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You know one thing about the dopamine system that’s so important and also explains a lot of pathology but also a lot of human evolution is that we have basically one major reward system which is the dopaminergic system you know i sometimes like the analogy that you know nowadays you hear about cryptocurrency or the dollar versus the euro versus the this versus that there’s only one currency. In all of reality action is dopamine whether or not it’s a dollar back to dopamine or it’s euro back to dopamine or bitcoin back dopamine in the end whether or not someone has a billion dollars or two dollars is really that that currency resides as something that’s transact transacted in the real world but their notion of power and potential is dopaminergic and so to the potential for mates the potential for food how much food you have you know how much meat you have stored in the freezer tells you a lot about your security and well-being. And that’s but and that is translated into a dopaminergic internal representation of how safe and secure you are etc. So this system of fear versus confrontation taps directly into the dopaminergic system and there’s a beautiful set of studies that were done in the nineteen sixties published in the journal science as you know one of the you know one of the top journals to publish in again this is not work that that I did but where they gave people human beings the option to stimulate a number of people. A number of different brain areas just sitting in the clinic and some brain areas would evoke feelings of drunkenness feel others would evoke feelings of of anger others of sadness others of sexual arousal and the area that these subjects all preferred to stimulate the most in fact they would just sit there and lever press pretty much all day long was this midline thalamus area and the subjective feeling that they reported I find this interesting and would love your thoughts on this is one of mild frustration. Anticipation of something although they didn’t know what and dissipate and it’s this idea I think that it’s tapping into the dopamine system and the dopamine system of the dopamine system says something good is going to have that’s right that the key to something good is going to happen something good is going to happen and it’s an it’s an it’s an a pettit of state in some sense because it doesn’t signify the acquisition of it’s not satiating it’s a pettit of that’s right and so drives you forward and you might think that being driven forward. Would be unpleasant but if you’re in some sense if you’re activating the systems that drive you forward voluntarily then that’s the most positive form of positive reinforcement you can have. I think I read animal researchers who said that when they when they watched animals who were bar pressing to receive stimulation in those brain areas the animals would look forward as if something was about to appear that they wanted to have appear incredible so that was part of that apprehension part of it says it’s a hope system. In some sense I it’s the elicitation of whole that’s right you know it’s dopamine and here I’m robbing words from others like my colleague on a limkey who you know it’s not about having it’s about wanting it’s not about pleasure as much as it is about craving and motivation and drive and something critical. And Panksepp called it seeking. Yeah brilliant brilliant I never met Panksepp did you you met Yuck? I met him I met him online we were in a we were in a neurological chat room so to speak for a neuropsychological chat room for about five years and I had a chance to interact with him a fair bit in that so that was really good. He’s done beautiful work and thank you for calling people’s attention to his work I know you’ve done that many times and such key work. The dopamine system is in touch with the autonomic system sure because it has to register success versus failure of some pursuit. The prefrontal cortex is actually part of the dopamine reward system people often overlook this and then we just think about nucleus accumbens and ventral tegmental area but the prefrontal cortex because as you pointed out before it is generating positive stimuli. Possible outcomes different rules different selves are being projected into the future. You can think that the two marshmallow tasks the classic you know give kids the option to either have a marshmallow now or wait and have two marshmallows and the cute little videos of the kids you know in the room with the marshmallows sniffing it talking to it occasionally a kid will just stuff it in his mouth. Another child will turn away you know delightful right and all sorts of ideas have come about about how they do in life versus if they can wait or not wait in any case that’s dopaminergic anticipation. The key thing with dopamine I think that encapsulates the most of it is this notion of reward prediction error which is very simple if you are excited and anticipating something. You are generating some internal sense of the probability of it happening we’re going to the ice cream store kids let’s go we’re gonna buy screen grab ice cream. It’s closed the disappointment that they experience actually brings them far lower than they would feel much more sad than they would feel. Then had you not told them you’re going to get ice cream which which speaks exactly to what you were saying that it’s an anticipation signal so dope means going up up up we’re gonna get ice cream and then no so drops below baseline they would be better off being not told they were going to the ice cream store just drive right by. Danger of hope danger of hope if you anticipate that it’s going to be open and again this could translate to any scenario and it’s open there’s a dopaminergic signal upon receiving the reward but. It then drops a little bit this is the basis of addiction actually drops a little bit below baseline transiently so we always think of the ice cream is the reward well actually the reward was right before you had that first look of ice cream because you know you’re going to get it. This is also true of sexual behavior it’s true of of people who sell a company or they’re anticipating something exciting or of a wedding it’s that it’s this hope it also sort of. Partially explains this notion of postpartum depression where people are so excited about something the delivery of a child or something in the arrival and then for some reason they feel let down it’s because the anticipation was that great so many many scenarios might be an exhaustion component there too well it’s also the case if I remember correctly that that dopamine kick. So imagine what it does is back track the neural systems that were activated as the reward was approached so then it feeds back reinforcement not reward but but mediate cellular growth and maybe maybe. My line ization it’s increasing the efficiency of the neural connections of the systems that were activated just prior to receiving that reward in the order they were prioritized in the order they were manifested. So the closer the behavior is to the receipt of the reward the more it’s reinforced and more likely to be manifested in the future and then there’s a decay function going back in time. So and that’s partly how an addictive sub personality can grow to right because you can imagine that there’s a certain state of mind that you’re in maybe it’s a state of something approximating nihilistic hopelessness. That grips you every time you’re motivated to seek out your favorite drug and that’s fairly far back in the activation chain but it’s there every time you take a hit so what happens is the dopaminergic reinforcement produced by the drug. Reinforces that nihilistic hopelessness that drives the drug seeking behavior right and that’s how in part you develop a monkey on your back. Yeah I love the example even though I am sad that it happens for people I love the example because what you’re saying is that and it’s exactly right that the memory for events and states of mind and emotions that preceded a successful collection of reward or arrival at reward is set into a huge number of motor commands some of which are subconscious. And and and the ultimate dopamine signal I should experience this the other day I can give an example my girlfriend I decided to go to the beach we’re going to do this little ritual that we’ve been talking about doing for a while and I had on a piece of paper what we had written out we were going to do and I had in my back pocket. And we got to the ocean and the sun was setting sort of perfect timing for this and the piece of paper was gone and I thought oh my goodness how did I screw this up like of all the things you know I’m supposed to you know I’ve been I’m 47 years old this is not like I should be able to do this you know that. I blew it yeah I blew it so I went back to the car long walk looking everywhere it was not a windy day but I thought gosh where’s this piece of paper looking around didn’t find it all the way back to the car was in the car came all the way back and I was walking towards her I saw her and I thought okay this is really embarrassing I’m gonna just have to have to wing it or remember we didn’t have our phones intentionally either so we couldn’t look it up and then I saw the piece of paper on the beach and it was partially buried in the sand I picked it up and I was elated what happened there was my dopamine had dropped way too below baseline because I was disappointed that I’d lost it disappointed in myself etc and then I found right and so your anticipation was for not exactly so you got punished by yourself for that because that should be eradicated if you’re highly anticipatory and it doesn’t make itself manifest then you were seriously wrong. So you’re going to take a emotional hit as a consequence of that I think that’s also associated that emotional hit that pain that you feel I think that’s actually associated with the beginning stages of the death of the systems that mediated that initial response because you should eradicate systems that make you anticipate that don’t work. Right and that means those systems which are already instantiated and live in some sense have to decay and die and it strikes me as highly probable that you’re going to pay a price in something approximating pain for the death of those malfunctioning systems. It’s also why because why wouldn’t they fight for their lives to some degree why wouldn’t they resist the decay and death that might be necessary to keep you going why there should be some pain associated with that logically because it is a biological transformation. That’s an interesting way to lens to view it through that that self image that I had in that moment of you know I’m a responsible partner who can take care of a simple thing right for this nice little ritual that we’ve been talking about doing for a while I failed right so that part. Well it’s also so interesting you think about that this is a depressive cascade a that and it’s very hard to bind because imagine you anticipate something and then you make a mistake. Now the question then becomes how significant is the mistake and one view of your error would be well the paper blew out of my pocket and that could happen to anybody. And the the more catastrophic interpretation would be and it’s an extension of the thought path that you started to walk down well I’m near 50 years old I should be much more responsible than this and there’s something wrong with me as a person and then a depressive person would go even further they’d say. Well not only is there something wrong with me in this decision this is a decision like every other decision I make right now I never make a good decision in the past I’ve never made a good decision and there’s no way I’m going to change in the future. And so they the depressive takes that punishment response let’s say that’s a consequence of failed anticipation and can’t bind it it just it just takes out all of their potential future selves that’s a good way of thinking about yeah and so then they’re in a depressive pit. Yeah it’s it’s so that’s that’s too much learning from failure right that’s it’s it I’m really I’m grateful for it for your insight on this because indeed if I’m if I’m honest that my thought train went to the point of you know I didn’t think I’m a total failure because I lost this piece of paper I thought to myself. Well you know if it were a priority I would have insured I wouldn’t have lost it right right show interpret is not being a priority like where are my priorities in my you know in my overspend you know like what what’s going on you start to sift into that the full set of questions and then of course finding the paper. Resurrects the sense of self it was you know I think it was in that movie Pulp Fiction. Yeah well that that binding problem is really tricky because so there’s some good rules of thumb for that which is it one of the rules of thumb for that that’s extremely use that useful that socially instantiated is innocent until proven guilty. Right so you might say when those thoughts come up because they’re adversarial and accusatory thoughts you might say well that is part of the realm of possibility but I shouldn’t when your child does something wrong that’s minor you don’t say you’re a rotten kid. Right you say. You bind it you say look kid here’s a bunch of things you’re doing right but in this particular example says this specific situation here’s the minimal thing you did incorrectly and how to alter it. And it’s a really good habit of mine it’s like to to address towards yourself as well as other people which is to say well what’s what’s the minimum crime that i’m responsible for in this moment. And that’s part of this miracle of the presumption of innocence and especially without proof a lot of what I did my clinical practice to people who had a depressive temperament was help them make a case for themselves it’s like. Well maybe you’re as bad as you think you might be but maybe not let’s take the contrary argument let’s make you as innocent as you can be in this situation and and only narrow the repair to the absolute minimum that needs to be manifested.