kobenni

I think what you're saying is both besides the point and incorrect.

Firstly, not studying, ignoring safety rules, or half-assing a task at work are behaviors, they don't necessarily reflect understanding or intelligence. Sometimes I get up late and have to rush in the morning, that doesn't mean I lack the intelligence to understand that time passes when I sleep.

Secondly, I don't think that most people fail to see the connection between not studying and failing a test. They might give other excuses for emotional or practical reasons, but I think you'll have a hard time finding anyone who genuinely claims that studying doesn't usually lead to better test scores. Same for ignoring safety rules or half-assing work.

Maybe those are two sides of the same coin, question-askers are treated harshly because the priority of the site isn't to help them, the priority is to help the people who are searching up similar questions and browsing the threads. It makes perfect sense from a business perspective, because for every question-asker you'll have many more question-browsers.

Most false information was on the hardware description language VHDL that I'm currently learning.

In my experience asking questions to Claude, the amount of incorrect information it gives is on a completely different scale in comparison to traditional sources. And the information often sounds completely plausible too. When using a text book, I would usually not Google every single piece of new information to verify it independently, but with Claude, doing that is absolutely necessary. At this point I only use Claude as a stepping stone to get ideas on what to Google because it is giving me false information so often. That is the only "effective" usage I have found for it, which is obviously much less useful than a good old-fashioned textbook or online course.

Admittedly I have less experience with ChatGPT, but those experiences were equally bad.

This post reminds me of myself in the past.

One thing I found very helpful was to regularly practice mindfulness meditation, as it reduces my desire for entertainment and generally seems to improve my executive function a lot. It also caused other improvements to my well-being in general.

Regarding a technological solution to blocking, I did the following (on Android, I can handle myself on non-portable devices):

1: Use adguard to block the relevant addresses on DNS level. I chose adguard specifically because it allows setting regex-like patterns on what addresses to block, eliminating loop holes.

2: Use applock (I haven't informed if applock specifically is better or worse than alternatives) to require a passcode when opening settings, when opening adguard, and when opening applock itself. Store this passcode in a way that it's cumbersome but possible to reach. Ask a friend or relative to set and store it for you if necessary.

3: Remove the icons of adguard and applock from the home screen, so that they are only reachable through settings -> apps.

This has worked well for me. It's cumbersome enough to discourage me from deactivating it. It's not so cumbersome that I can't update the block list if necessary. It's flexible enough that I can very precisely choose what to block and what not. And it's specialized for (android) smartphones, which are the worst scrolling addiction drivers.

You could also throw in Google parental controls to stop yourself from downloading apps if necessary, but I found that DNS blocks are enough for me.

If you struggle with other devices as well, like TVs, consider whether you can get away with not owning these devices at all.

All that being said, professional psychological help for addiction and executive dysfunction exists. That would have been my last resort if the methods mentioned above hadn't turned out to be sufficient for me.

Good luck, don't give up.

You are correct that working on underlying issues is very important, but there is a huge practical value to blocking out distractions. First of all, it gets you started on scrolling a lot less immediately. Secondly, it makes concentrating on the important parts of life and thus the underlying issues much easier as you have more time and energy now. Thirdly, you will always have some bad days, you will always have some issues in your life that you can't fix (yet), but having a mechanism that stops you from re-entering the habit independently of your current state is really helpful in stabilizing your behavior.

What I'm trying to say is that blocking and working on the "deeper" issues are stronger when used synergistically, it doesn't have to be an either or.

I think you are making a very important point here, but unfortunately getting downvoted for stating it so cynically. A more productive way to phrase it would be that people's self-report on a drug's effect (beyond the pure subjective experience of the trip) can be very misleading about alleged positive effects, and can be very incomplete about any negative effects.

Thank you for the suggestions.

Regarding NextDNS, can it be setup in a way that is difficult to disable? Or could I just disable the user application on my phone and use my unfiltered mobile internet? Same for accountability softwares, are there any that go below the user application level to stop me from simply disabling them?

Google parental controls seem cumbersome, as apparently I can only block domains in Chrome and will thus also need to block other browsers. But I will play around with it and see if I can make it work for me.

Could you give a description of how you block social media? All methods I found so far can be undone within seconds.

For mathematics, there are the Princeton Companion to Mathematics and the Princeton Companion to Applied Mathematics.

Yes, they were wrong. Many young kids who are bad at mental calculations are later competent at higher mathematics and able to use it. I don't understand what patterns and tricks you're referring to, but if they are important for problems outside of mental calculations, then you can also learn about them by solving these problems directly.

Home gyms are great. I also recommend adjustable dumbbells, they are very versatile.

Interesting, this sounds like my normal state. I cope by only eating tasty calorie-dense meals and snacks, never skipping meals or snacks, and weight lifting to increase my appetite. Otherwise I become significantly underweight.

Seeing this type of argument always bothers me. It's basically saying that, because people in the past were often overly critical of new technologies or trends, we can dismiss criticisms of new technologies or trends in general. Makes no sense.