Feeling like your life is being dictated by external forces – specifically, the relentless ping of notifications designed to hijack your attention? You're not alone. You're a system, and right now, you're an uncontrolled system, easily swayed by external inputs. But what if you could apply the principles of control theory – the science of designing systems to behave in a desired way – to regain some semblance of autonomy? In this lesson, we'll explore basic concepts like feedback loops, setpoints, and controllers, not to build robots, but to understand the mechanisms that keep you hooked and potentially design strategies (however futile) to manage your digital impulses. Prepare to see yourself as a system to be controlled – hopefully, by you, not by the algorithms.
Define yourself (or any system) in terms of what goes in, what comes out, and its internal condition.
Understand how the output of a system (your engagement) can become an input, reinforcing behavior.
Learn what a setpoint is and how to define a target state for your system (e.g., "less scrolling").
Explore basic control strategies to minimize the error between your current state and your desired state.
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