Electricity Addiction

Somebody told me that Electricity is more addictive than crack cocaine.

Go ahead, try to go without for just one day:

No computer
No car
No TV
No wristwatch (unless you've got an old one)
No electric lights
No phone
No Wiki

All you that are complaining of CarAddiction, VideoAddiction, WebAddiction, and the like, you're all really addicted to electricity.

Much like some of the earliest camping trips I took with my family with tent, sleeping inside on the ground in sleeping bags, cooking on a ColemanStove with the nights illuminated via ColemanLantern, lots of hiking to points of interest, with the only exception from above being the use of the automobile to get to and from the area where camping areas were wild enough to be interesting, yet somewhat developed. -- DonaldNoyes.20100318

If you want to limit your ElectricityAddiction, you could try Judaism. Religiously observant Jews do not manipulate electricity for about 25 hours each week (sunset Friday to nighttime Saturday, this time period being known as Shabbat). As examples, it is forbidden to drive, use public transportation, ring an electronic doorbell, answer a phone, flip light switches, use a microwave oven, and use a computer. Microphones and speakers are not used in the synagogues. This does not mean that no electricity at all is used during Shabbat. It just can't be directly under human control and manipulation. So it's customary to turn on the lights in the bathroom ahead of time and leave them on. It's also customary to remove the lightbulb from the refrigerator so that it doesn't turn on and off as a direct result of someone opening and shutting the door. The fact that the refrigerator's power might cycle on and off from people using the appliance is not considered a problem because it's under the direct control of a thermostat, not a person. The observance of Shabbat is more complicated than outlined here. Nevertheless, this goes to show that living without fiddling around with electricity for one day can be done. This practice can even become a new "addiction." Until you discover Wiki. Oh, well. -- ElizabethWiethoff

Isn't the prohibition just from humans doing work? I seem to recall a kibbutz that had a chicken farm, and they observed the Shabbat by having the feed system automated, and every Friday before sundown someone flipped a switch to turn the system on for Saturday. Not much savings in electricity there.

The prohibition is against the 39 types of work involved in building the Tabernacle. Fiddling with electricity is considered an extension of "kindling a fire". The point is not to not use fire/heat but to not build a fire or stoke it or fan it.

Hmmm, using home automation tools to turn on/off lights at specific times, turn on/off music when you enter/leave the room, even have the roast programmed to cook according to a defined schedule -- would make for a more comfortable shabbat? -- ChuckCottrill

See http://www.greencheese.us/IneedaTerabyte

Our neighborhood lost two transformers in the last six months. Fortunately it takes only a few hours to replace them.

But loss of electric power at home hurts like this:

No microwave or electric oven: Can't cook food.
No refrigeration: After a few hours food would thaw, melt and go bad.

: didn't you're mother ever nag you not to open the fridge unless you know what you wanted? I had a house fire, the kitchen was gutted, two days later we started cleaning, we pushed the fridge out to the garage, five days later we prised it open (the seals had melted shut) ... and enjoyed some still frozen ice-cream.

At my consulting office, the office complex has unreliable power.

Loss of electric power at work hurts like this:

Sudden loss of work on PCs.
Loss of most telephone communication. (Our PBX really needs a UPS!)
Loss of lights in the bathroom. And relative darkness in some inner offices.

That's why I always, always have a candle and matches in my desk drawer. I worked at a place that had power problems, and one day it went out for a long time. A visiting exec from a big foreign corp needed to use the ladies', so I got her the candle and she was able to go safely. Semper paradus -- PeteHardie

I agree - we are all addicted to electricity (I have no microwave (gas cooker) and no TV). Luckily, the phone still works when the power fails, so I can still pander to my Phone Addiction. Apart from the inconvenience of not having electric light, the real problem is Computer Addiction. Sadly the laptop has no batteries.

Of course there are many things that we've come to rely on that are not a biological necessity. Sometimes these can be surprising and none are without some social cost. Let's list them here rather than make a wiki page for each one.

fuel -- since the domestication of fire
courts -- a contract has meaning because of them (see CourtAddiction)
bytes -- by the billions
love -- and its baby brother, attention
news -- of any kind
travel -- and tourism

I don't think love OR its baby brother attention belong on this list. These are not artifacts of society that we have come to depend on in our civilized weakness. There are plenty of studies showing the deep biological necessity of these, and not only the extremely well known bond between mother and child. The basic evolutionary mechanisms of humans and our predecessors for millions of years have depended upon networked individuals acting as a collective intelligence - and love, attention, affection are key enablers of this relationship. -- BillBarnett

Has anybody else here read LarryNiven's KnownSpace series and found this discussion of electricity addiction extremely funny?

Hehehehehe.

Let's go the whole nine yards: OxygenAddiction?

Or remind ourselves what we're comparing things with/to: CrackAddiction?.

Not to mention the DreadTomatoAddiction?!

We should distinguish between dependencies we can overcome and those we cannot. The human dependency on H2O and O2 is not something we can do anything about. Without H2O and O2 we die; engineering our bodies to do without them would make us non-human.

Technological civilization's dependence on electricity is also not something we can do anything about. Without energy we can't power technology and that energy is conveniently distributed using electricity.

Our civilization's dependence on love and attention is also not something we can do anything about. Extreme lack of love and attention early on is a sure way of turning people into psychopaths. Even moderate deficits in love and attention lead to severe social and psychological problems. Ancient societies, with their widespread pederasty and infanticide, were neither 'human' nor 'functional'. A society of psychopaths would collapse instantaneously.

The entire point of the CarAddiction and VideoAddiction pages is that these dependencies are different. It is useful to devote attention to them because they are 1) extremely negative, 2) ingrained into the addicts' psyches, and 3) can be overcome. There are even detailed plans linked to from CarAddiction (bottom of page) which show how to construct (or adapt) a city for car-free use.

The only item on the list above which resembles cars and video is the formal court system. Fuel and love can't be overcome. Bytes aren't ingrained yet. News and travel aren't extremely negative. [Most of us don't find cars extremely negative. Just because you do...]

Do you mean that we could still have civilization without courts? In other words - without law? I don't think I'd want to live in a "civilization" without the rule of law. -- MikeSmith

(see CourtAddiction)

Of course, many of us are addicted to that hazardous substance DihydrogenMonoxide. I myself quaff several pints a day of the stuff...

I guess I avoided electricity addiction. I tried electricity once as a child by putting my finger in an electric socket. I cannot image how anyone could overcome that tingling feeling enough to become addicted.