What is Health?
--
What is Health?
Length: 08hrs 23mins 13 episodesCompletedScan code to listen more in Wehear
Summary
What is Health? explains from the bottom up––molecules to society––how we reached this point. The individual organism was designed by natural selection to maximize performance for a given energy cost. Our brain predicts what will be needed and controls metabolism, physiology, and behavior to deliver just enough, just in time (allostasis). By preventing errors, rather than correcting them, energy is saved. Predictive regulation requires learning governed by an optimal rule that rewards each positive surprise with a pulse of dopamine (experienced as a pulse of satisfaction) that encourages the behavior. But now obtaining food and comfort without surprise, we are deprived of the small rewards upon which rest the whole edifice of behavioral regulation and mood. Lacking frequent pulses, we grow restless and seek new sources via consumption: more food and more drugs that produce great surges of dopamine. But the next surprise must be more––to which our systems adapt by reducing their sensitivities––which drives us into spiraling addictions. Standard medicine treats addictions by blocking reward circuits. But this strategy prevents satisfaction and deepens despair. Standard economics promotes “growth” for more “jobs”. But “jobs” devoid of challenge and social rewards drive despair. To restore health, we must re-expand opportunities for small satisfactions and thereby rescue the reward system from its pathological regime.
Tags
Episodes
Hot Stories
AUDIOBOOK
LEGAL
PARTNERSHIP
Top Search