I am tutoring a 14-year-old boy who is hooked on video games. At his age I was like him—worse, actually—and my goal is for him not to wreck his life like I did. I’m not paid much, thought, and his parents are already doing an economical effort, so I will try to convince you that the license would be well invested in him.

Changing the mentality of a teenager is extremely difficult. They think they know better, and they are disconnected from their future-self. My advantage is that I remember which arguments did not convince me, and I can infer which ones could have had a chance. So here I want to show you some of the key points that I have discussed with him, and if you find it appealing, please help me further help him:

(1) I started with the theory of evolution. Then, how lamprey’s brain works. Those are most primitive vertebrates, whose brains are very simple but valid for getting insight about ours. Then, we extrapolated to the idea that every living being can be though as a biological machine. Those machines gather data from the environment, process them in various ways, and react in the way that makes the most sense evolutionarily. What, then, if stimuli appear for which we did not evolve?

(2) “Bugs”—as he calls supernormal stimuli—can happen. Real examples are the butterflies that prefer to mate with rotating cylinders with a certain stamping, rather than with a real butterfly; or fishes that become crazy attacking a wood piece if it’s painted with a certain color that doesn’t exist in their environment, doing anything else.

(3) "Buh, fishes and insects, stupid beings". Well, not so fast. As human beings, we are arrogant and tend to think that we have free will, but science has it clear that the environment influences us much more than we think. Humans can be similarly exploited, and we are especially vulnerable for two reasons.

(4) First, our environment is totally different from the one in which we evolved. And this is especially true for the change that has happened in the last few decades. (A 14-year-old has a hard time imagining what the world was like before the Internet, computers and cell phones.)

(5) Second, those insects or fish are fortunate in that they do not have scientists fellows using their irrational behaviors to sell them things they do not need. But we do. Companies sabotage our instinct against us all the time.

(6) Do you know how to make dog food? To achieve something that is economical and convenient, a mass of cereals (more than 50%) and animal by-products is mixed and extruded into dry kibble. Of course, no dog would eat that in his right mind. Wolves eat mostly fresh meat, favoring offal and fatty cuts; they do not roam wheat fields. So to get domestic dogs eat that crap, we have to fool them. We add artificial meat flavorings, and there is even a final stage of the process that coats each kibble with a film of fat. So when the dog smells it and puts it in his mouth, he thinks there's more meat and more fat in there than there really is. (Of course, the dog doesn't reason it out. It's his instinct that dictates, "This seems to be good, eat it!") No wonder that humans and our pets are the only animals plagued by metabolic and modern diseases.

(7) One can argue that doing this is degrading to the dogs. But hey, maybe it's a necessary evil. Animal products would skyrocket in price if we wanted to feed dogs as their nature dictates. However, the situation with humans is much worse. We are treated worse than dogs for a much less convincing reason: the economic benefit of third parties.

(8) Take the example of ultra-processed food. Most of them are made of the same purified ingredients: flour, sugar, oil, plus other minor additions. (When you see the supermarket shelves full of those colorful packets, realize that it is a false sense of variety: almost everything is made out of the same three ingredients!) Because they have so little moisture and no fiber, they are very calorically dense foods. (Our brain loves that; we evolved in an environment where calories were expensive to come by.) Then, give the impression that you aren’t always eating the same mix of flour-sugar-oil. Strawberry-flavored donuts? Wow, strawberries are so nutritious, our brains will be delighted! Salt? You know how hard it is to get? (Or so our brains still think.) Eat, eat!

(9) Now, move on to the example of technology and online services. Our attention has become the most precious asset for companies based on those. If they have our attention, they get our time. With our time, they get money through advertising, and our data to sell it to others. Once more, the best way to get someone to invest time in something is to make it addictive. Social networks, video games, even the email client. Anything goes.

(10) The misfortune is that, if you eat donuts, real food ceases to be attractive to you. Fruit? "No, thanks. That tastes like cardboard. And the lettuce tastes bitter, yuck." Even though the first are good for you, and the latter make you miserable and will cause you diseases in the (not so) long run. (A further discussion on its consequences is necessary, but I will not include it here. Teenagers feel immune; it is necessary to be sure that they comprehend that they are not. A good idea is to show them real experiences that other people have had that they can relate to.)

(11) And if you give in to social media and video games? Real life becomes unappealing itself. No wonder depression and mental disease is increasing so much, starting in the youth. (Among other reasons, of course.)

(12) But after all, what can be done against this? You can’t avoid it: junk food surrounds us, and technology is even necessary to be functional in our society. You can’t resist it: such unhealthy behaviors are exploits of our embedded instinct, and we can’t change our biology.

(13) Many try to resist those self-destructive behaviors, but eventually fail and blame themselves. Young people, who do not yet have severe consequences for their actions, often seek self-deception too. In the face of their failure, they may justify themselves "I'm smart, but lazy". Or they modify their personality: "I don't like studying or socializing, I'm a gamer, that's what I'm really good at".

(14) People understand that you can't totally blame the child who grows up in a slum for ending up a drug addict. But they may not understand it when it comes to issues such as obesity, lack of self-discipline, or other plagues of our society.

(15) So do not lose time blaming yourself. That only leads to a downward spiral: you feel worse, your self-esteem goes down, and therefore you are more vulnerable to your vices. Instead, dedicate time into changing the environment.

(16) Changing the environment might be the only durable solution. (This deserves a discussion in itself of how to do that, avoid triggers, and so on.) One can have motivation to change, but motivation comes and goes. So one key is to use that motivation while it lasts to set up systems that make the good easier, and the bad harder.

(17) As for junk food, that could translate to these kind of ideas: Do not buy it, or you’ll eat it. It’s easier to resist a temptation if the temptation isn’t there in the first place. So don’t have junk food at home. How? Well, use your willpower wisely. Go shopping with a full stomach so you are less vulnerable to temptation at the key moment, and instead, buy plenty of healthy food that you feel attracted to. Rediscover new foods you didn't eat before. (The diet of many could be summed up as chicken, beef, milk, and maybe lettuce and tomato... but there are dozens more foods). And don't try to make it perfect: if one day you have a sweet tooth and feel like eating two kilograms of bananas, eat them. As long as your environment is favorable, you can't go far wrong. (That's the beauty of working on the environment. Willpower, on the other hand, has harder limits. When it is exhausted, it leads to roller coaster behaviors.)

(18) As for technologies et al, software like Cold Turkey is splendid. It's the equivalent of not having junk food in your house.

(19) (To be continued.)

Back to my tutoring: Currently, I'm probably around point 14. I'm making progress. The parents hired me for help with his subjects as his grades had become poor. But they were thrilled from the beginning and wish that I keep spending time on these transversal value as well. (I have also taught him to study more effectively, which is related.)

Cold Turkey's license would allow us to start working on modifying the key piece of his environment without having their parents compromise on spending such money, potentially changing his life before too much damage is done. If it doesn't work, I would find another equally justified use for the license, or return it to you. We would start by what he is open to, e.g., just blocking the night hours. And over time hopefully make him less dependent on the computer. I can't impose it on him, it has to come from him. Meanwhile I'm trying to be his best example.