes, I dedicate my smartphone screen time to creating art and short animations.

- If I ever do feel the urge to read news, I'll pull up HN via the Harmonic app. If I stumble upon an interesting post with healthy comments threads, I'll bookmark it to read on a properly sized screen when I return home.

- My monthly data plan is purposefully capped at 4GB. I use an app firewall to whitelist the most essential apps while everything else is blocked by default from accessing cellular data.

- I don't use streaming services at all but I do occasionally pre-fetch longform podcasts for later consumption. I also disable all phone notifications and wear a "smartwatch" to tell time, track my step counter and monitor barometric pressure in that order.

> I can pass time while waiting - doctors office, etc - which makes me more pleasant.

If you need to suppress your thoughts by using a tool while being alone and not doing something (to be pleasant), maybe you should do something about these thoughts rather than suppress them?

It's not always running from your thoughts. Sometimes it's just nice to be occupied with something pleasant while you're waiting.

Also, sometimes when you're waiting at the doctor's office you're waiting for important news that would trigger anxiety in the healthiest among us, and distracting yourself is a great strategy in those moments.

Right? There were, and still are, magazines in many waiting rooms or TVs. If I want to meditate or sit without distraction it's probably not going to be in a waiting room or at a restaurant.

I tend to read books on mine in such situations. I can sit alone in the woods quietly without any issues, but reading something I brought seems preferable to flipping through the magazine stacks or staring a gray wall.

Reading books is somewhat different than scrolling through endless feeds and numbing yourself, though.

I also prefer to read books in these situations, or face with the thing which makes me uncomfortable. I don't like to have a puddle of thoughts which fester and attack at the most inconvenient times, making my life harder than it should be.

Just because you prefer one thing over another doesn't mean the other is bad.

Not everyone is scrolling through endless feeds, either - I'm more likely to play a game. There are more than two things you can do with a phone.

I don't need to supress my thoughts. I don't know why people jump to this. I do things quietly all the time. Perhaps you shouldn't assume this sort of thing and do something to see others in a more positive light.

The main issue with waiting is that I'm just waiting. I don't like waiting and don't don't see an issue with doing something so the time passes more quickly.

If you don't like something and have the tools to make it a little better, why would you not use them? Especially if it makes you a bit less irritated if they are running late - it makes things better for everyone.

> I can pass time while waiting - doctors office, etc - which makes me more pleasant.

You might believe that, a lot of people do. However, from what I understand the actual science doesn't support is assumption.

In short, for eons, humans lived in the shadow of boredom. The brain evolved in that context. That is, life without boredom has no historical precedent. When boredom is habitually removed you are doing the brain a disservice. You are stifling creativity, insights, and other growth that comes from the seeds planted by boredom and "down time."

Put another way, the convenience of constant access to your device comes with an opportunity cost. And often we're too distracted to consider the loses due to that cost.

You are stifling creativity, insights, and other growth that comes from the seeds planted by boredom and "down time.

Just because someone passes time while waiting doesn't mean they don't have downtime. I can entertain myself while in a position of waiting and still have downtime each day - I cook and clean and take walks and things. And I promise I still have creativity. It allows me to do non-representational art.

The reason I'm more pleasant is simply because I'm not annoyed at the waiting bit - which isn't a thing with most downtime.

I*m not sure everyone in the past was bored. There was stuff to do then, too, and some of that boredom was discouraged. After all, we got sayings like "Idle hands are the Devils playthings"

I'll tell you what, next time you're at the doctor, and you lose control and intentionally side step boredom, use your device - like the early Homo sapiens did? - to do some research on the value of boredom, on not using your device as a crutch, etc.

Please feel free to revisit your answer once you've done the necessary amount of research.

"There was stuff to do then, too, and some of that boredom was discouraged."

Yup! This ^^^ is exactly the point. Prior to that something (constructive?) to do, there was boredom. Pile on enough boredom and the brain finds "answers". And the opposite is true...no boredom...no answers. So we agree then.

The problem here is, your timelines are too short and your extrapolations too shallow. Perhaps that's a symptom of a lack of boredom. See?

I'm sorry - what the fuck? Lose control?

I've sat here and taken fixed something annoying - waiting for appointments. I fix that by doing things like playing low-effort games. You seem to think this is about "losing control" or something and it isn't like that. If you lower the amount of things that annoy you - and there always will be those things - of course you are more pleasant. You know, in a general sense. It isn't like I'm sitting here treating the staff badly. I'd get worse service - I'm an immigrant, and I really don't want things to go awry.

You've obviously misread. It isn't like I don't have boredom. I know boredom well enough to know that it isn't all productive or even possibly productive.

I don't think that everyone just "finds answers".

Creativity and "Answers" requires more than simple boredom - boredom isn't a magic pill. Heck, you don't even need actual boredom, just time for your mind to wander while you are doing something with low mental effort. Again, this doesn't mean games while waiting at a doctor's office are bad.

Yes, smartphone are a tool. They are tools that come with costs, though, and whether or not the costs are worth it depends on your particular situation.

> which makes me more pleasant.

Did you get this opinion from others, or is this your own rationalization?

I found that to be a strange reason, as if being pleasant were the goal (hello, Willy Loman!), and the value of smart phones, and not doing something actually valuable with one’s time. In that sense, my smartphone can help make better use of my time in waiting rooms, but of course, that’s up to the user. You can choose to waste your time.

  Living’s mostly wasting time
  And I’ll waste my share of mine
  But it never feels too good,
  So let’s don’t take too long.

If you find something that makes you no longer mind waiting (and therefore more patient) or makes you not be so anxiety-ridden when you get your appointment (like a doctor's appointment)... Wouldn't you be more pleasant, and that pleasantry would come more naturally rather than forced, would it not?

Smoking can also make you mind waiting less, and help you cope with anxiety during an appointment (though I would really like to see a source on the negative correlation between phone use and anxiety, because I don't believe it exists). Does that mean that lighting up in the waiting room makes you more pleasant to be around?

I really just want to know though: is this something you have decided makes you more pleasant to be around, or have others told you it?

You complain about people being friendly. You complain about having to actually learn a language.

It sounds like your phone is preventing you from the very normal human interactions that made society pleasant.

There’s no amount of asserting that others are uninteresting that can convince me that a society is better when strangers only interact transactionally.

I'm not complaining about learning a language. I'm simply stating that I have had a much better tool that can help me - which covers more than a wordbook could and is faster and means that I wasn't carrying around a book. Merely a phone/watch/communication device.

I'll add that not everyone needs to learn a language to make use of wordbooks and translation apps. Vacations exist. Temporary work assignments exist, the sort of which are much shorter than the time it would take to learn a language to even an intermediate level. Heck, my required language classes lasted 2 years at 18 hours a week of classroom time, which is definitely longer than work assignments.

And no, forced pleasantries at a gas station doesn't make people friendly. Plus it is labor for the cashier. I shouldn't be shamed for not paying attention to everyone on a bus and listening to music instead. This stuff isn't people being nice, it is people doing obligatory thing. A heart-felt thanks isn't the same as the one your mother made you say - greater society is similar. And I'll add that it isn't really making society pleasant: That sort of smalltalk isn't universal. I moved from the US Midwest to Norway, which really hasn't expected folks to chat up cashiers or talk to strangers on the bus. Society here isn't unpleasant, though.

If I'm going for a two weeks vacation and know I will never return - is it a reason to learn that country's language, further than hello/thank you/bye?

I think so, yes. There are tons of benefits to learning other languages even if you never travel at all. Traveling is a great opportunity to start picking up a new one.

It also demonstrates respect for people of the country you're traveling to.

There is no reason to learn the language of every country you visit for a short vacation, though. You'll do just as well learning a something convenient in your own country. In the US, this would usually mean Spanish.