Irresistible by Jacob Mahmood

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Meeting 1 Date: 2/7/24
Pages / Section: 1-68

Meeting 2 Date: 2/16/24
Pages / Section 69-147

Meeting 3 Date: 3/3/24
Pages / Section: 148-263

Meeting 4 Date: 3/12/24
Pages / Section: 264-320

NOTES

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Section/Pages: 69 - 147
Members Present: All

Discussion Highlights:
- Blake brought up the topic about the impact of technology addiction on mental health, relationships, productivity, and well being overall. He mentioned how Alter explains how a person slowly “deteriorates” as they spend more and more time on technology.
- Mahmood counterclaimed Blake stating how technology is very beneficial to humans when used moderately. He said how technology is just easy access to information that we didn’t previously have. He claimed that there is little difference between looking at information on your phone and from a book.
- To build off of what Blake said, Brian brought up F451. He claimed how the overuse of technology would lead to a dystopia, similar to that of the society in F451. Books hold information that has been passed on for generations, and the internet is a dangerous place where you can be tricked into believing false information. He agreed with Blake on how people’s brains are slowly turning into mush.
- Doran jumped in to bring up a great scenario where everybody overused technology. He said that if we continue to rely too heavily on technology, we will lose all real life skills. He asked the rest of the group, “What would happen if suddenly all the power went out and we were left with no technology?”
- Abrusci gave this scenario a more real life aspect. He said that a world war, or terrorist attack could happen that knocks out all the power in our country. If we rely too heavily on technology, we can be left helpless and vulnerable when a tragedy occurs. The whole group agreed that we can’t rely too heavily on technology, and that we need to have real life skills too.

Agenda Topic 1

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The impact of technology addiction on mental health

Agenda Topic 2

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Relationships being destroyed by technology usage

Agenda Topic 3

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What is the best solution to stopping the overuse of technology?

MEETING REFLECTION

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1. If we rely too heavily on technology, we can be left helpless and vulnerable when a tragedy occurs. The whole group agreed that we can’t rely too heavily on technology, and that we need to have real life skills too.
2. We decided that each of us was going to try to come up with a plan to stop technology addiction from spreading. Next meeting we will converge and find the best strategy for fixing this problem.
3. As a group, we were able to all put in our own point of view of this section. We all came to the agreement that we too are becoming addicted to technology and we need to do something to stop that,

NOTES

25245jm — 2024-01-30 16:51:24 UTC

Section/Pages:147-170

Members Present: All

Discussion Highlights:

-Video games, apps, and social media all use manipulative strategies to enhance their views and get them addicted.

- These techniques/strategies include:

Goal Setting
Feedback
Progress
- Luke mentioned how games like Super Mario Bros use progress to get users addicted.
- They also use escalation and increasing difficulty to get users to keep playing ex. Tetris

- They use cliffhangers to get people to keep thinking about the game and/or movie.

- The energy system / virtual money gets users to spend money to keep playing the game.

- People continue to seek dopamine hits similar to gambling/drugs.

How do they get users addicted?

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What are common strategies used to entice users?

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How do these technological addictions compare to those of gambling/drugs?

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MEETING REFLECTION

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They create games and apps that are fun and are long enough to get users to come back and use them more.
We found out how they use manipulative strategies to get people addicted. We concluded that there were 3 main strategies: Goal Setting, Feedback, and Progress.
They can involve money, people spending money on games for more points or lives. All of them involve people seeking a high, a hit of dopamine/excitement.

NOTES

25245jm — 2024-01-30 16:51:24 UTC

Section/Pages: 171-316
Members Present: All

Discussion Highlights:
-In this chapter, Alter describes how cliffhangers can have significant effects on people
-Cliffhangers leave people wanting more, and may lead them to developing theories for certain T.V. shows or stories that they have seen
-Lucas spoke about how cliffhangers in movies have kept him wondering what could have happened next
-Everyone in the group spoke about how cliffhangers can lead to people becoming more interested in a topic, but if that interest becomes too powerful, then it may lead to an addiction

Agenda Topic 1

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Why do authors and directors make cliffhangers in books and movies?

Agenda Topic 2

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Are cliffhangers created to make people more addicted to a certain topic?

Agenda Topic 3

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How are people able to stop themselves from becoming addicted to a certain topic or interest?

MEETING REFLECTION

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1. We all discussed the dangers of becoming too interested in something.

2. As a group, we went over why movies use cliffhangers, and what makes them work.

3. We realized why movies use cliffhangers, it is because they want people to become more interested in them, and to make sure that they will watch the next one.

Irresistible/ Adam Alter

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NOTES

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Section/Pages:

Members Present:

Discussion Highlights:

- Addictive technology is slowly taking up people’s lives

- Fixing the problem of blue light would be beneficial to our health

- Large business owners limiting screen time of their kids really shows how bad they think what they’re doing is

-This section really shows how similar our phones are to actual drugs

Agenda Topic 1

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How do you think the fact that large technological creators and business owners limiting the screen time of their kids reflects the products they are making?

Agenda Topic 2

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Reflect on the screen time and behavioral addiction we currently have and how it reflects the ideas about behavioral addiction in the book.

Agenda Topic 3

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Find was to fix the problems of blue light and discuss.

MEETING REFLECTION

25245jm — 2024-01-30 16:51:24 UTC

1. This sections introduces the theme of the text very well. It is scary to see that all the top technology gurus limit the technology use of themselves and their children. This is a strong use of ethos that greatly influenced our groups opinion on technology. It gave all of the ideas which we agreed on that technology must be bad. This use of rhetoric also shows how prevalent rhetoric will be in the text which is one of the reasons we decided to pick up this book.
2. We all agreed that our phones feel like drugs to us because they follow the six ingredients of behavioral addiction Alter mentioned. This shows the relatability of the text in our lives especially with new addictive applications like Tik Tok.
3. Our discussion of fixing the problems of blue light was not the fruitful with everyone having trouble to come up with nuanced ideas however the exercise itself was a cool idea and everyone still seamed to enjoy it. We only really focused on the benefits of it not specific ideas.

RULE 1

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ONLY JACOB Gets to change the background

RULE 2

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Be Safe

RULE 3

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Have Fun

MEMBERS

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Name: Jacob Mahmood

Email: 25245JM@chaminade-hs.org

Name: Blake Donahue

Email: 25426bd@chaminade-hs.org

Name: Lucas Abrusci

Email: 25002la@chaminade-hs.org

Name: Luke Doran

Email: 25110ld@chaminade-hs.org

Name: Brian Reilly

Email: 25438br

Name: Tristan Schellenberg

Email: 25353ts

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EXIT SLIP

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https://forms.gle/RrCGrsFtKgTWKQr96

BOOK CLUB PROMPTS

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