I think I have that misconception too. Idk if I picked it up from DD (who’s LT?) by accident. I may have mis-inferred that from an article of yours. Maybe this from Procrastination ?:
If you find you procrastinate on something, or partly feel like procrastinating on it, then part of you doesn’t want to do it . That is a conflict. If you were unconflicted, you wouldn’t even be tempted to procrastinate.
I think I may have mistakenly taken that as: don’t do it then.
I think this kind of error is really important to philosophy and that it’s really common by tons of people and is one of the major reasons philosophy discussions tend not to be very productive. I think doing better is a key philosophy skill.
The error can come about in different ways, e.g. it could be related to reading, logic or interpretation of people.
I don’t know if this is something you’d be interested in deep diving on and if you’d want to share more about your thought process and would be motivated to do whatever it takes (whether it’s grammar trees, studying logic books, anything) to address it.
Do you have other goals, which these nighttime binges are getting in the way of, that you would enjoy a lot if you made progress on them? A common reason people quit something or try a temporary break is because they think it will enable them to do better in other areas which they think will make them happier overall.
I didn’t know you viewed it that way. Are you aware of downsides or flaws with that point of view about it?
Yes. I think they get in the way of me doing stuff related to philosophy and law (and other goals related to my health too). The issue with the binges is how they affect my routines and stuff. Its going to bed at 3 and trying to keep the same lifestyle that’s an issue. And then binging in a manner where I don’t bother keeping up with my routines (not brushing my teeth in the morning to keep reading). Something that has a similar affect is working long shifts where I have no time to reasonable get stuff done at home. I can work long hours and feel fine after. Its the time that messes me up. I can feel ok working from 8 to 8. That doesn’t change the fact that I don’t have time to clean up, do my chores, and study while still going to bed on time. This has been less of an issue recently but pops up infrequently.
Yeah I have done this before with Chinese webnovels. I binged them a lot and decided to quit them for a while. For a time period I kept making a mistake of bringing them back into my life as a “treat” and ended up binging them. Nowadays, however, I’ve been actually been able to healthfully read webnovels. The most recent one I started reading was SSS-Class Revival Hunter. I’m 50 or so chapters in and I’ve been able to read it without obsessively binging it.
Hmm. I’ll brainstorm some more tomorrow but something that immediately comes to mind:
I’ve heard of stuff about what you tell yourself. Telling myself that I’m someone who gets self-destructingly addicted to things could lead me to do that?
I’d be interested in it.
One thing to consider is what you like about the things you binge. What is so great about them? Have you subjected that to logical analysis? Have you tried to think about them critically and objectively? Another angle is what you’re avoiding with them.
Write down all the facts you can remember related to it, like what you were thinking and feeling and why. Try to get your whole thought processes.
I thought that I didn’t have that misconception, like I thought I understood that when you have a coercive conflict, you need to resolve it, not pick a side. But I do actually have the attitude towards my actual conflicts that I should err on the side of avoiding activities I’m conflicted about. But yeah I can see that that is picking a side. Like you said in this reply, It’s trying to use a rule of thumb for how to pick the winner.
And the same is true with doing as of avoiding the activity, right?
It’s funny because I think I would feel better about myself in hindsight if I was using willpower to get started on things I was coercively conflicted about rather than just avoiding things I’m conflicted about. But avoiding things I’m conflicted about in general seems easier than using willpower and doing the thing i’m conflicted about (?)
So things I’m coercively conflicted about need to be turned into different activities to do with problem solving about the conflicts. Doing otherwise would be picking sides.
Another thing contributing to this attitude is feeling like I just don’t know what to do to problem solve a conflict well, like that while I understand that I should do some problem solving, I feel like i don’t know what to do or something. So I just do something else.
Good recognition. One thing this could be related to is a bias towards inaction, which I think is common and shows up in e.g. trolley problem analysis.
Yes. My view is basically that you should either solve the problem or use strategies for dealing with time (or other resource) pressure. If solving the problem is too slow or hard, you can consider what to do given that situation, and some or all of your preferences ought to relax their standards. If you get stuck in some other way, you can consider what to do given being stuck in that way, and this can be repeated. I have multiple essays about this stuff.
My view is about what’s rational. It’s about what’s ideal. People often do other things. People often don’t seem receptive to this sort of analysis of problems, especially when they e.g. have emotions about the problems.
You present it as asymmetric but it sounds symmetric to me. Doesn’t avoiding it take willpower too? If the coercive conflict were about gambling, I don’t think you’d tell me that avoidance takes less willpower than action.
There can be asymmetries that favor action or non-action, but you didn’t present one.
Can you make a flowchart of what CF generically says to do for problem solving? Brainstorming, IGC charts, etc.
I have never put them to logical analysis. I have given some thought to the stuff I like as I got older. I think it was something of yours (maybe, maybe not) that convinced me to start thinking of the media I consume and why I consume it. While I have thought about why I like the stuff I do, I don’t think I have done much with that knowledge.
Hmm. I have thought of this before. I remember hearing/reading about people binging media as an escape. I do think a lot my media consumption is intended as a constant escape. I know growing up I did a lot of stuff to detach from my crappy home life. From abusive parents to lack of energy I didn’t want to do much. I also think, related to the overreaching comments I’ve shared, games (and books in my imagination?) were a place I felt competent in. Whenever I sat down to actually want to study I always was too ambitious in my goals. I would go from not doing homework at all to one day doing it and then trying to follow a strict study plan on a subject. It went from not doing my geometry homework (I pick geometry because that was a math class I did do bad in) to doing it, to then wanting to read my textbook cover to cover to really understand geometry.
The thing I shared originally that I had a misunderstanding about was just a part from Procrastination. Do you want me get my whole thought process for the whole article or just that part?
In a moment I will start on just that part.
That part. And other parts if you think they’re relevant.
I don’t think you can expect to rationally or non-coercively change without doing more problem solving steps including analysis. So I think you should either work towards doing that or else work on figuring out some acceptable compromises or “good enough” pragmatic approaches or something that work well enough for you to get a reasonable amount of stuff done in your life for normal goals like career or housework.
Sometimes working on something else first, such as health/diet/fitness, can help. Sometimes it can be a distraction and not work out well. There are lots of things that could be relevant. There’s no fixed order for doing things; it’s up to creative problem solving and your personal context.
This sounds potentially like perfectionism: you want to do a really good job or you don’t like doing it all. It also sounds potentially like “bipolar” with “manic” episodes. I haven’t looked into that stuff much and have partial skepticism but it does seem to be an experience of some people to swing between high and low energy phases.
Ok so commenting on this part:
If you find you procrastinate on something, or partly feel like procrastinating on it, then part of you doesn’t want to do it . That is a conflict. If you were unconflicted, you wouldn’t even be tempted to procrastinate.
Ok when part of you doesn’t want to do it. If part of you doesn’t want to do it then don’t do it. Why? Because a side of you doesn’t want to do it. If you haven’t resolved that you are forcing yourself to do it.
You should only do stuff you’re unconflicted about. Like if you have a big decision such as going to college or not. If you’re conflicted you could be taking on lots of debt and time for something that you don’t have a clear cut decision on. Hmm. Putting it into smaller things. If you have a conflict on working out. Don’t work out because what if you decide you shouldn’t. That’s a lot of time wasted.
When I read articles I feel pretty calm/neutral/objective? Idk whats the right word. Probably calm? Interested too?
That’s all I can think of for now. I also remembered that I went through this article on the forum almost a yr ago?
This is from second time reading it through and sharing my thoughts: Procrastination - #13 by Eternity
Hmm. Looking back it doesn’t seem like I shared any sentiments related to not doing stuff. It seems like that’s a more recent thought. Or maybe something I thought was so obvious I didn’t share it at the time. Idk.
There was a bit of that. I definitely did think I need to know it well or not at all. I think have vestiges of that still today.
This has been less of an issue as I’ve gotten older but I definitely felt that when younger. Idk what bipolar exactly consits of, but I know my mood fluctuations were caused by something. I think sometimes how bipolar is talked about its fully random. For me it could be something like I just got a F or my dad was yelling, then I would get depressed, and then I listened to Atlas Shrugged (or The Fountainhead) get motivated. Try and fix my life with that motivation and something comes along to make me depressed again. Maybe there’s something to being emotionally resilient?
Why might someone be biased towards inaction? Laziness? A misconception that it’s possible to not act in the face of a decision? (Like not realising that not taking action is equally an action)?
That’s funny because it’s one of the things I like about CF. That it explains what’s actually going on with internal conflicts and explains how they could be resolved. Surely many people deal with problems like that and CF basically offers answers where a lot of the other stuff I’ve seen seems to offer nothing that makes much sense or seems promising.
Being able to understand and reliably resolve internal conflicts seems like so awesome, and would make one’s life so much better.
Maybe they don’t like finding out that they have problems that they aren’t dealing with because they don’t know how to deal with them. I have some of this because I’m not good at that stage yet. But I also feel optimistic that I can learn how to do that and that it’ll actually work and improve my life.
Oh yeah I think I had a too specific example in mind of e.g trying to schedule something that you were conflicted about and might right now prefer to avoid than to do. You’re right that e.g in a case of gambling addiction (or I suppose any addiction) that avoiding it would be the harder option and require more will power.
What’s going on there then that there can be asymmetries around conflicts? I’d think CF would disagree that parts of you can be more in favour of an idea than another part can be in favour of its idea? Could it be that more parts of you agree with one option than the other? Like maybe you have 19 parts in favour of gambling but 1 part that causes the conflict? And picking the 19 parts to win over the 1 part is easier than vice versa?
Based on trolley problem arguments, many people seem to think that action creates responsibility for outcomes while inaction doesn’t. And yes not counting inaction as a type of action is common.
You’re presenting it as asymmetric again. I think the idea that not gambling (or e.g. not smoking or not having an affair) requires an extra big amount of willpower is really problematic. I think the whole willpower concept is problematic too.
Here’s an asymmetry: If you buy an expensive non-refundable purchase, which could be done at any time (no deadline, no special urgency), that’s riskier than delaying another day to think it over more. Basically, if you choose option A, you’re stuck with it, but if you choose option B (inaction) right now, you can switch to A at any time.
This comes up with other stuff too, e.g. quitting your job is more irreversible than staying for another week. You can quit later but you generally can’t unquit later.
So what’s wrong with your analysis? And what’s right with it? Can you critically analyze it now?
Yes. And generally when people have unstable emotions, they also have unstable ideas. These things are connected.
So what have you done to reduce perfectionism?
Hmm. Let’s see. I’ve been perfectionist in the past about getting chores done. Well maybe? In order for me to do chores things would have to be just right. Uhh like cleaning my room. If my laundry basket was full I have nowhere to put my dirty clothes. So let’s not clean. Or if I can’t find the broom to sweep then I wouldn’t clean anything at all. This is something I’ve gotten much much better at. All I really did for this was to just start doing stuff and telling myself it didn’t matter. I’d say this was over a period of a year about ~3 years ago.
For perfectionism in my studies I haven’t done much because I never recognized it as such or thought to deal with it. One thing that comes to mind is that I’m very open to making mistakes and figuring things and not being perfect when I’m learning. It’s when, at some point, I felt like I “got it” that I become perfectionist. I think this happened with grammar trees. The beginning was “easier” because I didn’t expect to be good and that’s fine, but after doing it for so long subconsciously I assumed they had to be perfect. So I would take longer trying to get them right. Hmm. Maybe treat something as I’m always learning. That I’ll never “get it”?
Kinda related to the above I’ve noticed that tendency in games. I’ve also gotten much better at this by forcing myself to play through mistakes/bad runs. I’ve only been doing this for a few months now and its still kind of a habit. I think I tell myself that this mistake could have been avoided/doesn’t actually reflect my skill so I restart. This reply had me start thinking about my mentality on games and restarting: