From Combustion Chambers to Circuit Boards: What driving EVs taught me about embracing change!

Some months ago I penned down some thoughts, a vanguard defence as it were, of why I still drive manual transmission cars. Pretty heartfelt stuff. Pretty irrelevant too since most cars being sold now are automatics. Recently I've gotten my hands on a car with an electric powertrain. Which means no gears, instant torque on tap and no noise. It's been a pretty strange experience. Which meant I had to pen some thoughts on that as well. Me being me, I search for underlying mental models. Not so surprisingly, even when it comes to the prickly topic of ICE vs EV, some are evident.

I feel modern day EVs/HEVs/PHEVs differ fundamentally in their approach to driving experience than traditional ICE cars. How they look at driving itself is different. The former wants to isolate you from the road, the latter wants to connect you to the road. I'm not judging. Neither is good or bad. Just that the approach is fundamentally different. To use the “Amazonian” term, two different mental models.

This shift is perhaps most tangibly felt in the evolution of the gear shifter, which has transitioned from a mechanical instrument of engagement to a digital prompt. In a traditional manual transmission, the gear lever is an extension of the gearbox itself. The "thump" you feel when slotting into gear, the mechanical resistance, the audible click, the vibration traveling up the stick. It is a direct, physical handshake between the driver and the engine’s internals. It confirms that the gear has locked, grounding the driver in the reality of the machine's state. It's raw, it's visceral. As we moved toward the DCT (dual-clutch transmission) and it's more advanced CVT (Continuous Variable Transmission) and automatic era, that connection began to soften. The physical urgency of a hard mechanical lock was replaced by a smoother, more deliberate motion, often mediated by cables and electronics. While still mechanical in spirit, the act became less about commanding a cog to engage and more about selecting a state of operation. In fact, for a DCT, you still feel some of the connect. The sensation of the clutch engaging and gear changing is still there, it's just softened and not so visceral. In fact, the DCT developed as a need for the driver to feel some tactile feedback over the very delayed reaction of an AMT (automated manual transmission). CVT takes it further by removing the need for a clutch to be engaged at all. This is reflected in the user input. CVTs don't need a “gear shifter” so the “toggle” which still sometimes resembles a stick, doesn't feel so connected to the whole system. Today, in the EV/HEV paradigm, the "gear shifter" is frequently reduced to a rotary knob, a push-button array, or a stalk mounted on the steering column. The tactile feedback has been abstracted away; the physical sensation of "shifting" is gone, replaced by a satisfying but ultimately cosmetic click. This shift mirrors the broader transition in automotive philosophy: we have moved from manipulating a mechanical linkage to sending a digital signal. The driver is no longer commanding a physical force but rather confirming an intent to the vehicle's computer, prioritizing the clean, buttoned-up composure of the cabin over the visceral, clunky honesty of the machine. Come to the cabin experience. Even inside the cabin, this transition is evident. In cabins for cars as advanced and premium as the Corolla Cross, the ICE impact is evident. It's a mechanical device. The infotainment system is large, but the electronics are subservient to the machine. It's obvious you're sitting in a car with an advanced infotainment system. But it's still obvious it's a car. Cut to EVs/PHEVs coming out of the Chinese ecosystem. It's as if the shackles of restraint are thrown away. There's no pretense at masking the digitization. You step into a digital device not a mechanical one. The screen is front and centre. The steering wheel is smaller. The buttons are plush against the consoles or digitized altogether and blended into the infotainment system. The cabin experience in modern EVs extends this digital-first philosophy beyond just screens and controls. In many ICE vehicles, the interior architecture is defined by the central tunnel, which is a necessary housing for the transmission and exhaust components. This creates a distinct separation, a cocoon for the driver and passengers, reinforcing the idea of a machine built around the drivetrain. In contrast, the absence of these mechanical components in most dedicated EV platforms allows for a "flat floor" architecture. The transmission tunnel disappears, liberating the cabin floor space and turning the interior into an open lounge. This spatial shift from the intimate, cockpit-like feel of a performance ICE car to the expansive, airy interior of an EV is the most immediate physical manifestation of the powertrain's removal from the cabin environment. Furthermore, the sensory landscape inside is fundamentally altered. In an ICE car, the cabin is an acoustic chamber designed to manage the engine’s presence. You hear the idle, the revs, and the thrum of the motor, all of which provide constant, albeit often filtered, feedback on the engine's load. Engineers spend years tuning the sound to be pleasant, sporty, or authoritative. In an EV, that primary sensory anchor is gone. The silence forces a rethink of the entire cabin atmosphere. Without the engine as a backdrop, wind noise, tire roar, and the subtle whir of electronics become the new focus, leading to cabins that feel less like a mechanical workshop and more like a serene, hermetically sealed sanctuary designed for isolation rather than engagement.

Again, I'm not judging. I'm enjoying this new experience these days. It's different. It's not like driving a car at all. I sometimes miss that thrum, that thump, that feeling of connection. When you learn to drive, you learn to listen to the car's engine, the gears engaging, the sound, and the feel. That's what tells you whether you're in the right gear or at the right speed. Driving an EV is entirely different, and it will take time to adjust. It feels like a massive transition in the automobile industry: the old vs. the new. Rather than looking at it as a “loss of soul,” I'm looking at it as a “migration” of it. From the combustion chamber to the circuit board. Guess this automotive example is just a microcosm. We live in an era of constant change. AI, robotics, hyper-automation; they are fundamentally altering the way we live and work. Transformation is the new baseline. Why would something as personal as driving be left behind? Hell, I'm embracing the shift. Adieu to the visceral feeling of driving a car (albeit with nostalgia), hello to the high-tech isolation of a digital transportation device! All aboard, I say!

Wired for Worry

My wife and I take a walk every evening around our condominium complex. It’s a nice garden, lot of green, pretty flowers. This particular day was pleasant with a hint of rain in the air. Children gamboled about, other couples passed us on their evening stroll, a light breeze lent solace to a brisk walk. In these rambles around the complex we usually chat about things that interest us. My day, her day, our plans, interesting books, movies . . . The usual chitchat married couples engage in. My wife is a psychologist. And when discussing some interesting theories in her field, she made a very interesting statement - The brain is built for safety not for happiness. 

Prima facie, it felt very counterintuitive. I mean what price the pursuit of happiness? Isn’t it one of those inalienable rights enshrined in that Will Smith movie? Oh sorry, I meant in the declaration of independence of the only free country of this world? What are we all doing if not seeking happiness?

Turns out mainstream media might put this “pursuit of happiness” on a pedestal, but our biology most certainly does not. Turns out my wife was right. The brain has evolved to prioritize safety over happiness. From an evolutionary standpoint, nature has no interest in our long-term happiness or self-actualization or any of those lofty goals; its sole priority is survival and reproduction. Our ancestors survived by assuming every rustle in the bushes was a predator, not a harmless draft of wind. A caveperson who was constantly content and relaxed was eaten; the anxious, hyper-vigilant one survived to pass on his or her genes. This was primarily due to a  simple fact – the cost of being wrong was very low in the case of a false positive (Type I error) and very high in the case of a false negative (Type II error).

Scenario	Error	Outcome	Evolutionary Cost
Caveperson assumes a rustle in the bushes is a tiger when it’s just the wind.	Type I error (False Positive)	Alive, but slightly embarrassed.	Low
Caveperson assumes a rustle in the bushes is just the wind when its actually a hungry tiger	Type II error (False negative)	Dead	Terminally high

What’s more, not only is the brain geared towards safety and towards always thinking of the worst-case scenario, but it’s also built in such a way that happiness is fleeting and fear is much more permanent. 

• A negativity bias ensured survival. 
• Temporary nature of dopamine spikes meant we remained motivated to keep moving, hunting and surviving. If we were satisfied forever, we would be the neanderthal equivalent of couch potatoes. Cave potatoes.
• Immediate hijack of the amygdala by our threat-detection system meant we were always alert. If serotonin was long-lasting and cortisol/adrenaline could not over-ride it quickly, our reaction time would be high.

Essentially, happiness is something humans have to actively cultivate because our default biological hardware is optimized strictly for risk mitigation. In other words, maintaining mental well-being requires deliberate effort. It means actively working against millions of years of evolutionary programming. Jeez, that sounds like a lot of work just to fight off depression. That in itself; ironically, is a depressing thought.

But it doesn’t end there. Extending this logic further, it’s easier to be a cynic than an optimist. It’s easier to mistrust than trust. Here we came to the crux of our discussion. Safety is one thing, but active cynicism/pessimism being our default state? Really? Turns out, science says a resounding "yes." If you look under the hood, neuroscientists have a name for this design flaw: the Negativity Bias. Research shows that our brains react more intensely to negative stimuli than positive ones. In fact, a famous study by psychologist John Cacioppo revealed that the brain’s electrical activity spikes far more drastically when we look at a picture of a dead cat compared to a slice of pizza or a Corvette. We are literally hardwired to obsess over the threat. Even our social interactions are rigged. Take Error Management Theory, a framework popularized by evolutionary psychologists Martie Haselton and David Buss. They found that human cognition is designed to make safe, systematic errors to avoid costly catastrophes. For instance, their research into "cross-sex mind reading" revealed that women possess an evolved "commitment skepticism bias”. Which means they naturally underestimate a partner’s genuine commitment. Why? Because historically, trusting a liar was far more dangerous than doubting an honest person. Conversely, men over-estimated women’s sexual interest. At first glance this might seem counter intuitive. Women mistrust men but men are running around hoping for a best-case scenario of mating? Not exactly. When men systematically overestimate a woman's friendliness as sexual interest, they aren't practicing genuine, sunny optimism. In the brutal economy of natural selection, a blow to the ego or a moment of social awkwardness is just burnt toast. But missing a mating opportunity? That is a maximum-cost, catastrophic risk, the evolutionary equivalent of a house fire. The hyper-confident overestimation isn't hope; it's an aggressive risk-mitigation strategy designed to avoid the ultimate worst-case scenario: genetic extinction. Whether the brain is utilizing a woman’s default mistrust to protect against abandonment, or a man’s overestimation to protect against a missed opportunity, the operational logic remains completely unchanged. The human mind does not care about objective reality. It is a finely tuned paranoia machine, forever optimized to commit the cheapest possible mistake.

We no longer dodge predators on the savanna, but our brains treat modern social and professional stresses with the exact same life-or-death intensity. Take some very common modern-day scenarios.

• The performance review: You receive an annual review with nine glowing compliments and one piece of constructive criticism. Your brain will completely ignore the nine positives and obsess over the single negative for days. The amygdala flags that one critique as a threat to your status and tribal belonging (your job security).
• Emails with an ambiguous tone: When a manager sends a brief message like, "Come by my office when you have a minute," the default assumption is almost never, "They want to praise my work." The brain automatically fills the ambiguity with a worst-case scenario ("Am I getting fired?") to prepare you for a threat.

There’s a ton of research backed examples of this behavior – from loss aversion in behavioral economics to market routs in investment theory to the colloquial phrase – “takes years to build trust, a second to destroy it”.

So to sum up, our brain is wired for safety over happiness, what happiness we experience is fleeting, mistrust is our default state. Quite a gloom-and-doom scenario so far. Doesn’t end there though. Cut to the digital age. Take this scenario and amplify it a thousand-fold. That’s what happens when biology meets capitalism. Turns out media and news organizations discovered this long ago. They’ve been taking advantage of this biological hardwiring for some time now. Ever wonder why you see so much bad news on the internet or TV? Why true crime dramas have more TRPs than positive news of community spirit? Since we respond to it instinctively, news channels sell it to us even more aggressively. It’s a vicious cycle. Capitalism simply looked at our biological vulnerability and built a monetization model around it. A headline about a stable economy or a community garden is just "burnt toast" to your subconscious; it gets ignored. But a headline about an economic crash, a rising crime rate, or an impending crisis? That’s a potential "house fire." Your amygdala locks on, your thumb clicks, and the media company cashes an ad check. So let’s sum this up –

[Human Brain scans for danger]

       ↓ (Clicks on bad news)

[Media Platforms track engagement]

       ↓ (Realize fear/outrage = revenue)

[Algorithms amplify sensationalism]

       ↓ (Floods feed with more threats)

[Human Brain perceives world as more dangerous]

We started off in a garden with gamboling children and a light breeze. That escalated quickly. But we’re not done. This same doom loop plays out in social media as well as political campaigns. We click more on bad news even in our social media feeds, and we listen more to politicians prophesizing doom. 

A landmark 2017 study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), led by William Brady and Jay Van Bavel at New York University (NYU) attempted to study this relationship and check whether “the people around us online affect the information flow to us and whether there’s a negativity bias to the spread of information”. This was a fascinating study. ​To test this, they analyzed a massive dataset of over 560,000 tweets covering highly polarizing social and political topics (in the US): gun control, climate change, and same-sex marriage. Using established linguistic dictionaries, they categorized the words in these tweets into three distinct buckets: Exclusively Moral - Words dealing with values or duties (e.g., duty, honor, standard),  Exclusively Emotional - Words dealing with general feelings (e.g., fear, safe, alert), and Moral-Emotional - Words where morality and intense emotion fuse together (e.g., greed, hate, shame, outrage, corrupt, sin). When they tracked how these tweets were shared, they found a striking mathematical pattern. The presence of a single moral-emotional word increased the likelihood of that tweet being retweeted by 20%. If you added two moral-emotional words, the virality compounded. Conversely, tweets that used dry, purely moral arguments or generic emotional words did not see a consistent boost in sharing.

Let’s think this through. News organizations are already sensationalizing news and churning out more negativity online. To compound that, politicians are dialing up rhetoric by triggering our threat response. But to make matters worse, we do this as well! We’re churning out negative content online too! And we’re subconsciously geared to sharing it more as well! Basically, social media platforms took the media's business model and put it on steroids. This reminds me of a scene from the movie Nightcrawler starring Jake Gyllenhaal and Rene Russo. Lou Bloom (Jake Gyllenhaal) is trying to sell a bit of news to the late night segment of a local news channel where Nina (Rene Russo) is a manager. She is trying to explain what the news channel represents and what type of news bytes/videos they want to purchase. She sums it up by saying, “Think of our news cast as a screaming woman, running down the street with her throat cut”. That basically captures the essence of not just local news but news/media organizations worldwide. The movie itself is a brutal, severe indictment of the modern media landscape, but it captures an ugly, immutable truth: news and media organizations worldwide are not in the business of objective journalism. They are running a commercial enterprise optimized for a consumer base that is biologically trapped by its own survival instincts.

Like I said, doom and gloom. Is there any hope? Are we doomed to this vicious cycle? Is there nothing we can do? Again, we turn to evolutionary science. On one end of the spectrum we have our amygdala which triggers our threat response and forces our adrenal glands to churn out adrenaline/cortisol. It hijacks our brain at a moment’s notice and turns us into paranoid fearmongers; The George Costanza of our brain. On the other end of our spectrum is blind sunny optimism, the evolutionary cost of whose mistakes is fatal. The Sue Heck of our brain. The bridge between both is our neocortex. The latest development in our evolution as humans. The most advanced arsenal in our toolkit of reason. The ambulance waiting for that woman running down the street with her throat cut.

We can dive deeper into brain biology and study what the neocortex made of, its six different layers, inhibitory and excitatory neurons, the nuts and bolts. Or we can understand its history and function which is more relevant for us. The neocortex is the most recent addition to our brain structure. It is what makes us uniquely human. The neocortex increased in size in response to pressures for greater cooperation and competition in our early ancestors. The neocortex accounts for almost 80% of our total brain mass. Amongst mammals that is the highest. Chimpanzees come close with around 73%. For the vast majority of mammals, ranging from rodents to small carnivores, the neocortex averages roughly 30% to 40% of total brain volume. With this increase in size, there was greater voluntary inhibitory control of social behaviors resulting in increased social harmony. Sounds like just what we need!

Well hold on, not so fast though! Using our neocortex is a slow process. There’s a reason that the amygdala “hijacks” our brain. It wants to secure our safety first. The neocortex steps in later to analyze data, dissect facts, determine the truth and take a more nuanced, balanced approach. Think of our neocortex as our fact checker. But a fact checker is a dry, dispassionate job; and more importantly, a boring one. It really takes effort to bring in a fact checker when your amygdala is crying fire!

This brings us to the nub of my whole tirade. Is there anything we can do? Or are we stuck in this biologically imposed but capitalistically monetized doom loop of negativity and paranoia? If bad news gets created more and shared more, isn’t the answer as simple as shouting the good news even more? Amplify the positive 10x times to counter the effect of the negative already being shared? Perhaps not. I think it’ll be a losing battle. If we’re wired for worry, just blasting good news will always be an uphill battle. We’ll be battling biology with noise. What if the answer is to battle our animal instincts with our human ones? If our animal “hindbrains” are switching on our flight/fight modes too often, maybe we need to train our neocortex to ease in and switch on our rational thought processes and critical thinking skills? It’s not that easy to be honest. The problem we face today is unique. Not only are media and news organizations selling us bad news but social media is reducing our attention spans. Think back a bit and you’ll see this playing out across the last decade or so. We had movies, which turned into episodes, which turned into YouTube videos which became reels and YouTube shorts. In 2014, the average length of a music video was 3 minutes 50 seconds. Today, while the average (mathematical mean) is just over 3 minutes; the new norm for hit singles is 2 minutes 30 seconds. This is going down YoY. Streaming platforms like Spotify and Apple Music count a "play" and trigger a royalty payout once a listener hits the 30-second mark, regardless of whether the song is two minutes or five minutes long. Mathematically, if an album features twelve 2-minute tracks instead of six 4-minute tracks, it generates twice the potential revenue in the exact same amount of listening time. It’s all about the money honey! I can do a whole other piece on dopamine hits, addiction science, how social media apps are like slot machines in a casino, and reduced attention spans; but suffice it to say that our attention spans are going down. The math is clear. Why am I bringing up attention spans here? If you’re still reading this, I obviously still have your attention. I bring this up to highlight the fact that if our neocortex has to step in and fact check our animal hindbrains, if our uniquely human traits are to kick in and calm down our paranoid amygdala, our attention spans have to go up. We need the ability for focused, deep thought. We need the ability to parse information, use our critical thinking and analyze nuanced scenarios rather than classify everything as just good or bad. After all, that’s exactly what makes us human! If news and social media organizations are using monetization algorithms, we must break that cycle of addiction to reclaim our humanity.

Across the world, governments are realizing the harm that social media organizations are doing and acting on it. Australia (who pioneered this) has enacted a law to ban social media for kids under 16. The UK has recently announced a similar set of legislation which will come into effect by 2027. Ditto Indonesia and Malaysia. These are the first steps to reverse the devastating effect social media has on children’s attention spans. But we can do our bit today as well. It’s not just about social media remember? We began our dive into this rabbit hole with our tendency to be attracted to bad news. To increase our attention spans and ability for critical thinking, we need to step away from short-form content. Read books. Switch off the reels. Cease the infinite scrolls. Read articles instead of tweets. The process is going to be slow. The results are not going to be immediate. Maybe the benefits will be observed not by us but by the generations that come after us. De-addiction has a playbook. First step is to create friction; which means making it tough to access the substance you are addicted to. In this case, it’s that spike of dopamine or that morbid curiosity about bad news. Maybe the starting point is as simple as charging our phones in a room that’s different from where we sleep. Next step in the playbook is envisioning a life without addiction. If it’s smoking, think of a break without a cigarette. A party without alcohol. Prepare the mind for the options. In this case, maybe the starting point is embracing the boredom. Sit without a screen or notification. The de-addiction playbook goes on to environmental redesign. In our case it might be inhibit access to news, social media. In the latter phases, Maybe we need to create content ourselves that’s long-form. Spread the habit. Over time, I think our attention spans will go up, our ability to parse information will increase, our capacity for accepting the inherent duality of a situation will be enhanced and our polarized opinions will be more nuanced. Over time, our reactions to sensationalized news will be distaste instead of morbid curiosity.

A long road ahead of us. But I think it’s worth it. The risk is lesser revenue for social media organizations, the ecosystem of content creators who churn out short-form content, and over time news organizations who sensationalize news and media. The advantage is that we might reclaim our attention and give it back to the things that are important - actual social connections, healthy debate, nuanced perspectives, diverse opinions, and real progress.

The Stick Shift

In 2020, on average, between 30% - 40% of all cars sold were automatic transmissions. In 2025, that figure has jumped up to somewhere between 60% - 70%. In western countries like the US, automatic transmission rules the roost. Over 90% of all new cars sold are automatic transmissions. In the US, cars with manual transmissions are for racers, off-roaders and some hardcore enthusiasts only. In fact, with the advent of EVs, manual transmissions are increasingly becoming obsolete. Even in India, which has been a market where manual transmissions dominated, automatics have grown exponentially (from 20% in 2020 to almost 40% in urban markets in 2025). It's easier, more convenient and with the advent of CVTs (continuous variable transmission), doesn't really impact your mileage. A no brainer right?

I learnt driving/riding when I was 18. That's a long, long time ago in a galaxy far, far away. Since then, I've always used a stick shift for cars and the good ol' five speed or six speed gearbox for my motorcycles. Occasionally, I have driven the automatic transmission. Occasionally . . when I've rented a car or a moped on vacations. But by and large, I've stuck to my guns. Given that I am an early adopter of new technologies in almost everything, I am puzzled by my own reluctance to move to auto-mode! I was using a computer before they became ubiquitous in computer labs in school. I was using Linux before it became cool with Android. I had switched from watches to fitness trackers long before their readings became reasonably accurate. For a long time, this one remaining bastion of low-tech usage puzzled me. 

Recently, I've started to realize why though. It's not about tech at all. it's about sanity in an ever changing world. It's about a level of control that you might be missing everywhere else in life. I discovered this coincidentally, on one of my rides. To explain that, I will have to take a step back and also explain a bit about the experience of using manual transmission. Surprisingly, this is necessary as more and more people (especially young adults) have simply never used a stick shift or ridden a motorcycle with gears. The transmission (also called a gearbox) is basically a set of gears of different sizes connected together. The transmission's purpose is to transfer power from the engine to the wheels through the gears (simplistically speaking). The low gears (1st and 2nd) use a small input gear from the engine, connected to a large output gear to the wheels. This combination delivers high torque and low speed. Greater pulling force to get the vehicle moving. The high gears (5th and 6th) use a large input gear from the engine, connected to a small output gear to the wheels. This delivers low torque but high speed since the input gear has to move fewer times to turn the wheels. 

Keeping the technicals aside, as a driver/rider, two things are very important for shifting up or down successfully - the rpm and the speed. If you shift too fast at low speeds, you'll stall. If you shift too slow at high speeds, you'll redline. Both bad. And how does one know what's the optimal time to shift gears? The newbie rider is taught that certain gears have certain speeds that you must shift at. You put in 2nd gear around 10 kmph, 3rd gear around 20 kmph, 4th gear at around 40 kmph, 5th at 50 kmph and 6th beyond 60 kmph. For the most part, that holds true. That's good enough on flat roads, for average engines. But the higher you go up the displacement ladder; that doesn't really hold true. On slopes, the numbers change. And the better you get at riding, you know when to shift by the sound of the engine and the rev range. Every engine has an optimal power band; an rpm range when it delivers power and torque most efficiently. And the engine makes a different sound in this optimal rev range. It's a throaty purr. It's a satisfying fullness. For want of a better term, you can feel the engine is happy! At this rev range, the engine delivers the best mileage and yet gives optimal output. You know you've slid out of that "optimal zone" by the sound. You know you're back in the sweet spot by the sound. 

Why am I rambling on about the sound? Because that level of control takes time. It takes skill. They say you should never learn on a new machine. You are going to destroy a new machine learning it. So true. It takes time to get accustomed to each vehicle's rev range and the sweet spot for each gear. The more vehicles you ride/drive, the easier you find it. But till you get there, it's a lot of stalls and redlines and failed clutches, for which the engine is paying the price. 

For me, gears are control. They signify skill. Skill that I have acquired over two and a half decades of driving and riding. Today cars have CVTs, they have hill assist; motorcycles have quick shifters, they have ride-by-wire technology. But with each of these advancements you give over control to the vehicle. When I straddle my motorcycle or get behind the wheel, I do it to ease my stress. I do it as a form of therapy. If I am not in control atleast behind the wheel or on the handlebars, it's not therapy. In an increasingly volatile and constantly changing world, It feels safe knowing that I decide the pace atleast when I am driving. I decide when to shift up, I decide when to shift down. In the saddle, I know I am an expert. I am humble enough to respect the power, but skilled enough to control it. Humble enough to know it's dangerous out there on the road, and skilled enough to still ride out for hundreds of kilometers. 

I realized all this on a ride. When I was shifting up the twisties. That sweet sound got me thinking. This is not about the tech at all. It's about the last remaining bastion where I still have the feeling of control in a chaotic world. I know that given the convenience, an "upgrade" to the automatic transmission is inevitable. But I also know that if I want therapy, it's going to be manual mode that'll give it. Some things just never change. 

Stranger Things

Those who don't learn from history are doomed to repeat it. 

- George Santayana 

Many economists, investors and market experts have studied, spoken, and written about economic cycles. From boom to bust and back. I'm hardly any of them. I've not studied economics, am not a bigshot UHNI investor, nor can I call myself a market expert since my journey with value investing began in 2017 which is less than a decade ago. Though I boast a decent alpha, good CAGR and a healthy passive income due to the quantum of my investment; I am no expert. So this article is more a sharing of thoughts and experiences than any prophetic call to arms. 

So . . . Indian equities have seen a roller coaster year so far. As of Oct'25, markets are up 7% YTD. However, gains for the past year (since Oct 24) have also been muted (around 6%). That's not great by any stretch of the imagination. My own investments have plateaued as well. Macroeconomic indicators remain strong though and I wouldn't have been worried too much IF it were left to Indian markets alone. Unfortunately we live in a very interconnected world and what happens in the global marketplace affects us. Which brings me to this rant. Given all else were equal, I wouldn't consider changing course - continue looking for value where one finds it, continue with the same old boring SIPs, continue with the same old index linked equities, let my PMS's do their thing and stay the course. All things not being equal of course, me (and so many investors like me) are in a bit of a quandary. 

Why? Some very strange things are happening in the global economy in general and the US in particular. As a bystander, it's very entertaining. If my money wasn't at stake, I'd grab a bucket of popcorn and enjoy the show. As it happens, for better or for worse, I can't be just a detached spectator; I'm an interested party. 

• Strange thing 1 - Booming US equities. You'd say, "Hey, why is that a strange thing?" . . And you'd have a very valid question. But look deeper and there's something afoot. First off, whats strange is that most of this growth is driven by the Mag 7 (AAPL, AMZN, GOOG, MSFT, META, NVDA and TSLA). To test this hypothesis, I charted out the YTD (annualized) and 1yr growth rates for Mag 7, XMAG (S&P500 index linked ETF less Mag 7) and overall S&P500. The numbers are quite striking. To sum up, Mag 7 accounts for 37% of the overall market capitalization for the S&P500. That's big. Even at the height of the dotcom bubble, the top 10 companies represented 26% of the overall market cap. Traditionally, the top 10 companies have a weightage of between 20% to 25% of the overall market cap. The fantastic results that US equities have shown is a direct result of the Mag 7. Keeping the Mag 7 aside (which is at an overall return of 24.66%), YTD annualized returns for XMAG is 18%, which is 666 bps lesser (not my fault that's such an ominous number). 
  
  
  
• Strange Thing 2 - Malaise in the macros. So, we've identified that most of the growth in US equities is because of the Mag 7 AND that they contribute to an unnaturally large % of overall market cap. That in itself would be strange enough, but we all know that's driven by AI growth and the heavy capex flowing into data centers and investments around AI tech. So far so good. But can we really explain what's driving the "still-great" returns for XMAG (S&P500 less Mag 7)? 18% returns are still fantastic. What's stranger is that these returns are despite some very contradictory macroeconomic indicators - Political affiliations aside, these are numbers released by the govt so we can take them "as is" - First off, US Job growth has really tanked this year. From an average of 122k jobs per month for the period ending Apr'25 (JFMA-25) to an average of 26k jobs per month for the next four months (MJJA-25) to no data at all for Sep'25. Secondly, Unemployment numbers reflect a similar story. That's increased by 30 basis points this year (from 4% to 4.3%). Additionally, Inflation is trending higher as well since Apr'25 (increased by 70 bps from 2.3% as of Apr'25 to 3% as of Sep'25). To sum up, inflation creeping up, unemployment creeping up, job growth tanking. But what does the market do? Keeps going up! Not just the Mag 7, but across the board - 18% growth is AMAZING. Remember, with far healthier macroeconomic indicators, Indian equities have barely returned 9% (annualized) this year. 
  
  
  
• Strange Thing 3 - All that glitters is gold? - So what have we got so far . . It's strange that equities are heavily concentrated. It's stranger that growth is so good despite slowing macro-economic indicators. What's even stranger is the flight to gold. Traditionally, equities and gold are inversely correlated. What's so strange is that in 2025; both have witnessed parallel and remarkable growth. Confidence in US equities is at an all-time high and still people (read central banks) are buying gold like nobody's business. You might say that fair enough, gold is going up because people have lost faith in the dollar not the stock market. But take a look at YTD US 10yr treasury yield and that's gone down as well (low yield means high bond prices)! As of Oct'25, the US10Y yield is at 4.003%, down 57 bps from 4.573% in Jan'25. Which means that people are still buying US treasuries (still going long on the dollar) but also buying gold AND also buying stocks! Weirder and weirder!
  
  
  
• Strange Thing 4 - Private Credit! Now this one's a bit scary! What's more, it could explain the inexplicable growth. After 2008, central banks came together to form the Basel III accords. Legislaters in the US pushed through the Dodd-Frank Act. These regulations forced traditional banks to hold more capital against riskier loans, making middle-market lending slower, more expensive, and less profitable. The Basel II accords were intended to prevent the stupidity and mania that led to the subprime crisis. However, humans being humans and greed being the norm; the market circumvented these rules through something called private credit. Not private equity with which it is often confused. Private credit is direct, one-on-one corporate lending (often to middle-market companies) that is funded by institutional capital managed by specialized non-bank financial firms . And that's even scarier. Atleast banks and financial institutions had to report their NPAs, their balance sheets and their cash holdings. Private credit funds (NBFIs) don't even have to do that. Their relationship with their clients is 1x1 AND is not disclosed at all to investors. Which means that we have no idea how much loans private credit funds have given out, how many of these are still good, and how much cash they hold against these loans. What's even scarier is that they don't use traditional deposits for their lending activities. They use investments. So they take money from pension funds, insurance companies, sovereign wealth funds, AND select private individuals (usually UHNIs) to give credit to venture capitals and middle-market businesses who are too risky to get credit from banks. To give some perspective, in 2000, private credit AUM was at USD 40 billion. As of Oct'25, AUM is at USD 3 trillion. Since 2008, the private credit industry has grown tenfold! Surge in credit activity, no reporting, no governance, no oversight! In Sep'25 Tricolor holdings and First Brands Group declared bankruptcy. Tricolor was a subprime auto lender and First Brands was a manufacturer of auto parts. Tricolor was heavily involved in a segment of finance closely associated with private credit, often called Asset-Based Lending (ABL) or Specialty Finance. The company primarily funded its loans (subprime auto loans to customers) through large "warehouse lines" from major banks like JPMorgan Chase and Fifth Third Bank. These loans were then packaged into Asset-Backed Securities (bonds) and sold to investors. These non-bank financial methods are a key part of the broader private credit ecosystem. Jamie Dimon (CEO, JP Morgan Chase) ominously said there's more cockroaches in the woodwork. Coming from a survivor of the 2008 crisis, and nobody can deny he was in the thick of things with his takeover of Bear Stearns, those are scary words indeed. 
• Strange Thing 5 - Lack of data - In this crucial phase, when it's super critical for policy makers to keep a hawk's eye on macroeconomic trends, the data pipeline is shut off! With the US government in the midst of a shutdown, we don't know if the next month's numbers will be released and if they will be accurate. That's a big problem for the Fed and policy makers across the globe who are looking at these numbers to formulate their own policies. It's akin to driving a large trailer with a blindfold on. Not just government data, some sources are also saying that the practice of publishing quarterly results for listed companies will be moved to half-yearly. Which means investors might be using 6 month old data to make decisions. 

Any one thing in itself is strange indeed. All of the above coming together is not just "stranger", its downright bizarre! One thing is certain, the global economy is undergoing a reset. Global supply lines are moving (probably decoupling from the US), settlement in USD is going down and more importantly, economies are clearly marking themselves into groups and alliances. Nowhere is this clearer than data on holdings in 10yr US treasury bonds. Since Jul'24, traditional allies (Canada, Europe, Japan) of the US have increased their holdings of treasury bonds (US10Y) by 12.35%, adversaries and neutral parties (China, Hong Kong economic zone, India and others) have decreased their holdings by almost 4%. Which means the strong demand for the US dollar is from allies. The rest are selling the dollar. The trend is clear. The numbers are published by the US govt. A decoupling is underway. How this plays out is anybody's guess. 

What's my takeaway as an investor? Sit tight. Something's afoot. I am building cash reserves so that when the next correction comes along, I can jump in and buy. This served me in good stead during the pandemic when I made the first big jump into equities. It gave me rich dividends. I think another big opportunity is coming along. I keep remembering the golden credo of value investing - Be fearful when others are greedy, and greedy when others are fearful. Right now, everyone's greedy. Call me a vulture, circling the bloodsport happening on the ground. Waiting for the pickings. For what it's worth; at the very least - the heady world of high finance is giving me a great ringside view of some once-in-a-lifetime series of events. 

Downfall

German philosopher Friedrich Hegel: "The only thing we learn from history is that we learn nothing from history."

To the lay person, Hitler's persona has always been larger than life. We all know the evil atrocities his regime committed. We have been taught about his victories in Western Europe and his subsequent downfall. We know about the xenophobia and the genocide. The popular plot-line is of course that he tasted defeat because he over-extended himself in the vast Soviet hinterland and his forces were unable to cope with the Soviet winter. Partly true of course, but the rot in the Third Reich was much deeper than just the Soviet winter. Very recently I saw two excellent German movies - "Downfall" directed by Oliver Hirschbiegel and "Look Who's Back" directed by David Wnendt. Bruno Ganz has portrayed the role of Hitler in the former and Oliver Masucci in the latter. 

 

Oliver Masucci as Hitler in Look Who's Back

Bruno Ganz as Hitler in Downfall

Both amazingly executed roles in their own way. However, any historian would agree Downfall captures the essence of Hitler much more accurately. While Look Who's Back is more of a precautionary tale, Downfall is a look back. A retrospective. This retrospective forced me to read up in more detail about World War 2. The first book that I took up was "The Second World War." by Antony Beever. This is a holistic account of events leading up to and during the war. The second one was a bit off the beaten track - "Blitzed" by Normal Ohler. This was a very controversial account of how the German army used Pervitin (a form of methamphetamine) to amp up their performance levels during the war. The last one was "Enemy At the Gates: The Battle of Stalingrad" by William Craig. The more I read, the more morbidly fascinated I became by Hitler the person. A man full of contradictions. From a military strategy a lot has been analyzed and written about his blunders. But not enough from the leadership standpoint. Hitler is often credited with brilliant and daring military strategies in the early period of the war. Definitive victories over the low countries, Poland, Czech Republic and then the crowning glory - revenge against the French. He made French general Charles Huntziger sign an armistice tantamount to surrender at the very same spot in the very same train carriage where Germany was made to sign a similar surrender after the first world war. In short, a military genius who came up short against the Soviet winter. However, that's definitely not the case. From a leadership standpoint, we have conclusive evidence that Hitler was weak, insecure and incompetent. The image of a strongman has been cultivated through propaganda. It's all done with smoke and mirrors. That image has persisted through the years. Look at the evidence. 

First off, let's look at The French victory and Hitler's tendency to believe his own lies. All credit for the Battle of France is usually given to Hitler. In fact, though Hitler supported the plan itself; he did not do so because he had any military insight. He supported and endorsed the plan because his generals told him it could be done fast. Field Marshal (then General) Erich Von Manstein came up with the idea. General Heinz Guderian played a big part in executing it. In fact, Hitler refused to believe Guderian's panzer division had rushed so far ahead into French territory; calling it a "miracle". In fact, General Franz Halder recorded in his diary - The Führer is terribly nervous. Frightened by his own success, he is afraid to take any chance and so would pull the reins on us ... he keeps worrying about the south flank. He rages and screams that we are on the way to ruin the whole campaign". Hardly the picture of a decisive leader. In fact, a massive victory slipped out of German hands due to this indecisiveness when Hitler allowed the English to escape across the channel at Dunkirk. Some key problem areas in Hitler's leadership style were apparent in this whole episode - indecisiveness chief amongst them. Other problem areas became apparent soon after; when Hitler didn't give a shred of credit to his generals. Of course everyone understood political credit would be given to Hitler. However, Hitler believed his own delusions; that he was the military genius that envisioned the "sickle cut" strategy of attack through the Ardennes. At the very core were big problems - Hitler did not analyze his own victory closely enough and had fallen prey to the Dunning-Kruger effect (a cognitive bias that causes people to overestimate their own knowledge or abilities). Importantly, he failed to realize how big a role Pervitin had played in the Battle of France. It is widely documented that German troops used Pervitin, a form of methamphetamine, during the Battle of France. The drug was distributed to soldiers in large quantities, often as part of their daily rations. It was intended to boost morale, reduce fatigue, and enhance alertness. He was only too eager to believe that it was German racial superiority that allowed them to dominate the French and cross the entire country in under six weeks. This tendency to delude himself would cost him dearly. Leadership lesson - Always watch your own game footage; be it victory or defeat and most importantly; stay real, stay grounded!  

FM Erich Von Manstein

Gen Heinz Guderien

The Compiègne Wagon where the French signed their surrender

 

Let's now turn to Hitler's complicated relationship with his generals. He had, for want of a better word; a love-hate relationship with his generals. He craved their approval and thought little of their talents at the same time. He was a politician aspiring to be a military commander. To understand this apparent conflict, one has to understand the Prussian tradition of military nobility. Many of the Prussian aristocracy ended up as military generals. Many of them carried a rich legacy of military training. Hitler's relationship with the Prussian nobility was complex and often fraught with tension. While he admired their military traditions and sense of duty, he also resented their aristocratic privileges and perceived arrogance. Hitler was a product of the lower middle class, and he deeply resented the social inequality that existed in pre-war Germany. He saw the Prussian nobility as a symbol of this inequality, and he was determined to dismantle their privileges. In addition, Hitler never progressed in the military beyond the rank of corporal. He was a messenger (then called a runner) for the army in the first world war. He did see action but not as a warrior (which is what he thought of himself). These prejudices played an important role in his relationship with the army. In fact, these prejudices and his own insecurities were manifested in some harmful ways in his military campaigns. Firstly, he refused to listen to his generals. He micro-managed military campaigns and chided his generals in public. Secondly, he kept moving his generals around and never gave them the opportunity to consolidate their units. The most famous example of this was Erwin Rommel (The Desert Fox) who was, at various points in time, assigned to the African, French and Italian theaters of war in the space of three years. Another example was Erich Von Manstein. In 1940, After his successful leadership during the Battle of France, Manstein was promoted to command the 11th Army on the Eastern Front. Immediately in 1941, despite his successes in the initial stages of the invasion of the Soviet Union, Manstein was demoted to a subordinate position due to disagreements with Hitler over strategy. Cut to 1942: Manstein was reinstated as commander of the 11th Army Group and played a crucial role in the German defense of the Crimea. Finally in 1944, After the defeat at Kursk, Manstein was once again demoted and replaced as commander of Army Group South. Hardly the traits of a decisive and secure leader. Leadership lesson - provide a secure environment for your team to thrive. 

Hitler with his generals in 1943 at a situation conference in Ukraine. The war had turned by this time and experts had opined defeat was inevitable.

 

Lastly, let's now take a look at the relatively well-known and well-documented failure of his - his dictatorial tendencies. These tendencies meant that he absolutely did not tolerate views contrarian to his own. Most importantly, he failed to cultivate people more intelligent than himself, did not listen to the experts and did not retain talent. When asked why the Allies had won WWII, a Churchill aide replied “because our German scientists were better than their German scientists”. Pre-war tensions created by Hitler and his sense of paranoia meant a brain drain in Germany and the rest of Europe. A lot of these people went to America and later played pivotal roles in Germany's defeat. Einstein, Oppenheimer, Hans Bethe, Leo Slizard, Werner Heisenberg . . all scientists who fled Europe due to Hitler's policies and were openly accepted in America to continue their studies and/or research. Some other famous examples in fields other than science were Ray Dolby whose parents fled Europe, Marlene Dietrich (an acclaimed actress), Sigmund Freud.  One can't deny the impact that this brain drain had on Germany's innovation and productivity. Leadership lesson - surround yourself with and cultivate people smarter than you even if you don't agree with them.

Of course Hitler was a disaster of a human being. Of course he was xenophobic, a raging racist, a murderer and probably deserved what he got. That's not the point of our analysis. We seek to dispel the myth that Hitler was a brilliant strategist and a leader of men. Why do we seek to do this? Partly, because it's scary to contemplate that just for want of a few leadership qualities, history could have turned out very differently! But more importantly, to understand that there's some amount of these traits in all of us as leaders. Humans are inherently self-deluding (it's a coping mechanism). We are inherently tribal and seek to gang up with our own kind (again, a preservation instinct drilled in by evolution). We have hard-coded insecurities and fears that affect our rationality (a result of early childhood influences more often than not). That's not to say we are all rotten or that I am a misanthrope. There are shades and spectra. For example, the tendency to self-delude is so hard coded because as I mentioned earlier, it's a coping mechanism. Grim realities would destroy our well being. In the field of psychology, it's called cognitive dissonance. There's some research that points to this trait having an evolutionary advantage in terms of it's adaptive value. It might have evolved as a way to maintain psychological equilibrium. By reducing the discomfort of conflicting beliefs or actions, individuals can avoid the stress and anxiety that can be detrimental to survival and reproduction. Point is, whether we like it or not, there's a Hitler in all of us. All we can do is stay on our guard against these tendencies and avoid our "Soviet winter".

Together

How did we spend our 10th wedding anniversary just a month ago? I was recovering from Chikangunya and suffering from joint pains. Sylvia was just discharged from hospital owing to a back injury. In the midst of a busy work season and a phase of professional uncertainty, we'd planned nothing. There was a huge amount of stress both personally as well as professionally. On the evening of our anniversary we were sitting in our living room, exhausted and spent from the day's stresses. But from that point on, it turned into one of the best anniversary celebrations of my life. No jokes. We pushed aside our quagmire of troubles and ordered a simple cake. We lit a candle, cut the cake and just held each other without talking. No music, no people, no celebration. And that's when it hit me. We were over the hump. We would be together all our lives. There were no pretenses left, no hangups, no facades. For a bit of time, all my troubles melted away and I knew things would be fine no matter how tough it got. Because of moments like these. When all else is stripped away, we realized we didn't need a milestone party or a fancy celebration to commemorate this tenth anniversary. We just needed each other. And conversely we also realized an important fact - through the tough times, the most important thing we needed was each other's support. The rest would fall in place.

Sometimes one envisions and dreams about things that might be. Our version of what we think of our futures. Not utopian dreams but our desires nonetheless. In 2011 I had penned a poem on what I felt a relationship should be like. I was inspired by the biological phenomenon of facultative mutualism, strongly displayed by the sea anemone and the clownfish. 

A hundred fathoms deep,

waters peaceful but swift.

She gently sways in sleep

her tentacles adrift

in currents from afar blown - 

The lovely Sea Anemone.

Shades of ethereal blue

adorn her tentacles.

Ripples lending a hue

to those grim sentinels.

Deadly but beautiful

Masking her fatal pull.

Within her dense petals

lives the simple clownfish

In her warmth he nestles

safe in the polyp's swish.

His vibrant colours bring

her food to her deadly sting.

He flitters in and out

amongst tentacles armed

with poisoned darts throughout

letting him play unharmed

and with his fluid nourish

her every fibre does relish. 

A barracuda stalks him

its ugly mouth agape.

She readies to guard him

and afford him escape,

From his predatory jaws

and teeth like deathly claws.

A butterfly-fish waits

for him to wander out

and leave her in dire straits

prey to a hungry snout.

But he stands by her side

The fish's threat brushed aside.

Such threats oft and common

met with equal measure;

Is symbiosis begun

in these depths of azure.

where enemies so abound

Each other have they found.

This perfect symphony

helps them survive

in mutual harmony

The union comes alive 

To the others every need

Attuned; each other pays heed

I didn't really realize then how accurate this poem was and how strong this phenomenon is. Took me ten years to truly understand what I had composed. And I'm sure it'll take us some more time to truly appreciate what we have too. But we can try. Starting with our tenth wedding anniversary. Here's to us. 

The Era of Absolutes

 We hear a lot these days about the world becoming polarized. It is either good or bad; right or wrong; all or none. So many national and global events today draw sharp reactions from either side of the spectrum. But whichever side of the spectrum you align or identify with, more and more people have sharp opinions and extreme reactions. We hear this often from so many quarters – the world has become divided; politics is becoming polarized, and opinions have become extreme. but what does it mean exactly?

Take the recent example of China. We have people on two sides obviously; but most Indians believe that China is an evil, authoritarian regime that is hell-bent on destroying their competitors (read India) and hell bent on world domination. If you purchase and use Chinese-made products, you are branded a traitor. If you refuse to use them, you are branded a hyper-nationalist. Another polarizing topic is Narendra Modi. You can either love him or hate him. People fall into these two distinct categories. Either he can do no wrong or he can do nothing right. Either he is saving the country and the world from apocalyptic melt-down or he is taking the country down the path of a genocide and/or economic ruin. The most recent polarizing topic is of course the Israel-Hamas conflict. You see opinions expressed strongly on both sides of the dispute – you are either an antisemite or an Islamophobe. There is no middle way!

That is a most curious phenomenon. The question that comes foremost to my mind is – has public opinion always been this sharply divided? Has the discourse always been about two extremes? Perhaps we feel this way because this is the only “age” we have lived in. Statistics suggest otherwise. A 2022 study by Anindita Borah and SR Singh ^[1] on political polarization in India through social media network analysis and mining concluded that there was a significant amount of polarization (non-overlapping social media interactions) for retweets in general and controversial topics in particular. A 2023 study by the Association for Democratic Reforms found that 72% of Indians believe that the country is more politically polarized now than it was 10 years ago. A 2016 study by the American National Election Studies ^[2] found that Americans have become increasingly hostile towards the opposing political party. The study found that the share of Democrats who view Republicans as "very unfavorable" increased from 35% in 1992 to 89% in 2016. The share of Republicans who view Democrats as "very unfavorable" increased from 38% in 1992 to 85% in 2016. Prima facie, these are significant changes. To conclude, statistics from studies around the globe indicate two things - first; opinions are more polarized today than before and second; this trend is increasing.

Being a numbers guy, the second question that comes to my mind is whether this polarization has any correlation with income, education, age etc.? Extent of political polarization being the dependent variable, it would be worthwhile to check the independent variables that have the highest correlation in terms of impact. Are richer people less likely to have polarized opinions? Do highly educated people tend to avoid political extremes? Does political extremism taper off or increase with age? All truly relevant questions which should have some independent studies done for further investigation. But while this can be done by more capable people than me (read TISS or any other educational institution interested in this topic), armchair thinkers like me can sit back and contemplate more anecdotal incidents. A recent conversation with an acquaintance brought home this point in stark and brutal fashion to me. This conversation was with a young person (just under 30) about the ongoing Israel-Hamas conflict. It lasted around 30 minutes and it almost seemed to me that we were talking different languages. The disconnect was so obvious as to be comical. While my whole fascination with this topic was of a geopolitical nature and I kept trying to draw the discussion towards facets like the Sykes-Picot agreement, the Balfour declaration, the impact of the ‘Law of Return’; this acquaintance of mine kept brushing these topics aside and kept talking of the “ongoing humanitarian crisis” and how one side was the oppressor and the other was the victim. The conviction was absolute despite knowing that the best minds in the world agree that this is a complicated issue. At one point, I had to politely stop the conversation. This (and more such incidents) brought home to me the stark realization that political polarization might be increasing, and that income and education do not seem to have a correlation to it. This of course led me down the rabbit hole of whither did this come from?

One factor that we hear about is social media. It is cited often (and ironically enough, quite vehemently) that a glut of information and echo chambers created by social media algorithms have led to this rise in polarization. But to be honest, I feel that this simplistic solution is like missing the forest for the trees. Could very well be that echo chambers are created by polarized opinions rather than the other way around. I feel we need to go deeper. While social media might or might not be the root cause, there are two particularly important considerations that I would like to lay down – Firstly, reduced attention spans and secondly, the need/gravitation towards instant gratification.

Let us first talk about attention spans. Herbert A Simon, An American economist, political scientist, and computer scientist uncannily prophesized this in a 1971 paper titled “Designing Organizations for an Information-Rich World.” ^[3]

In an information-rich world, the wealth of information means a dearth of something else: a scarcity of whatever it is that information consumes. What information consumes is rather obvious: it consumes the attention of its recipients. Hence a wealth of information creates a poverty of attention.

Gloria Mark, a psychologist and currently the Chancellor's professor in the Department of Informatics at University of California, Irvine, lays out the data in her new book - “Attention Span: A Groundbreaking Way to Restore Balance, Happiness and Productivity.” ^[4] In the early 2000s, she and her team tracked people while they used an electronic device and noted each time their focus shifted to something new—every 2.5 minutes, on average. In recent repeats of that experiment, she says, the average has gone down to about 47 seconds. Another study by Microsoft Corp ^[5] published as a consumer insights report highlights that attention spans (defined here as the amount of time consumers spend on one screen before moving on to another app/screen) has dwindled from 12 seconds in 2000 to 8 seconds in 2015. To put this finding in perspective, Microsoft themselves have compared it to the average attention span of a goldfish, which is about 9 seconds. This means that by 2015, on average, humans (at least Canadians as per this study) had a lesser attention span than goldfish. The study goes on of course to discuss the implications of this for marketers but we need not get into that. The point is attention spans have reduced markedly in the last two decades. Even citing high-level data, that hypothesis seems to be true. There has been a 66% increase in viewership for the “Shorts” format from 2022 to 2023. The average length of a typical music video ^[6] has decreased from 259 seconds (about 4 and a half minutes) in the 90s to 197 seconds (about 3 and a half minutes) today. The average length of a typical newspaper article ^[7] has decreased from 1222 words in 2000 to 589 words in 2022. A 2023 report by the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) ^[8] found that the average length of a digital video advertisement had gone down from 30 seconds in 2000 to about 15 seconds in 2022.

In an interview with Time magazine, Adam Brown, co-director of the Center for Attention, Learning, and Memory at St. Bonaventure University in New York cited technology (read phone usage) as a key factor in reduced attention spans. ^[9] To quote him verbatim -

Human brains want novelty, excitement, and social connection, and devices play into those desires. Checking a notification flashing across your screen can provide a small hit of dopamine, creating a sense of reward that keeps you coming back for more. When you give in to temptation by pausing a task to check your phone, your brain also has to shift gears to stop what it was previously doing and move to a new task, Brown says. This process negatively affects the overall speed and quality of your work in the short term, research suggests, and in the long term, “the more you engage in task switching, the more your brain wants to wander and look for that new thing,” Brown says. In other words, your brain gets used to constant diversions and engages in them out of habit—hence why you might find yourself mindlessly checking your phone even as you watch your favorite television show.

This “malevolent” design is everywhere. To understand how instant gratification has become inextricably linked to our shortened attention span we need to understand the reward mechanism in our brain. The first analogy to draw on is the spike in blood sugar levels after eating carbohydrates. Refined carbohydrates cause a much steeper spike in blood sugar levels than whole/complex carbohydrates. This is because the fiber in whole/complex carbohydrates need more work to be digested. This happens more slowly and therefore supplies a slower release of glucose into the bloodstream. Unfortunately, refined carbs can be highly addictive. Carbs release glucose into the bloodstream and a burst of dopamine in the brain, and this can act like a drug for some people. There is a reason these foods are called comfort foods. The essential molecular structure of the carbohydrate is similar in refined as well as the complex variants. However, the addition of fiber causes us to do more work to digest it and hence delays the gratification. Another example is the ubiquitous slot machine. When one pictures gambling, one often thinks of poker tables, and people in dinner jackets calculating the odds of various combinations in their mind. This notion of traditional gambling was made very popular by actors such as Daniel Craig in Casino Royale. However, slot machines are far more popular. They contribute over 70% of any casino’s revenue. The slot machine hacks into a very primal reward mechanism of the brain remarkably like Pavlov's dogs. We "salivate” at the sight of those reels lining up and that familiar sound which is a precursor to a reward. We continue to press that button, mindlessly tuned in to the short, quick bursts of dopamine or the painful thrill of disappointment laced with hope for the next turn of the reel. Delayed gratification is mostly not addictive. Instant gratification is. It is that simple. This design is embedded by large corporations into everything they try to sell us – from chips with the perfect blend of salt and fat to cola drinks with the perfect blend of sugar and caffeine to tobacco companies with the perfect blend of nicotine and tar to shopping apps with the perfect blend of deals and customized recommendations to social media and smartphones! The last two are a veritable smorgasbord of addictive choices with instant gratification. Smartphones reel us in with the very design of their UI and the way user experience is built. Notifications keep us hooked. That small red number indicating the number of unread messages, the buzz or ping or beep of the notification sound . . it's a science that is being perfected at alarming rates.

Having plumbed many examples of how instant gratification can get addictive, let us dive a little deeper. What is it that makes instant gratification addictive? Think of the baseline dopamine levels in our brain as an “elastic” string tied across two poles. It is a crude but effective metaphor often used by Andrew Huberman (A Stanford researcher and neuroscientist with a special focus on ophthalmology) on his podcast. From sugar to shopping to sex, any addictive substance has two (amongst others) important characteristics – firstly, the time lag between an activity and the associated burst of dopamine (rate of onset); and secondly, the introduction of a spike in the level of dopamine in the brain. This spike must be significantly higher than baseline. The higher the rate of onset, the more addictive a substance. The higher the spike, the more it's addictive potential. This elastic that I mentioned earlier is impacted by these two factors – the flood of dopamine and its rate of onset. But in a short time after the flood, the dopamine levels in our brain drop back down. The higher and steeper the surge, the more they drop. The more they drop, the more the craving for the same experience again. The more the craving, the more reinforcement for addictive behaviors. It is a vicious cycle. Spike, drop, crave, repeat. Over time with repeated abuse of this reward mechanism, the baseline dopamine level drops too. The elastic loses strength, and it sags down. This leads to a host of other problems such as depression, which is a topic unto itself.

Smartphone manufacturers and social media companies have tapped into these characteristics of the human brain just like all other large corporations have done. Some of the key addictive features ^[10] of smartphones in general and social media in particular are infinite scrolling, instant push notifications, pending notification count, personalized recommendations, constant profile customization and instant messaging. Small things like a slight delay when refreshing the feed are by design! They increase the anticipation of a refreshed feed.

Which brings us to the impact. Over the last 10 years, daily average screen time ^[11] has increased by a whopping 23%! A large chunk of that is because of smartphones which has registered an increase of 43% in the same period! As of 2022, we spend around 7 hours in front of a screen every day and around 4 of these in front of a smartphone. But because of the addictive nature of its usage, we are not focusing on anything for too long. These 7 hours in front of a screen are spent scrolling/browsing/flitting from one screen/app to another. As per research done by Gloria Mark (cited above), the average time we spend on a screen is 47 seconds (8 seconds if you believe Microsoft). Even at the higher end of the spectrum, 47 seconds is just not enough to form a nuanced opinion. At this point we will have to delve a bit deeper again ^[12] into neurobiology and how humans make decisions/form opinions. While it is an oversimplified theory, the Triune model of the brain’s evolution suggest that the limbic system is more involved in decisions and actions involving emotion and the neocortex is involved in higher-order decisions, analytical thinking, and rational decision flows. While decision-making is an extremely complicated process from a neurological standpoint and the triune model is considered an over-simplified framework, it does provide a frame of reference or a point of ingress for us to understand the very crude basics. It is safe to say however, that the limbic system is highly involved in lower order emotional processing of input from sensory systems. On the other hand, the neocortex is understood to be involved in higher-order brain functions such as sensory perception, cognition, spatial reasoning, language, and analytical decision-making. The effect of social media on how we think has been well analyzed. A 2023 paper by Sergey Yu Tereschenko titled "Neurobiological risk factors for problematic social media use as a specific form of Internet addiction: A narrative review.” ^[13] found that internet addiction can lead to several changes in the structure of the brain. To quote -

"To date, a large number of studies have been devoted to the pathogenesis of Internet addiction using various neuroimaging techniques, including magnetic resonance imaging, positron and single photon emission computed emission tomography. These techniques have revealed a number of structural brain changes associated with Internet addiction: Decreased grey matter density in several areas, including prefrontal and orbitofrontal cortical layers and an additional motor area; abnormal functional activity of brain regions associated with reward dependence; activation of sensorimotor synchrony with a concomitant decrease in audiovisual synchrony; activation of brain regions associated with compulsive craving and impulsivity; increased glucose metabolism in brain regions associated with impulsivity, reward dependence and the urge to repeat sensations; increased dopamine secretion with a concomitant decrease in dopamine receptor availability in the striatum.

To sum up, social media addiction leads to two especially important effects – it increases our stress, and it increases our impulsivity. This leads to impaired decision-making (amongst other things). As we saw earlier, the neocortex is involved in higher-order processing of information. However, if the brain is hijacked and does not get enough time to involve the neocortex due to a greatly reduced attention span and a highly active need for instant gratification, the result is not surprising – polarized opinions, extreme reactions, and simplistic solutions. We use the limited time our attention is focused on a particular screen to react emotionally and instinctively to the content. In our hard-coded need to make sense of what we are seeing, we jump to conclusions, search for the simplest solution without analysis and form opinions based on emotion rather than logic/rationality. In essence, we are losing our ability for deep, focused, and nuanced thought. That is truly a scary thought. An even scarier consideration is that the brain is a veritable "learning machine” up to around 25 years of age. Neural pathways are being formed and it is extremely easy to pick up skills and reinforce them. After this age, it is generally considered that neuroplasticity goes down and it takes a lot more effort to "rewire” the brain (pick up new skills or change mindset). Young adults who have grown up with an internet addiction and have never picked up the skill for focused, deep, neocortex-worthy thinking will have an especially tough time dealing with complex topics. If this trend continues, we can expect future generations to be even more polarized in thought and even more easy to influence through nefarious techniques of social media manipulation. A whole generation of brain-washed consumers of information ready to amplify whatever is being fed to them and spread it even faster to other brain-washed consumers of information.

So what is the solution? As someone who has quit a debilitating alcohol and nicotine addiction and has stayed clean for the last decade or so, I can vouch that the path is not easy. To top that off, this is not an individual that we are talking about. We are trying to solve for the addiction of an entire population. We are also fighting the systemic disinclination of the entire establishment (from Big Tech to governments) to do something about this problem; mainly because it serves their needs. A population of these aforementioned brain-washed consumers of information are easy to influence. They’re easy to manipulate and easy to bring to a boil. In this moment of despair, I am reminded of Rabindranath Tagore’s timeless poem which can easily serve as a call-to-action for us and a fitting conclusion to this journey through the rabbit hole.

Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high

Where knowledge is free

Where the world has not been broken up into fragments

By narrow domestic walls

Where words come out from the depth of truth

Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection

Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way

Into the dreary desert sand of dead habit

Where the mind is led forward by thee

Into ever-widening thought and action

Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake.

 

References 

1. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s13278-022-00939-z
3. https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2016/06/22/partisanship-and-political-animosity-in-2016/
4. https://www.oxfordreference.com/display/10.1093/acref/9780191843730.001.0001/q-oro-ed5-00019845
5. https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/60795084
6. https://dl.motamem.org/microsoft-attention-spans-research-report.pdf
7. https://www.statista.com/chart/26546/mean-song-duration-of-currently-streamable-songs-by-year-of-release/
8. https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/10/10/new-york-times-story-length/
9. https://www.iab.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/IAB_PwC_Internet_Advertising_Revenue_Report_2022.pdf
10. https://time.com/6302294/why-you-cant-focus-anymore-and-what-to-do-about-it/
11. https://medium.com/swlh/the-secret-design-tools-which-social-media-apps-are-using-to-create-addiction-e6a502ccb79f#:~:text=The%20psychology%20behind%20all%20this,see%20if%20you've%20won
12. https://explodingtopics.com/blog/screen-time-stats
13. https://seattleanxiety.com/psychiatrist/2022/7/22/anxiety-social-media-use-amp-maintaining-mental-health#end1
14. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/370906115_Neurobiological_risk_factors_for_problematic_social_media_use_as_a_specific_form_of_Internet_addiction_A_narrative_review