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> You will pollute your brain. Such an interesting perspective, never crossed my mind that a brain could be polluted! My direction always been to fill it with

> You will pollute your brain. Such an interesting perspective, never crossed my mind that a brain could be polluted! My direction always been to fill it with as wide array of information as possible, the more different from existing information the better. What are some other things that you think "pollutes your brain"?

neomantra 6mo ago
Mixing metaphors, there is signal and noise. You can keep asking for noise, but the suggestion is to not train your neural networks with it as it will impair your inferencing. That said, we all have our own cost and reward functions...
- embedding-shape 6mo ago
  Assuming brains work like computers, maybe yeah, that'd make sense :) You also won't know what's a signal vs noise until you've read and tried to understand it, and at that point you've already read it. Besides, something could be "noise" at the point you read it, but be a "signal" in a completely different context and/or time.
felixyz 6mo ago
Your information diet. Social media. Gossipy and negative people. Mulling over old failures/regrets/slights etc. The mind is easily pulled along by negativity and outrage... as can be observed in our current global psychological state.
- embedding-shape 6mo ago
  All those are fine, as long as you're able to process it in a healthy way after. I guess personally I focused more on bettering that processing, as sometimes you don't get to control what information you get served, so at least it works in all cases.
  - scrollaway 6mo ago
    Don’t be so optimistic about your ability to “process information healthily”. You are more of a slave to your instincts than you think and can’t always know whether you’re actually doing a good job at this— literally, it’s not possible to faithfully introspectively this.
    - embedding-shape 6mo ago
      > Don’t be so optimistic about your ability to “process information healthily”. Don't be so pessimistic about your own ability to control how you process information, you can control this a lot more than you think, apparently.
      - scrollaway 6mo ago
        I wonder who will fare better: the fools who don’t know their limits, or the ones who underestimate theirs?
        embedding-shape 6mo ago
        Considering I'm pretty much as content I could be in life, and I know others who live their life pretty much opposite from what I do, and they're also content with their life, I think there is room for both types of people to be happy and fare OK :)
        Fricken 6mo ago
        All glory is fleeting. Death is the great equalizer.
    - a_small1 6mo ago
      The belief that you have control over your actions leads to better outcomes either way, no matter how true that is in reality. This has been found mostly with the idea of free will and internal locus of control.
  - K0balt 6mo ago
xtiansimon 6mo ago
The classic thing that pollutes your brain are punk (music and Mad Magazine) and smut. I’d add “dangerous memes” such as injecting bleach to cure covid. https://www.susanblackmore.uk/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/2010-Dangerous-Memes-or-What-the-Pandorans-let-loose.pdf https://www.susanblackmore.uk/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/201...
- embedding-shape 6mo ago
  I guess at this point my brain must be essentially mush then, add in frequent recreational drug usage and it's a surprise I'm even able to type?
- jmbwell 6mo ago
  These days, I’ll take Mad magazine
engeljohnb 6mo ago
Not who you asked, but Neil Postman's "Amusing Ourselves to Death" is an excellent book about polluting your brain. As for my personal experience, internet comment sections will pollute one's brain. Filling your brain with reasonably reliable information is good, but filling it with people online just saying things isn't. For example, when 30 reddit comments all repeat the same "fact" (for which their source is other reddit comments), it can subtly work its way into your subconscious as something you know is true but can't remember where you first heard it, which is only one step away from seeming like "common knowledge." Now imagine a similar effect with a politically charged news story instead some random fun fact. Now imagine all the comments are actually just AI run by propagandists with the specific intention of making you believe things that aren't true. One way I've tried to avoid the worst effects is by being very careful to remember my source for anything I know. I never say "It turns out xyz," I only say "according to abc, xyz." It's probably not enough, I think it might be time to just get off internet forums entirely. Yes, I'm a hypocrite and yes, it's very funny.
- embedding-shape 6mo ago
  > it can subtly work its way into your subconscious as something you know is true I dunno, I know this is something some people struggle with, but I'm not sure how I could personally end up here. You can repeat something how many times you want, it doesn't make it true, and if anything, seeing people repeat the same "fact" like that would probably trigger the reverse in my brain, almost automatically going out of my way to disprove it while reading it. Maybe it's a matter of being connected to the internet early in my life and essentially making "Don't trust anything you read on the internet" the most important rule in processing whatever you read.
  - engeljohnb 6mo ago
    Sounds like you always knew something it took me a decade to realize. > seeing people repeat the same "fact" like that would probably trigger the reverse in my brain, almost automatically going out of my way to disprove it while reading it. I think that's a very fundamental difference between you and me. I'm too lazy to fact check most of what I read. One day I decided I would never run my mouth about something unless I felt I could write a five paragraph essay about it, and now I don't run my mouth very much because apparently there aren't a lot of things I'm willing to research even that much. Still, I highly recommend Amusing Ourselves to Death. It has more and better insights into stuff like this, and I seriously believe everyone should read it.
redsocksfan45 6mo ago
[dead]
hk__2 6mo ago
You’ll feel like you learned something without realizing it’s totally wrong.
- embedding-shape 6mo ago
  But that's just "learning", doesn't matter if what you learn is totally wrong or totally right. Some things we learn are right when we learn them, but wrong at a later point. And then it's more learning once you learn that it's right or wrong, or maybe it's a bit wrong in that case, but mostly wrong in another, or it oscillates between wrong/right depending on year, location or even mood. There are no universal truths anyways, might as well just roll with it :)
  - hk__2 6mo ago
    It does matter, because it can affect your whole life. If tomorrow I learn that apples cause cancer and eating plastic is good for my stomach I’ll change my habits and quickly have some issues ;) > There are no universal truths anyways Of course there are.
    - embedding-shape 6mo ago
      But just because someone told you that, doesn't mean you need to operate by that? You can still have your own understanding, follow your own way :) The context here was that it's somehow "dangerous" as in information can "pollute" your brain, just because you read it.
      - hk__2 6mo ago
        I gave an example about something easy to verify, but things become harder about niche things where it’s not easy to just search on Google to check.
jxf 6mo ago
> What are some other things that you think "pollutes your brain"? Moderating posts on a public (or worse, private) forum. You will see some truly heinous, vile things.
- embedding-shape 6mo ago
  I did that a long time ago, moderating forum categories like pedophilia, drug usage, suicide ideation and a bunch of others. Even ended up moderating a thread where a forum user committed suicide while live streaming it to forum members and the public, made big news at the time. Still don't think my mind is polluted from it, although I've certainly seen, read and heard a lot of "sick" stuff through my years on the internet.
ralfd 6mo ago
> What are some other things that you think "pollutes your brain"? Horror movies. They are going straight to the amygdala but there are no vampires or zombies being afraid of. The nightmare fuel of my childhood prepared me wrong.
LastTrain 6mo ago
> My direction always been to fill it with as wide array of information as possible, the more different from existing information the better. Clearly.
- embedding-shape 6mo ago
  Wanna expand? I don't understand what you mean, but I want to.

neomantra 6mo ago

Mixing metaphors, there is signal and noise. You can keep asking for noise, but the suggestion is to not train your neural networks with it as it will impair your inferencing. That said, we all have our own cost and reward functions...

embedding-shape 6mo ago
Assuming brains work like computers, maybe yeah, that'd make sense :) You also won't know what's a signal vs noise until you've read and tried to understand it, and at that point you've already read it. Besides, something could be "noise" at the point you read it, but be a "signal" in a completely different context and/or time.

felixyz 6mo ago

Your information diet. Social media. Gossipy and negative people. Mulling over old failures/regrets/slights etc. The mind is easily pulled along by negativity and outrage... as can be observed in our current global psychological state.

embedding-shape 6mo ago
All those are fine, as long as you're able to process it in a healthy way after. I guess personally I focused more on bettering that processing, as sometimes you don't get to control what information you get served, so at least it works in all cases.
- scrollaway 6mo ago
  Don’t be so optimistic about your ability to “process information healthily”. You are more of a slave to your instincts than you think and can’t always know whether you’re actually doing a good job at this— literally, it’s not possible to faithfully introspectively this.
  - embedding-shape 6mo ago
    > Don’t be so optimistic about your ability to “process information healthily”. Don't be so pessimistic about your own ability to control how you process information, you can control this a lot more than you think, apparently.
    - scrollaway 6mo ago
      I wonder who will fare better: the fools who don’t know their limits, or the ones who underestimate theirs?
      - embedding-shape 6mo ago
        Considering I'm pretty much as content I could be in life, and I know others who live their life pretty much opposite from what I do, and they're also content with their life, I think there is room for both types of people to be happy and fare OK :)
      - Fricken 6mo ago
        All glory is fleeting. Death is the great equalizer.
  - a_small1 6mo ago
    The belief that you have control over your actions leads to better outcomes either way, no matter how true that is in reality. This has been found mostly with the idea of free will and internal locus of control.
- K0balt 6mo ago

xtiansimon 6mo ago

The classic thing that pollutes your brain are punk (music and Mad Magazine) and smut. I’d add “dangerous memes” such as injecting bleach to cure covid. https://www.susanblackmore.uk/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/2010-Dangerous-Memes-or-What-the-Pandorans-let-loose.pdf https://www.susanblackmore.uk/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/201...

embedding-shape 6mo ago
I guess at this point my brain must be essentially mush then, add in frequent recreational drug usage and it's a surprise I'm even able to type?
jmbwell 6mo ago
These days, I’ll take Mad magazine

engeljohnb 6mo ago

Not who you asked, but Neil Postman's "Amusing Ourselves to Death" is an excellent book about polluting your brain. As for my personal experience, internet comment sections will pollute one's brain. Filling your brain with reasonably reliable information is good, but filling it with people online just saying things isn't. For example, when 30 reddit comments all repeat the same "fact" (for which their source is other reddit comments), it can subtly work its way into your subconscious as something you know is true but can't remember where you first heard it, which is only one step away from seeming like "common knowledge." Now imagine a similar effect with a politically charged news story instead some random fun fact. Now imagine all the comments are actually just AI run by propagandists with the specific intention of making you believe things that aren't true. One way I've tried to avoid the worst effects is by being very careful to remember my source for anything I know. I never say "It turns out xyz," I only say "according to abc, xyz." It's probably not enough, I think it might be time to just get off internet forums entirely. Yes, I'm a hypocrite and yes, it's very funny.

embedding-shape 6mo ago
> it can subtly work its way into your subconscious as something you know is true I dunno, I know this is something some people struggle with, but I'm not sure how I could personally end up here. You can repeat something how many times you want, it doesn't make it true, and if anything, seeing people repeat the same "fact" like that would probably trigger the reverse in my brain, almost automatically going out of my way to disprove it while reading it. Maybe it's a matter of being connected to the internet early in my life and essentially making "Don't trust anything you read on the internet" the most important rule in processing whatever you read.
- engeljohnb 6mo ago
  Sounds like you always knew something it took me a decade to realize. > seeing people repeat the same "fact" like that would probably trigger the reverse in my brain, almost automatically going out of my way to disprove it while reading it. I think that's a very fundamental difference between you and me. I'm too lazy to fact check most of what I read. One day I decided I would never run my mouth about something unless I felt I could write a five paragraph essay about it, and now I don't run my mouth very much because apparently there aren't a lot of things I'm willing to research even that much. Still, I highly recommend Amusing Ourselves to Death. It has more and better insights into stuff like this, and I seriously believe everyone should read it.

redsocksfan45 6mo ago

[dead]

hk__2 6mo ago

You’ll feel like you learned something without realizing it’s totally wrong.

embedding-shape 6mo ago
But that's just "learning", doesn't matter if what you learn is totally wrong or totally right. Some things we learn are right when we learn them, but wrong at a later point. And then it's more learning once you learn that it's right or wrong, or maybe it's a bit wrong in that case, but mostly wrong in another, or it oscillates between wrong/right depending on year, location or even mood. There are no universal truths anyways, might as well just roll with it :)
- hk__2 6mo ago
  It does matter, because it can affect your whole life. If tomorrow I learn that apples cause cancer and eating plastic is good for my stomach I’ll change my habits and quickly have some issues ;) > There are no universal truths anyways Of course there are.
  - embedding-shape 6mo ago
    But just because someone told you that, doesn't mean you need to operate by that? You can still have your own understanding, follow your own way :) The context here was that it's somehow "dangerous" as in information can "pollute" your brain, just because you read it.
    - hk__2 6mo ago
      I gave an example about something easy to verify, but things become harder about niche things where it’s not easy to just search on Google to check.

jxf 6mo ago

> What are some other things that you think "pollutes your brain"? Moderating posts on a public (or worse, private) forum. You will see some truly heinous, vile things.

embedding-shape 6mo ago
I did that a long time ago, moderating forum categories like pedophilia, drug usage, suicide ideation and a bunch of others. Even ended up moderating a thread where a forum user committed suicide while live streaming it to forum members and the public, made big news at the time. Still don't think my mind is polluted from it, although I've certainly seen, read and heard a lot of "sick" stuff through my years on the internet.

ralfd 6mo ago

> What are some other things that you think "pollutes your brain"? Horror movies. They are going straight to the amygdala but there are no vampires or zombies being afraid of. The nightmare fuel of my childhood prepared me wrong.

LastTrain 6mo ago

> My direction always been to fill it with as wide array of information as possible, the more different from existing information the better. Clearly.

embedding-shape 6mo ago
Wanna expand? I don't understand what you mean, but I want to.