Name: 你的大腦承受不了這麼多資訊！| Richard Cytowic (Your brain wasn’t built to hold this much information | Richard Cytowic)
Uploaded: 2026-02-16T18:12:16.000Z
Duration: 19 min 27 s

Everyone agrees that our attention spans have gone to hell.

大家都有同感，我們的專注力都變差了。

程度副詞

I call it the tyranny of attention because there's so many demands on our attention coming from so many different directions that we are simply overwhelmed and we don't have the mental bandwidth to cope with it.

我稱之為「專注力霸權」，因為有太多來自四面八方的注意力需求，讓我們應接不暇，精神頻寬也不夠應付。

I'm Richard Cytoic, professor of neurology at George Washington University and an author.

我是 Richard Cytoic，喬治華盛頓大學的神經學教授兼作家。

你的石器時代大腦在螢幕時代。

Coping with Digital Distractions and and Sensory Overload.

Your Stone Age brain in the age of screens, Washing machines and appliances change every five or ten years.

你的石器時代大腦在螢幕時代，洗衣機和家電每五到十年就會改變。

Evolution doesn't say, oh, it's time for another memory module or time for another language module.

進化不會說，喔，是時候來個新的記憶模組或語言模組了。

The modern brain is no different than that of our distant Stone Age ancestor.

現代大腦和我們遙遠的石器時代祖先沒什麼兩樣。

That is, once the brain arrives on a solution that's good enough, it keeps it and then adds on new features.

也就是說，一旦大腦找到一個夠好的解決方案，就會保留它，然後再增加新的功能。

Sort of like a New England add on house where you add one room after another and it looks sort of funky, but

有點像新英格蘭的增建房屋，你一間一間地加蓋，看起來有點奇怪，

Working memory is like the mental scratch pad where we hold whatever we're focused on at the moment, whether it's remembering a short grocery list or trying to remember an access code for an app.

工作記憶就像是精神草稿板，讓我們能記住當下專注的事物，不管是記一份簡短的購物清單，還是要記一個App的存取碼。

And it's limited in what it can do, how much it can hold.

而且它的能力有限，能記住的東西也有限。

Everything that we do costs us in terms of energy expenditure.

我們做的所有事情，在能量消耗上都要付出代價。

And ATP is the fuel that fuels every cell in the body.

而ATP就是為身體每個細胞提供燃料的燃料。

Creatures all over the animal kingdom all rely on ATP.

It's like the bedrock of energy transformation.

So for example, if you have to go take a test, you're not doing anything, you're just thinking.

所以，舉個例子，如果你要去考試，你什麼都沒做，只是在思考。

But at the end of three or four hour section, you're really beat, you're tired because you have expended a lot of mental energy.

但是考了三四個小時之後，你真的會累垮，因為你耗費了大量的精神能量。

You want to be careful not to waste your attention or spend too much.

你要小心，不要浪費你的專注力，或是過度使用。

It's like a bank account that can go into the, into the red very easily.

這就像一個銀行帳戶，很容易就會透支。

The brain operates within a fixed energy limit bandwidth.

大腦是在一個固定的能量頻寬限制內運作的。

And there's no amount of diet, exercise or Sudoku puzzles that can increase that.

而且無論是飲食、運動或數獨遊戲，都無法增加這個限制。

So we have to learn to live with the amount that we have.

所以我們得學會珍惜我們擁有的能量。

Listening to one person speak takes up about half my bandwidth.

聽一個人說話，就佔用了我一半的頻寬。

And trying to listen to two people at once is impossible because then we've exceeded it.

而試圖同時聽兩個人說話是不可能的，因為那樣就超過了。

Now you might think that as you're scrolling or swiping that you're not really doing much, but

你可能會覺得，當你滑動或瀏覽時，其實沒做什麼事，但

because that bandwidth is so small and narrow, there's not much left over.

因為這個頻寬很小很窄，所以沒什麼剩餘的。

And most of the energy goes towards maintaining the physical structure by pumping sodium and potassium ions across membranes.

大部分的能量都用來維持身體結構，透過鈉鉀離子跨膜泵送。

And that leaves very, very little left over.

A great example is the Oscar fiasco in which they named the wrong Best picture for best picture.

一個很好的例子就是奧斯卡頒獎典禮的烏龍事件，他們把最佳影片頒給了錯誤的電影。

Just as Emma Stone was walking off the stage, Cunanan took a picture and tweeted.

就在艾瑪·史東走下舞臺時，庫納南拍了張照片並發了推文。

And that's the exact moment that he should have been discarding the envelope and lining up the next one.

而這正是他應該丟掉信封並準備下一個的時刻。

Basically, he flooded his working memory.

基本上，他讓他的工作記憶過載了。

That's what led to them announcing the wrong best picture.

這就是導致他們宣佈最佳影片錯誤的原因。

The brain and the peripheral nervous system is really one big changed detector.

大腦和周邊神經系統其實是一個巨大的變動偵測器。

That is, it responds to any change in the current environment.

也就是說，它會對當前環境的任何變化做出反應。

所以它會對新奇事物做出反應。

Now, back on the savannah, things didn't change very much except the constellations overhead and the seasons.

現在，回到非洲大草原，除了頭頂上的星座和季節之外，事物變化不大。

Now, of course, we're, we've got change everywhere bidding for our attention now, I mean, take in terms of attention and distraction.

當然，現在我們身邊到處都是爭奪我們專注力的變化，我是說，就以專注力和分心來說。

I often say that the screens are like secondhand smoke.

And so in the fact that whoever's in the line of sight is affected by it.

所以，任何在視線範圍內的人都會受到影響。

And we've all experienced this in waiting rooms and airport lounges, those huge monitors with their moving images, they demand to be looked at.

我們都在候診室和機場貴賓室經歷過，那些有動態影像的巨大螢幕，它們強迫你看。

And trying not to look costs energy as much.

所以不論哪種方式，我們都輸了。

I think the only way around that would be to put in earplugs and put on a blindfold so you're not distracted by this stuff, this what I call forced viewing.

我想唯一的辦法就是戴上耳塞、蒙上眼睛，這樣你就不用被這些東西分心了，我稱之為強迫觀看。

Is it ironic that you're looking at me on a screen and the answer is not if you're just focused on my talk right now.

你現在正在螢幕上看著我，這不是很諷刺嗎？如果你的專注力只在我說的話上，那答案是否定的。

But if you're trying to do three things or five things at once, then your focus is really shot.

但如果你想同時做三件事或五件事，那你的專注力就真的被削弱了。

I think the term, you know, dopamine reward is being thrown around too loosely.

我認為「多巴胺獎勵」這個詞被太隨便地使用了。

It's sort of a shorthand for anything that feels good.

它有點像是任何讓人感覺良好的東西的簡稱。

一頓好飯也會讓我們產生多巴胺。

So, I mean, it's, we're getting, we're getting these, these squirts all day long.

所以，我的意思是，我們整天都在接收這些東西。

But there are two pleasure circuits that exist in the brain.

One related to wanting and reward, and the other to pleasure and liking.

一個與渴望和獎勵有關，另一個與愉悅和喜愛有關。

The two systems differ in how easy they are to trigger.

這兩個系統在觸發的難易度上有所不同。

Now, the wanting and reward system is very easy to trigger.

現在，渴望和獎勵系統非常容易觸發。

Its network is diffused widely throughout the brain and basically in every crevice.

它的網絡廣泛分佈在大腦的每個角落。

And this is the basis of the hedonic treadmill.

As soon as we get something that we want, we want something else.

只要我們得到想要的東西，我們就會想要別的東西。

Even Aristotle pointed this out long ago on the Other hand, the opioid system is smaller in its expanse in the brain, is harder to trigger.

即使是亞里斯多德很久以前也指出了這一點，另一方面，鴉片系統在大腦中的範圍較小，較難觸發。

And this is the basis of addictions, really.

Studies show that behavioral addictions, such as excessive swiping at your screen or TikTok addiction, activates the same brain areas as do physical addiction.

研究顯示，行為成癮，像是過度滑手機或抖音成癮，會活化跟生理成癮一樣的大腦區域。

So alcohol, cocaine, other kinds of drugs.

像是酒精、古柯鹼、其他各種毒品。

This has been shown in many experiments where the anxiety level rises minute by minute as you take their phone away.

這在很多實驗中都顯示出來，當你拿走他們的電話時，焦慮感是一分鐘一分鐘地上升。

The tech giants know that there's only 1440 minutes in a day, and

科技巨頭知道一天只有 1440 分鐘，

so they fight ruthlessly for our eyeballs.

所以他們為了我們的眼球，無情地競爭。

And they want to keep us glued to their platform as long as possible because that's how they make their money.

而且他們想讓我們盡可能地黏在他們的平臺上，因為這就是他們賺錢的方式。

I mean, Reed Hastings of Netflix said it long ago, he said, sleep is their biggest competitor.

我是說，Netflix 的 Reed Hastings 很久以前就說過，他說，睡眠是他們最大的競爭對手。

Not Amazon prime, not Hulu, not the other streaming services.

不是 Amazon prime，不是 Hulu，也不是其他串流服務。

They have become expert in exploiting positive, intermittent reinforcement.

他們已經擅長利用正向、間歇性的增強。

我是說，我知道他們在做什麼，而且

yet when I see that next episode in five seconds, it's like, okay, what time is it?

但當我看到五秒後出現下一集時，我就會想，喔，現在幾點了？

This is the same mechanism that's used by slot machines in casinos to keep us playing.

這跟賭場的老虎機用來讓我們一直玩的機制是一樣的。

That is, we scroll and we get a hit or something interesting or a good piece of news, and

也就是說，我們滑動，然後看到一個亮點、有趣的東西或一則好消息，

And so we said, oh, let's get another one, and we keep going.

所以我們就會說，喔，再來一個吧，然後就一直繼續下去。

But the rewards come infrequently and on an unpredictable schedule.

但獎勵出現的頻率不高，而且時間也不固定。

So you are physically addicted as well as behaviorally addicted.

所以你生理上和行為上都上癮了。

Well, the most effective thing would be to turn the phone off.

嗯，最有效的方法就是把手機關掉。

But that also turns out to be the hardest thing for people because they have what's called nomophobia, a fear of being without their phone.

但這也變成了大家最難做到的事，因為他們有種叫做「手機恐懼症」的症狀，也就是害怕沒有手機。

To the whoosh that happens when a text message comes in.

簡訊進來時發出的「咻」聲上癮了。

We really have trained ourselves like Pavlov's dogs.

我們真的把自己訓練得像巴夫洛夫的狗一樣。

When these stimuli come in, the screen lights up, we get the whoosh.

當這些刺激出現，螢幕亮起來，我們就聽到那個「咻」聲。

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你的大腦承受不了這麼多資訊！| Richard Cytowic (Your brain wasn’t built to hold this much information | Richard Cytowic)

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fatigue

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mental