For me it's not the phone that's stopping me from reading books but my computer, on which I play games, and browse, and do private stuff.

Where I live, electricity price is so ridiculous, I leave my PC off for 3 to 5 hours a day.

You get bored after 5 minutes. This is the best time to open your book and read.

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Same idea applies for the phone. Just leave it off.

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wbobeirne 7 hours ago | parent [-]

It's difficult to turn your phone off if you have a spouse or children or other dependents who you can't drop communication with for hours at a time. But it's helpful to strip it down to the essentials so it doesn't double as an entertainment device.

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downut 6 hours ago | parent | next [-]

It is in actual fact not difficult to "drop communication with for hours at a time". This was the human norm for millenia, up to a decade or so ago. And given the toxic side effects of all this communication it's probably going to have to be worked out again.

We raised a child with the principle that "No News is Good News". She turned out great! And she lives that way still. That constant level of screen stimulation is strictly not necessary for family happiness, and I think you all who think so have not really internalized what it means for a child to learn responsibility.

See also free-range kids, and the social insanity that causes kids/parents to get arrested for eg playing in a park alone. There's a bunch of mental illness out there, and the screens are big reason why.

Oh right. My beautiful daughter reads books constantly. Weird that, huh.

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devin 6 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

To be sure, you absolutely can do this. I did it all the time as a kid. Nothing bad happened from being out of constant communication for hours.

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yipinwong 6 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

You are focusing on things that never happened or never will happen.

Phone is not the only communication you need for your kids or spouse.

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kibwen 6 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

The need to be instantly reachable at a moment's notice is a modern anxiety that we successfully lived without until the mass penetration of cell phones 20 years ago. Your spouse and children will manage without being able to text you for a few hours, just like spouses and children did for the first 100,000 years of humans history.

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andrepd 6 hours ago | parent [-]

That's ridiculous. We have managed without electricity or antibiotics for 100,000 years too. Are you keen on reading by candlelight or dying of preventable infections?

Instant messaging and calling is extremely valuable. Algorithmic social media is extremely noxious. Unfortunately, they both live on the same device.

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ianm218 5 hours ago | parent | next [-]

A more apt comparison is would you be OK reading by candle light sometimes for a few hours? I would be, it’s perfectly fine to read for a few hours by a bright candle.

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pessimizer an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

> Instant messaging and calling is extremely valuable.

They, and I, are disagreeing with you. Instant messaging and calling are nice-to-have at best, and a huge burden at worst. They teach an extreme codependency that has little benefit, and causes a lot of anxiety.

They're convenient when somebody needs to go to the hospital, needs to get picked up, you can't find somebody in a museum, you're at the store and somebody at home might need something.

You are rarely using it for this. You're mostly wittering on and on about nonsense and not giving each other any room. When others go silent or don't answer quickly enough you get nervous about what they think about you, or if they are in danger. When others are interrogating you about things that make you uncomfortable, you feel like you have to answer now or you're making a statement with your silence.

Most of the useful stuff could be moved to a house phone (which doesn't exist anymore) and a payphone (which doesn't exist anymore.) For the people farther away, writing a letter was better. You don't need to be on the back of somebody 1000 miles away. There are too many of them, and companies and governments slip in. It's not healthy and it's not safe.

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devin 40 minutes ago | parent | prev | next [-]

This is a completely laughable comparison.

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kibwen 6 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Comparing smartphones to antibiotics is somewhat ironic given that smartphone addiction is a disease, not a cure to one. There is no law of the universe that says that technology cannot create ills where previously there were none. I assure you that you are allowed to turn your phone off for hours, days, weeks, forever if you so choose, and your life may be better for it.

	▲	wat10000 5 hours ago \| parent [-]
		That’s fine, but the argument needs to be something better than “humanity did without it and survived as a species.”