Dopamine Culture

We are living through the rise of dopamine culture.

A diagram popped onto my Twitter feed recently that perfectly encapsulates our progression through to this new cultural era - painting a picture of something I’ve been feeling but haven’t been able to articulate:

Take this chart in, look at those arrows. It’s a story of instant gratification - society systematically optimizing every aspect of human culture toward it.

The ways many Americans interface with different aspects of culture have fundamentally changed - from playing sports to sports betting, from newspapers to clickbait, from albums to tiktok, from handwritten letters to disappearing snaps.

Boredom has been defeated. Dopamine has been weaponized.

Technocapitalism has a tendency toward efficiency; but this isn’t just about tech making things faster / more convenient. We’ve rewired how we experience the world. Each evolution in the diagram shows a trend away from delayed gratification toward instant reward. From depth toward stimulation.

Coping with Dopamine Culture

Many people struggle with it - I know I do. The question is, how do you avoid gigafrying your endocrine system? Screentime limiter apps like Clearspace and Opal have become popular; dopamine cleanses are now a ‘thing’. But at the same time, many people seem perfectly content with all of it, no reason to sto.

Growing up in the late 90s / early 2000s, most cultural consumption was still in the “slow traditional” or “fast modern” columns. You can remember that buying a CD was an event, watching a movie was a genuine commitment.

Now you scroll through TikTok with Netflix on in the background and 3 browser tabs open. Reward yourself by watching something on the big screen while scrolling your little screen after a long day of working on your midsize screen - a normal GenZ day.

But here’s what gets me - I’m 27, a part of the most ‘online’ generation in human history so far; we’ve grown up device in hand. I do worry a bit about older generations who are discovering social media / some of these other dopamine culture phenomenon recently; will they have the same native skepticism + defenses as someone who grew up in a digital world?

The Historical View

I figured I’d look back to see how this period fares compared to others. And while our present ‘dopamine culture’ era is unlike anything ever before, it certainly rhymes.

• 1450s: clergy worry the emergence of the printing press and mass book production will destroy the sacred art of memorization

• 1840s: the telegraph made people anxious about society becoming more ‘superficial’ through instant communication

• 1900s: Radio and television each triggered their own moral panics about shortening attention spans, turning serious discourse into entertainment

This idea about the evolution of communication technologies changing human nature is not new. Marshall McLuhan (father of media theory) predicted this in the 60s. Aldous Huxley envisioned it even earlier in ‘Brave New World’ imagining a society not controlled through force but through pleasure / stimulation.

Each previous tech ‘moment’ followed a similar pattern: initial resistance, gradual adoption, then complete cultural integration. But there's something different this time - speed. The speed and sophistication of dopamine optimization has reached a level that feels qualitatively different.

What Comes Next?

The big question - what comes after dopamine culture?

You see enormous variance right now frankly. On one extreme, some young people live every waking minute plugged into TikTok / Instagram / Snapchat / repeat. Others (mostly older folks) still operate like its 1975.

Ultimately this is still largely a ‘pre-AI’ phenomenon. We haven’t yet seen how artificial intelligence will reshape these cultural forms even futher.

In the end, AI could go either direction. It may enable up to swing the pendulum back toward depth by making shallow content so abundant it becomes essentially worthless. On the other side, it could make the ‘dopamine trap’ infinitely more sophisticated; hyper-personalized stimulation impossible to resist.

My best guess for now is that AI will simply broaden the spectrum - like most technologies. Some people will use it to escape the trap. Others will sink before than ever before.

Living in The Transition

For entrepreneurs living through this era, it creates a fascinating tension. Our economy increasingly rewards capturing (and monetizing) attention. The most successful companies of the past decade (TikTok, Meta, Snapchat) are basically dopamine delivery machines.

At the same time, there’s enormous opportunity to zig now while everyone zags. As more ppl realize the “cost” of constant stimulation, there’s a growing demand for products / experiences / mechanisms that respect attention, perhaps even delay gratification vs exploiting it.

For me, I dont think the answer is to retreat entirely. Yes I’d like to spend more of my time in the ‘slow traditional culture’ column, but the efficiency gains from our connected world are also real. Twitter is the most effective way in human history to learn about the bleeding-edge of technology / connect with smart ppl globally.

The trick I think is conscious engagement vs passive consumption. You should underestand that every app, platform, piece of content is designed to capture your attention. Being intentional about how much of it you’ll give is the only way.

We are living through a phase shift cultural transition. It can’t be stopped. The question is can you navigate it without frying your brain.

Maybe (just maybe) the next column in the diagram ins’t about even faster communication. Maybe it’s about conscious choice.. about tools that enhance human capability vs hijacking our psychology. About depth in an age of shallow.

Maybe im just being optimistic and we’re just getting started with dopamine optimization and whatever comes next will make TikTok look like a Harry Potter book.

We shall see.

Peace,
Ramsey