I don't like knee-jerk reactions and low hanging fruit

1/16/2025

There's certain stimuli or contexts that trigger the same reaction or thoughts instantly in everyone's brain.

For some reason, one of my biggest pet peeves is when people give in to those thoughts — or are ignorant/lack self-awareness to the fact that they're giving in to them.

Responding to world events or headlines

can you believe _____ said/did this?

A cool YouTube channel called CGP Grey has a good video about this, but things that make people angry are very good on going viral.

Sending an emotionally charged video in a group chat is like sneezing in a crowded elevator without covering your face.

Apply some meta-cognition

Think about your thoughts

You are not the voice inside your head

If you feel a sneeze coming, put your elbow up or something

Basically, if a video or article was clearly designed to make you angry — and you actually got angry, I think you're a sucker.

Low hanging fruit in conversations

• I don't like asking people questions they probably get all the time

• I don't like answering the same question all the time

  • this was my motivation for writing down what I do for work
    • so when people ask me this I can just send them the link

I understand some repetitive questions are unavoidable.

I understand small talk serves a genuine social purpose.

• At some point, you sort of need to learn where someone is from and what they do for work, but at least most people are self aware that this is a repetitive question.

Scripted conversations

During my exchange year in Germany in 2016, I noticed that a lot of conversations with friends at school or with my host family were identical to conversations I'd already had back home — almost line for line.

This made me think:

• oh that's cool, check out these examples of unifying conversations of the human experience and whatnot that crosses geographies and cultures
• hmm, humans are pretty unoriginal and say the same stuff as everyone else and don't realize it
  • or don't realize to what extent it's true

My go-to example for this is during pandemic vaccine era, I could almost close my eyes and hear the millions of conversations world-wide that followed pretty much this exact script:

Person A: which vaccine did you get?

Person B: Moderna

A: ah ok yea I got Pfizer

B: haha, at least we got these and not AstraZeneca

A: haha yea, I don't even know anyone who got that one, what's up with that?

B: <low hanging fruit joke about AstraZeneca>

Participation in these scripted conversations is inevitable, but more people should at least recognize these as closer to small social rituals rather than original dialogue. I know this point is somewhat derivative and already made fun of by office space.

I hope Gen Z can finally break free of the cringey back-to-work-after-the-holidays comments.

Knee-jerk reactions in conversation

I preface a lot when I'm talking.

A lot of times, this prefacing is because my brain constantly evaluates and predicts what people's knee-jerk reactions to what I'm saying are going to be — and I feel the need to get ahead of them.

• This actually stems from conversations with a certain ex girlfriend - hello if you read this, we can talk about it if you want
  • I noticed that when I'd talk, she'd have some initial reaction to something I said in the middle of a story and her brain would get stuck on that, no matter if details that followed in the story resolved what she got stuck on
    • so I started predicting what she would have a reaction to and feel the need to cushion it with something like a 'this next bit might make you think/feel X, but just hold on'

remember those annoying kids in college lectures who'd ask about things obviously on the next slide

I never understood if those people thought they were being 'on top of it'

So much of communication follows a conflict->resolution structure.

Have some awareness to realize the direction the resolution is going in. If after the resolution is delivered something is still left unsolved within you, that's when its your turn.

other knee-jerks

• pulling your phone out immediately when an artist comes out at a concert
• pulling your phone out immediately when you come up on a nice viewpoint or sunset

The taking your phone out isn't inherently bad and gets talked about enough.

I'm focusing on the fact that I think people don't apply some meta-cognition to really evaluate whether they're taking their phones out because they actually want to take a picture or video or just because its the first thought that came in racing in their mind.

I say this because I don't think anyone is immune to these thoughts. I get the same thought every time I'm at a concert, but then I think about it for .2 seconds and decide for myself if I want to go through with the action my brain has suggested to me or veto it.

I guess this all boils down to npc habits

Conversations that carry more entropy are more interesting.

If both what people say and how people react are totally predictable because they constantly run on their brain's autopilot, then the whole interaction seems more npc-like.