

Don’t! The secret of self-control - alextp
http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2009/05/18/090518fa_fact_lehrer?currentPage=all#

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biohacker42
Does anyone here, like me, really appreciate Feynman's just the fact's style
of writing?

Most people describe it as eerily cold, but I love it. Articles like the this
one on the other hand, while excellent, bury their valuable information under
a lot of fluff. And most people like that kind of writing, but I just find it
annoying.

Good article, I just wish it was more direct.

~~~
electromagnetic
Took a lot of self-control just to read through the damn thing!

~~~
zvikara
On the other hand, I could use some more self-control to do actual work
instead of reading through HN.

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audionerd
Radiolab summarized the study in a 15 minute segment, if you lack the self-
control to read the entire article :)

[http://blogs.wnyc.org/radiolab/2009/03/09/mischel’s-marshmal...](http://blogs.wnyc.org/radiolab/2009/03/09/mischel’s-marshmallows/)

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boredguy8
Of course students who 'sit still' and 'do as their told' do better in an
educational system which prioritizes conformity.

The kid who decides to open the drawer to find the toys: that's the guy I want
on my team. I'm more than willing to farm out grunt work to the 'successful'
high delayers.

~~~
jmatt
I agree.

Here are the choices 1) Do as you are told and get another marshmallow 2) Eat
as many marshmallows as you want with no punishment. That doesn't seem to be a
very hard choice. I personally like the kid that checks to make sure that no
one is looking then eats the inside of the Oreo and returns it.

I'm not arguing with the results. I would imagine that on average those that
do as they are told and conform do better on average. But I doubt those are
the same people that make big discoveries or become successful entrepreneurs.

So what happened to the kid that split the Oreo and returned it? That seems
like a much more interesting question.

~~~
pbz
Why would you like his behavior? While clever, isn't the same as having an
adult as an employee who looks around to make sure nobody's watching while
stealing from you just enough so you won't notice? I wouldn't want somebody
like that on my team.

~~~
jmatt
_I wouldn't want somebody like that on my team._

I would. Who is he harming by eating the middle of an Oreo? You imply that his
solution to the problem is wrong because it's deceptive. But it's the testers
and parents that put him in that situation. I definitely wouldn't hold it
against the kid. I think the solution is more unique and out of the box than
just sitting there waiting and getting all worked up over it.

Recognizing this behavior as clever and out of the box is similar to saying
lazy programmers are good programmers. Everyone knows a truly lazy programmer
is no good. It's the inclination to do work in a more efficient way that they
are really after. So while the kid being potentially deceptive and stealing is
bad, his inclinations and temperament may not be.

That being said I imagine I would have been the kid that ate the center of the
Oreo and put it back... so I may be biased.

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ambulatorybird
I've never had much trouble holding back -- it's pushing myself forward that's
the hard part. Any tips on metacogitating my way out of that?

~~~
shellerik
If you're not pushing yourself forward what are you doing instead? Perhaps
whatever you are doing in place of pushing yourself forward is the marshmallow
you need to say no to.

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pseale
This sounds vaguely like the test given to Paul Atreides in Dune, testing to
see whether he was Human or an animal.

~~~
radu_floricica
Dune is a ridiculously good book. I never understood why it's relatively
obscure. Other then perhaps the fact that I tend to grit my teeth when I hear
people talking (or making movies) about it with only superficial
understanding.

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maheshsingh
Indian Yoga is teaching us about importance of self-control also people can
improve their self control through Yoga. People are getting benefited through
yoga for self control from thousand of years. Whole concept of yoga is based
upon self-control. This research is simply re-inventing the wheel. People who
want to improve self-control should try Yoga for at-least couple of months.

~~~
TFrancis
Agreed. Additionally, I found meditation was useful for increasing my self-
control. Many types of yoga are focused on meditative practices but not all. I
think these are just mind tricks (hacks?) and this jives with the research the
article presented.

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robertk
Another worldview changing article. I'd love to be a psychologist, but I'm not
clever enough. Honestly, these guys are mind hackers. Finding unit tests for
the brain.

~~~
tjic
You're looking at some of the most interesting research from one of the most
clever guys and then generalizing and saying "these guys are super bright".

The best folks in any field are super bright.

I'm not impressed by 95% of psychologists (but then again, I'm not impressed
by 85% of coders...).

~~~
sfk
If I'm not mistaken, the comment you responded to was highly sarcastic.

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noahlt
Mischel's team found that they could teach tricks to underperforming kids, who
would subsequently perform just as well as the originally patient ones.

Does anyone here have good hacker-relevant tips for self-control?

(For instance: when tackling a large problem, approach it bottom-up by
starting with utility functions.)

------
defen
See "A Farewell to Alms" for a really interesting discussion of the rise of
low time-preference individuals in medieval England, and the role this played
in fomenting the Industrial Revolution.

Short interview with the author here:
[http://www.gnxp.com/blog/2007/08/10-questions-for-greg-
clark...](http://www.gnxp.com/blog/2007/08/10-questions-for-greg-clark.php)

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jamesbritt
"Once you realize that will power is just a matter of learning how to control
your attention and thoughts, you can really begin to increase it."

Ah, one of my favorite four-letter words: "Just".

You _just_ add a second database to the system. You _just_ write the slow
parts in C. You _just_ learn how to control your attention and thoughts.

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beza1e1
For a scientific article two things were lacking: How do they define
"successful"? How big is the variance/standard deviation?

~~~
silentbicycle
It's a summary of academic research for the New Yorker. If you want statistics
on the results, you'll probably need to consult the research itself, not a
popular summary.

~~~
sketerpot
It would be nice if they gave a link to the research itself. This goes in
general for all popular science news.

~~~
timr
The research spans multiple decades and research groups. It's not like the
results are published neatly in a single article.

If you really want to read the primary literature, you've got the name of the
researcher and his university. PubMed is your friend.

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comatose_kid
Really interesting. I think that most diets don't work because you're forced
into thinking about what you eat (and what you're not supposed to). Perhaps
the best diet involves changing your lifestyle so that you're doing things
that remove your mind from thinking about eating.

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Tichy
Why newspapers are dying: because they could not adapt to the shortened
attention spans of modern times and learn to write shorter articles.

It was a little bit interesting, but way, way too long...

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agbell
I wonder if any of the 'Brain Gym' genre of games train this delay
gratification? lumosity.com has games targeting attention but they aren't the
games mentioned in the article.

~~~
Alex3917
Executive function is determined largely by the amount of self-directed play
before age five. That's why electronic toys and baby videos are generally
thought to be harmful.

edit: I don't know much about Brain Gym, but Pamela Paul has a whole chapter
in Parenting Inc. comparing the different ECE programs, which might answer
your question.

~~~
swombat
Could you define "self-directed play" for those of us who aren't 100% clear on
its meaning?

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ekanes
Self-directed play is where the child isn't playing according to "rules".
Where there's no "right" or "wrong" way to play, and the child is making up
their own game/world/etc as they go. Think "Lego" :)

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rokhayakebe
Where in the world is it May 18th?

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c00p3r
That was called the yoga almost 3k years ago. I mean self-control (control of
the thoughts and emotions) through behavioral exercises.

~~~
silentbicycle
Yeah. Similarly, a big part of Buddhism is trying to be live mindfully, to
avoid doing impulsive things that just lead to greater suffering. It's
historically tended to get entangled with contemporary religious ideas as it
spread throughout the world (not all Buddhists believe in reincarnation,
etc.), but none of those are essential.

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badger7
It's the secret to avoiding procrastination too - if you can't stop mulling
over all the other things floating around your head, then don't - _just
start_. The other things will be replaced fairly quickly with what you're
trying to do, and there you go - you've distracted yourself from your
distractions and are now being productive :)

