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Comment by andrewstuart2 | Hacker News Reader

There's no way I'm the only one wary of the moral implications of trying to addict your users without their knowledge and for a profit. It just seems like the most self-centered possible way of using your skills when you don't care at all whether it's going to destroy lives as long as it brings their cash to your (and/or your investors') bank account.

I have no problem with helping people understand how to use their brain chemistry to help themselves do things they want to do. This, however, just feels so bad for the human race as a whole.

I guess what I'm saying is that it makes me sad that this happens and that people are okay with doing it.

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Scott Alexander wrote this about Vegas:

>Las Vegas doesn’t exist because of some decision to hedonically optimize civilization, it exists because of a quirk in dopaminergic reward circuits, plus the microstructure of an uneven regulatory environment, plus Schelling points. A rational central planner with a god’s-eye-view, contemplating these facts, might have thought “Hm, dopaminergic reward circuits have a quirk where certain tasks with slightly negative risk-benefit ratios get an emotional valence associated with slightly positive risk-benefit ratios, let’s see if we can educate people to beware of that.” People within the system, following the incentives created by these facts, think: “Let’s build a forty-story-high indoor replica of ancient Rome full of albino tigers in the middle of the desert, and so become slightly richer than people who didn’t!” [http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/07/30/meditations-on-moloch/]

Moral qualms will be crushed by competitive dynamics. I'm pretty afraid of this addiction arms race, especially with the coming rise of VR.

>“Let’s build a forty-story-high indoor replica of ancient Rome full of albino tigers in the middle of the desert, and so become slightly richer than people who didn’t!”

One could argue that the value added here is the environment. Otherwise most peoples' dopaminergic reward circuits will not erroneously evaluate slot machines in an empty desert positively.

What exactly is the difference between vegas and any other kinds of entertainment that could possibly be addictive then? (WoW or other MMORPGs, tetris, board games...)

The biggest difference with Vegas is the direct relationship between time and energy spent gaming and money spent. The Skinner Box phenomenon is directly harnessed to empty peoples' wallets in a way that you don't see as completely with other forms of addictive games and entertainment.

For example, I spend the same on an MMO subscription no matter how often I play.

This is obviously a moral gray area. Anything can be addictive. How much is too much? But I do feel that things like scientifically designed gambling are certainly on the dark side of the divide.

I'm also concerned about it, but I'll give you a slightly more optimistic possibility:

I wonder if, over time, this addiction arms race might not harden us a little bit against these cognitive blind spots?

I have absolutely no idea if this is plausible, but it is generally the nature of a Red Queen's race.

Which doesn't make sense to me, given that:

A) We already educate people about addictive behaviors, and it's not that effective, and

B) If you're going to allow potentially-addictive gambling at all, you probably want to do it in a way such that people must overcome a major barrier to engage in it, like a plane flight or a long drive, which is already accomplished by the centralization of gambling in Las Vegas.

So, the gaudy money-hungry casinos in the middle of nowhere are a lot closer to the ideal gods-eye-view casino than Scott Alexander suggests.

(Not to mention the ecosystem around entertainment there that has produced positive-sum results like magic shows and boxing matches.)

>A) We already educate people about addictive behaviors, and it's not that effective

It's a complex subject that we do a poor job of addressing.

The moral problem may be when the value provided does not match the cost (in this case to the slot user). Just because a slot machine is able to rewire some neural circuitry in the user so that he thinks the value matched the cost...doesn't mean it actually does.

It's as immoral as selling a car for 10x an appropriate price, by not voluntarily revealing a critical flaw. Both involve "cheating" someone based off a sort of information/computation asymmetry.

Addicting someone's brain in way that creates value (e.g. getting them to exercise) is obviously worth a significant cost - and I'm totally ok with someone making a profit on that!

To expand a bit - in the car selling example, it's an information asymmetry, known and ignored by the seller.

In the slot example, it's an "information-computation asymmetry" - the slot machine literally knows how you think and is pushing your psychological buttons in order to cheat you. It's even rewiring your brain (your dopamine response AKA your computation) so that it can push your buttons more effectively.

In both cases, the "cheater" is enabling and taking advantage of asymmetry. They are explicitly harming the other party in a way that benefits them.

(If you have a better term than information-computation asymmetry I'd love to know what it is!)

My family has several addicts in it. Some recovered, some not. Whenever you ask them "why?," it's usually "because it makes me feel normal." This is the re-wiring. Your body just becomes used to the dopamine party, and you feel kinda crummy when the dopamine is gone. The only way to get back to feeling normal is to do the addictive behavior. Left untreated for a long enough time, this can be a big factor in clinical depression.

It's not that it's bad for the human race. Betting has been going on since "I bet I can throw this rock further than you". It's probably older than prostitution. Much like alcohol, there's this "yeah we can ban it, but people will still do it, so we might as well collect money and regulate them, and try to treat the addicted"

It's the same argument when it comes to legalizing cannabis -- people are just going to smoke it, no matter your personal opinion on whether or not it's a good idea. The state is better off regulating for safety, legitimizing the business, and collecting taxes to offset the perceived social harm.

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I'd counter that the definition of a consumer product is to trade a product with the consumer -- you provide something of value to them (the product), they provide something of value to you (the money).

I suppose the implication with addiction (and its analogies here) are that they provide a way to get something of value from the consumer (money) without providing them any value in return -- only the illusion of value. Its not to say that all addictive products are inherently value-less -- but that their perceived value is far greater than their actual value -- by design (with the perception being driven by addiction).

Your specific point -- that endorphin hit you get is a social reinforcement for a positive contribution to the community of Hacker News. Its not an addiction by design -- its using our internal wiring as it was intended (social contribution makes us feel happy)

I would add a caveat though that in some cases the addiction itself is a form of value.

Broccoli that is as addictive as chocolate might be more inherently valuable than normal broccoli - since consumers of it are more likely to keep eating it and stay healthier, and so it could be sold for a premium to those who value that.

Though if it later sold for as much as cocaine because of withdrawal symptoms...I would consider that a problem!

Not sure that was a counter as much as agreement, based on parent's comment after the quote :-)

EDIT: now I'm confused. The comment I thought you were replying to appears to be a different comment now and the original deleted. Maybe I'm going crazy.

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