Dimining Marginal Returns In Herman Hesse's Siddhartha

While social media is a great tool for online, world-wide communication, there are certain drawbacks that come with its constant accessibility. Lack of sleep, strained eyes, and procrastination plague the majority of those who participate in these interactive communication methods. This is why I chose to forgo my use of the online outlet, Tumblr, for one week. Often I used this website on my phone to put off doing work or delay going to sleep, and although it never got to the the point at which I was completely beset by it, I still was occupying a good portion of my day with Tumblr. This is why I decided to take a page out of the book, Siddhartha (1922), by Herman Hesse, and practice a less severe form of self-deprivation. The Law of Diminishing Marginal Returns in medicine refers to the decreasing effect of drugs on the body the

This law can also refer to the dopamine response. Dopamine is a neurotransmitter released from the substantia nigra and the ventral tegmental area in the brain, and it acts as a ‘reward’ for enjoyable activities, such as eating, playing, or social media of any form. The Pavlovian dogs salivating at the sound of a bell is a prime example of this response. According to Mauricio Delgado, associate professor of psychology at Rutgers University, “You don’t even have to go through the physical exertion of clicking. Often, if you have the earliest predictor of a reward—a sign of a social media alert, like your phone buzzing—you get a rush of dopamine from that conditioned stimulus.”. The chemical addiction to the dopamine response I had from phone alerts was obvious. As soon as I heard an buzz from my phone, I would immediately open it to see what had updated. Though, the less I used Tumblr, the less I wanted to use it, because I was deconditioning my dopamine response to my phone alerts. In chapter one, Hesse wrote, “Did not he, who had thirst, have to receive a holy quenching of thirst by