stop using the word 'dopamine' if you don't know biochemistry/pharmacology because i guarantee you don't know how it works
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hopeamine
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everywhere you hear yourself or someone else refer to "dopamine" (e.g. "gotta make good tweets for that sweet sweet dopamine" or whatever), try substituting "hope"
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the top-level tweet here is a good example of what i called "command" in a recent thread. basically pessimistic about this sort of thing. people use "dopamine" for a reason - it refers to real phenomenology they don't have a better word for
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1. “command” - tell people to do the right thing and they’ll do the right thing. this might work on impressionable young people, or people who are desperate, but i am pessimistic about it overall. if commands were enough we’d be done by now
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namely the phenomenology of a "shot of reward" from seeing e.g. numbers go up on social media or in a video game. that's an important phenomenological feature of our time and "dopamine" was the closest word available at hand for it!
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but it doesn't necessarily need to have anything to do with neurotransmitters. what people are referring to is the phenomenology which is why i suggested a replacement that is imo faithful to the phenomenology
I think it’s essential to the phenomenology that the “dopamine” is seen as something both internal and external to the person, which is why we reach for a scientistic vocabulary of molecular entities that are inside us but that we don’t control
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oh i like this observation!
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