Brian > Recent Status Updates

I got through quite quickly. This book is *so* light on content. More on what I skipped discussing here in the review.

His solution is wilderness programs. He peddles the one he runs. He also encourages parents to get more riled up by spreading the word and getting political about this.

"Is having a rewired brain ... worth the potential for developing impulse-control disorders—like addiction and ADHD—not to mention more serious psychiatric and developmental disorders, such as schizophrenia and autism?"

I have been avoiding profanity so far, but exploiting ADHD and autism is too much. F*** you, Dr. Kardaras. This is despicable. I will be posting percentages only until you talk "treatment".

Finally, one article that I have not seen covered elsewhere. Problem is, it doesn't measure prevalence of gaming addiction. It just describes differences between "compulsive video game players" and "non-gamers". These are Dr. Kardaras' words.

Is every chapter going to start with an anecdote? These would be great if the author presented any research to illuminate us as to the actual presence of this issue. Here, they are just manipulative substitutes for data that for all we know does not exist.

And here's where I will stop for now. Ugh.

A journal with "Waldorf Library" in its name does not count as an unbiased source, Dr. Kardaras.

An eight-year-old child saying “I like Minecraft better than my homework." is neither scary nor surprising. How many eight-year-old actually like homework? Would people saying “I like playing out better than my homework" mean that outdoor play should be banned for them?

And by the way, the aforementioned kids are *not* dead. They are playing a game.

"Other parents have become “Minecraft widows,” lamenting that they have lost their children to the insidious game..."

First, this is another anecdote. Second, a parent who *actually* loses a child to some fatal event is not a "widow". The fact that they are referring to themselves as such is more than a little creepy.

The book quotes a supposed "Commander Dr. Doan of the U.S. Navy" to suggest that video game makers hire "the best neurologists and neuroscientists" to "hook up electrodes to the test-gamer" to measure neurological responses and make sure that every game raises blood pressure -- "typically 180 over 120 or 140 within a few minutes of playing". I will discuss in my review why this is horsecrap.

From the book: "It’s a profound question: do kids who create gaming avatars suffer from a version of multiple personality disorder? Are they becoming digital Sybils?"

Do I need to even comment on the difference between an alter-ego and an alternate personality? They are different. Mark Felt ("Deep Throat") is not Norman Bates from "Psycho".

From the book. "Today, 97 percent of all American children between the ages of 2 and 17 play video games."

My father once mentioned that many people use statistics like a drunkard uses a lamppost: for support but not illumination. Mr. Kardaras is one such drunkard -- this statistic is unsurprising and tells us nothing.

While I cannot say that *no* mother would be unhappy to see her child play outside, I can certainly say that no mother I have ever met would react as the author describes. That's the problem with anecdotes: they describe and reflect individuals, not populations.

"gaming-induced psychosis (also called Game Transfer Phenomena [GTP] or the “Tetris Effect”)"

I'm not even done with the first chapter, and I can already tell Mr. Kardaras is a liar. The Tetris Effect is *not* psychosis -- a form of it is prized in mathematics.

The quote on the first page is utterly fatuous. It may be elegant, but no philosopher in any age would concern himself with the relative dangerousness of various types of wronged men.

"The mesa was like a ship becalmed in a strait of lion-coloured dust"...I wonder what that might signify?,,,

This book is superlatively good!

The therapist's response to a clearly threatening note: "This is cryptic, maybe even menacing."
What. The. Heck.

I've just started Chapter 2. Aside from the fact that it seems the entire book is going to be one gigantic load of schmaltz, nothing particularly horrible has come up

If this text were food, it would be stale gruel flavored with aspartame and artificial flavoring.

It's like reading translated Ancient Egyptian texts, only infinitely less interesting.

All the sentences are short and clipped. No thought is given to eloquence, and the errors seem to indicate that the author has some difficulty expressing herself.

From the book: "There's a hesitation in her voice that stings me." What the heck is this supposed to mean?

Currently reading section on duplication of the cube. It is fascinating.

Currently reading section on duplication of the cube. It is fascinating.