To increase the size of the obstacle it represents, I once modified the command I am in the habit of using to open files for editing so that any request to open /etc/hosts got changed to a request to open the file containing my to-do list.
But the next time it wanted to go to one of the sites on my blocklist, it took my brain about 5 seconds to realize that if it requested the opening of /:/etc/hosts (the /: being a quoting convention in Emacs) rather than /etc/hosts, it could get around my obstacle.
Some small software changes have proved effective obstacles for months, but the above was not one of them.
I will continue to maintain a blocklist in /etc/hosts because it causes my brain to observe my policy on work and procrastination more than it would without it, but the reason I am involved in remote-monitoring experiments is because it is a more powerful anti-akrasia technique.
Oh, I’ve been doing that for years.
To increase the size of the obstacle it represents, I once modified the command I am in the habit of using to open files for editing so that any request to open /etc/hosts got changed to a request to open the file containing my to-do list.
But the next time it wanted to go to one of the sites on my blocklist, it took my brain about 5 seconds to realize that if it requested the opening of /:/etc/hosts (the /: being a quoting convention in Emacs) rather than /etc/hosts, it could get around my obstacle.
Some small software changes have proved effective obstacles for months, but the above was not one of them.
I will continue to maintain a blocklist in /etc/hosts because it causes my brain to observe my policy on work and procrastination more than it would without it, but the reason I am involved in remote-monitoring experiments is because it is a more powerful anti-akrasia technique.