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Language: en
the amount of pleasure that you will
eventually experience is directly Rel
related excuse me to how much pain you
experience so we know this from actually
what nowadays would be considered quite
barbaric and unethical experiments where
they would give people electrical shocks
and they would measure their response
and then they'd say we're going to
increase it we're going to increase it
eventually they get to the point where a
slight shock that was previously very
painful actually evokes a sense of
pleasure now you couldn't do these
experiment anymore these are not the
experiments I do in my lab these are
older experiments but for instance and
this has been discussed in scientific
research papers giving somebody a like a
10-minute ice bath for instance or even
a three-minute ice bath or a one minute
ice bath is quite painful but there was
a study from University of Prague a
European Journal of physiology showed
that after a painful ice bath stimulus
the amount of dopamine release goes up
for 2 and 1/2 hours to 250% above
Baseline and that not because the ice
bath itself evokes dopamine release a
lot of people think oh cold water evokes
dopamine release No Pain evokes dopamine
release after the pain is over yesterday
I tweaked my back because I do this
stupid thing every few years the same
stupid thing and it it's really painful
and then you just remember all the ways
in which you can't move around I was
like standing up this saring I'm like H
and just walking is so painful as the
pain has started to dissipate you get a
little bit of a high right you get a
little bit of a Euphoria that's dopamine
because of the the degree of pain you
experienced previously predicts how much
pleasure so when you start a company
down in the drgs and you're shoveling
again that's beautiful because that
means that the win that you achieve is
going to be as good or greater than the
one you had previously in your case with
Quest and so we go back to this example
of the person that's not motivated that
can't get off the couch that's doesn't
want to do anything well this is the
problem we remember the rat experiment
they are effectively the rat with no
dopamine but they can still achieve some
sense of pleasure by consuming excess
calories by consuming social media and
look I'm not judging I do this stuff too
right scrolling social media if you've
ever scrolled social media and you're
like I don't even know why I'm doing
this it doesn't really feel that good
and I can remember a time where you'd
see something it was just so cool or
you'd see something online I remember
this when TED Talks first came out I was
like this is amazing these are some at
least some of them are really smart
people sharing really cool insights and
then now that they're like a gazillion
in TED Talks I remember spending a
winter in my office at when I was a
junior Professor cleaning my office
finally and binging TED talks in the
background thinking this is a good use
of my time pretty soon they all sucked
to me I was like this isn't good so what
you need to do is stop watching TED
talks for a while wait and then they
become interesting again and that's this
pain pleasure balance and so for people
that aren't feeling motivated the
problem is they're not motivated but
they're getting just enough or excess
sustenance so they're getting the little
mild hits of opio it becomes an opioid
system and if you think about the opioid
drugs as opposed to dopam dopaminergic
drugs dopaminergic drugs make people
rabid for everything you know drugs of
abuse like cocaine and amphetamine make
people incredibly outward directed right
they hardly notice anything except what
they want more of more more more more
more it's very it's bad because those
drugs trigger so much dopamine release
that they become the reward it's very
circular the only the drug can give that
much dopamine nothing they could pursue
would give them as much dop imun is the
drug
itself so there's that and then there's
the kind of opioid like effects of
constantly indulging oneself with social
media or with video games or with u with
food or with anything to the point where
it no longer evokes the motivation and
craving and this is really the New
Evolution of the understanding of of
dopamine in neuro in Neuroscience which
is that dopamine itself is not the
reward it's the buildup to the reward
and the reward has more of a kind of
opioid Bliss likee property which itself
is not bad if it's endogenous released
from within but when we can just sit
there like the like the rat with no
dopamine gorging ourselves with
Pleasures so to speak what you end up
with is somebody that feels really
unmotivated and those Pleasures no
longer work to tickle those Feelgood
circuits and so there's no reason for
them to go out and pursue anything and
that's a pretty dark picture so the the
keys are to pursue rewards but
understand that the pursuit is actually
the reward if you want to have repeated
wins okay you the celebration has to be
less than the pursuit and that's hard
for some people to do they you know they
it's got to be that your celebration is
slightly less
dopaminergic it can be very reflective
you can be in gratitude those are other
neurotransmitter systems but you don't
want to be on that high as you celebrate
the win you want to be trickling out
your dopamine regularly until you pursue
things and then just understand there
will always be a crash of pain and the
more pain you experience the more
dopamine you can achieve if you get back
on the Avenue of pursuit yeah this gets
into unintended consequences of
modernity and so we're living through
this time where we you know going back
to that flag that we planted of these
unintended consequences of oh I can make
myself smell good oh I can you know
watch the coolest video oh like Tik Tok
dude I don't have an addicted
personality that's the first thing where
I'll lose an hour and be like what the
[ __ ] did I just do well that's the the
problem is not Pleasures the problem is
that pleasure experienced without prior
requirement for Pursuit yes is terrible
for us it's terrible for us as
individuals it's terrible for us as as
groups and I I have great confidence in
the human species to work this out but
we are finding now and we are going to
increasingly find that those who will be
successful young or old are going to be
those people who can create their own
internal buff offers they're going to be
able to control their relationship to
Pleasures because the proximity to
pleasures and the availability is the
problem if you look at the increase in
uh use of uh drugs of abuse or
prescription medication which at least
at the first path deliver pleasure pain
relief the whole issue with the opioid
crisis and and dopaminergic drugs like
ralin
adderal you know there sometimes is a
clinical need but tons of people are
taking those recreationally now or to
study huge dopamine increases are what
those cause that is a problem that's a
serious problem because it creates a
cycle where you you need more of that
specific thing I always say addiction is
a progressive narrowing of the things
that bring you pleasure God that's such
a good definition and you know and I
don't like to comment too much on
enlightenment because you know I don't
really know what that is as a
neurobiologist but a good life we could
say is a progressive expansion of the
things that bring you pleasure and even
better is a good life is a progressive
expansion of the things that bring you
pleasure and includes pleasure through
motivation and hard work and
understanding this pain pleasure balance
whereby If you experience pain and you
can continue to be in that friction and
and exert effort the rewards are that
much greater when they arrive and so I
think that if you look at any drug of
abuse or any situation where somebody
isn't motivated or thinks now they may
have clinically diagnosed attention
deficit hyperactivity disorder but a lot
of what people think is ADHD it turns
out is people just overc consuming
dopamine from various sources and then
then and also the context within a a Tik
Tok feed is the context switch is insane
the brain has never seen first of all
this is the first time in human
evolution that we wrote with our thumbs
but that's a pretty benign shift and
then the other shift is normally you
walk from one room to another or from a
field into the trees or from a Hut into
or a house or whatever it is but now you
can get 10,000 context switches in that
30 minutes of scrolling on Instagram or
Tik Tok and so it's all about
self-regulation we are going to select
for the people that can self-regulate
and
so then people say well how do you
self-regulate how do kids self-regulate
well this is my hope and one of the
reasons I've gotten excited about public
education and teaching Neuroscience is
that this is a place where knowledge of
knowledge actually can allow oneself to
intervene when you think I'm feeling low
I don't feel good nothing really feels
that good am I depressed maybe but maybe
you're just you've saturated the
dopamine circuits you're now in the pl
Pain part of things what do you do well
you have to stop you need you need to
replenish dopamine you need to stop
engaging with this behavior and then
your pleasure for it will come back but
you have to constantly control the hinge
it's not just about being back and forth
on the Seesaw you have to make sure the
hinge doesn't get stuck in pain or in
pleasure so it's a it's a dynamic
process being a a human being it's not
easy and remember these circuits didn't
evolve for this purpose they they evolv
primarily for making more of ourselves
that's why they're so closely tied to
the reproductive circuits and that's why
it was interesting and very relevant
that you said that your desire to have
sex with your wife is one of the most
powerful feelings and it kind of as a
from a neurochemical perspective it
Wicks out into all these other Pursuits
right those other Pursuits aren't about
sex per se but it's the same molecule so
the feeling is the same it's just that
some people for some people the
amplitude of that dopamine s signal for
craving sex is very high for some people
that's lower and it's higher for um
video games you know whatever you lean
into and and you think about out often
in these Pursuits will start to reshape
these circuits because these
dopaminergic circuits are tied to
everything you know there are examples
of people getting addicted to the most
incredible things there are also
examples of people getting very good but
not addicted to chess for instance it's
all the
same general set of
mechanisms yeah you talked earlier about
um the the knowledge of knowledge and
that was the big breakthrough for me at
the darkest period of my life I happen
to grab a book we talked about this
briefly in our first interview I
happened to grab a book that talked
about neuroplasticity and they were
hypothesizing maybe this is a thing and
that gave me hope because I could
imagine what was going on in my brain
and once I can visualize it then I feel
like I can insert myself into it it's
why I've gotten so interested in health
why I'm am so interested in Neuroscience
is for me if I were sliding towards
depression I would do exactly what
you're saying I would assess that and be
like okay wait a second I know that I
can insert conscious control I know that
this is a biological experience and I'm
I'm obsessed with that idea that you're
having a biological experience and to me
like there's some people that see the
way the magic trick is done and it loses
the magic then for other people it's
like you see that it's this is somebody
that's spent 30,000 hours learning how
to move their hands so that you don't
notice that they just moved the coin you
know from this hand to this hand it's it
blows me away I I love magic uh before
the pandemic a friend took me up to the
Magic Castle Inwood and there's some
incred going on Magic is actually really
cool we could just as a from a
neuroscience perspective magic it's all
about um creating gaps in your
perception that's obvious right and when
that happens because the the brain is so
accustomed to the laws of physics like
objects fall down not up Etc when that
happens it clearly triggers the surprise
circuitry and that itself that feeling
of delight and surprise is absolutely
tied also to these dope dopamine
circuits it's interesting though that
that doesn't send us into like Terror
like that people don't it depends on the
magic trick I when I went there there
was this crazy trick that the guy did he
took out cards and I was invited up to
sit next to him I signed my name on a
card mhm I took the card I took the card
I I tore it up I put it in my pocket and
at the end of the show we went through a
series of things at the end of the show
he took off his shoe and presented the
card to me with the signature intact and
the card Inta and that was my signature
so he clearly created gaps of perception
um but at some point as adults I think
as long as we know the context is right
then we can we can do this one thing
about dopamine that I just want to make
sure I uh mentioned and it based on
something you said earlier is that one
interesting question about the brain is
we is just asking the question you know
how do we segment time how do we how do
you know that this podcast has obviously
has AIT beginning and middle and an end
but you know how do we segment time and
so there have been someti experiments
done recently showing that uh for
instance if you're watching a a sports
game regardless of whether or not your
team scores like let's say basketball
goes down Court let's say they miss the
three-pointer and then that you know
it's a close game there's a little blip
of dopamine that says that was one
segment of time and so dopamine is a big
way in which we segment time the other
way are blinks believe it or not what
yeah that every time we blink this is a
paper publish in current biology every
time we blink we reset our perception of
time understand more I guess than the
dopamine why would dopamine be involved
in time perfect question turns out that
the frequency of blinking is set by the
level Baseline level of dopamine in the
brain yes so when people are wide-eyed
with excitement and they're and they're
just they're not blinking very off but
or someone is on a drug that kicks out a
lot of dopamine they hardly ever blink
their pupils are huge they are they are
actually not segmenting time in a normal
fashion W and so much of your life in
retrospect is segmented by those Peaks
and dopamine they those mark key events
in your life when you met your wife uh
there there are all the segments of your
life are are noted by peaks in dopamine
or the way that you happen to
conceptualize dopamine and so also
people who are depressed are often very
focused on the past they rumin naturally
they default to ruminating on the past
when you adjust people's dopamine levels
to healthy levels they start becoming
more Forward Thinking and more present
and so there's this relationship between
blinking and time perception dopamine
and blinking how you conceptualize time
has a lot to do with these peaks in
dopamine and when they occur and this is
a big deal because we're you know 2020
was a rough year for most people 2021 is
feeling a little better but we don't
really know where we are in this whole
Arc of everything that's happening
there's a lot of uncertainty
yeah the dopamine Peaks and the
frequency of those dopamine Peaks have
everything to do with how we carve up
our EXP experience of time and anyone
who spent a lot of time in deep
meditation starts to develop a kind of
intuitive internal representation of the
fact that time is very fluid in this way
when we say time is fluid what we mean
is the secretion of dopamine in these
pulses is very fluid they are under
control of our of what's Happening
externally but also how you
conceptualize your life like where are
you in your life are you know hopefully
we if David Sinclair has his way and
hopefully he will we will all live to be
you know more than 100 years old
hopefully in good Vitality so this is
the more esoteric aspect of dopamine
real fast before we move about the time
thing let me ask you so there was a
period in my life I'll Peg it at about 2
years where for whatever reason I it
could have been 6 hours since I last
looked at a clock I would be within 3
minutes of what time it was and my wife
found it hilarious and so she'd be like
what time is it and I'm like oh it's
4:5 it was so weird that it like made my
radar is like oh my God I have like this
special power and then it went away and
now I can probably get you within 15
minutes but like uh it was really eerie
is is there does that make a prediction
or around like a consistency of dopamine
release or something yeah you nailed it
it's the consistency that's an internal
it's an Interval Timer as we say so when
people's dopamine is low they tend to
overestimate okay okay and when people's
dopamine is high they tend to
underestimate time now it is true that
dopamine when it's released is a little
bit of a stimulant in the system because
of the way it works with epinephrine how
finely you slice time is very dependent
on dopamine and your internal level of
autonomic arousal really good example
would be you're really excited about
something or you're really stressed
about something doesn't matter dopamine
is elevated in excitement but
norepinephrine epinephrine tend to be
elevated anytime we're agitated or or
excited just imagine you need to catch a
flight you're in line at this security
and the person in front of you seems
like they're going really really slowly
your frame rate is faster you're just
carving up time more finely people who
are in car accidents and then they
report everything being in slow motion
your frame rate is is smaller you're
you're essentially getting you're taking
larger time bins and this is why let's
say you wake up and you're really tired
or you just you're kind of out of it and
you look at it's like text messages and
emails and all this stuff the world
seems like it's going by really really
fast dopamine is what is the Dy is the
dynamic process by dopamine release I
should say is the dynamic process by
which you adjust time perception so if
you had a very keen perception of the
passage of time right down to the minute
or so that suggests very regular
intervals of dopamine release and that's
probably tied to outside events that are
below your conscious awareness but uh
dopamine releases I I sort of not to
make this uh PG-13 or R rated but if we
go back to the example of sex sex and
sleep are the two times when space and
time have a very fluid type relationship
it's very hard to conceive space and
time in sleep that's actually the nature
of sleep is we do the long blink no joke
we close the shutters stop bringing in
external information and in sleep space
and time are very fluid right things can
happen very fast or very slow slow
motion you can be flying it there's a
lot of you know some of it is dreaming
but space and time are very fluid in
wakefulness space and time are very
anchored by physical events in the world
but our perception of those is
dynamically regulated by how much
dopamine is in our system so it's
beginning to sound like dopamine does
everything but it's really associated
with motivation craving and time
interval keeping and so I would be
willing to bet that your pulses of
dopamine were very regular just like
drops so interesting if you like that
clip check out the full powerful episode
here and I'll see you there