ピゴスパ<p>What's a new skill you picked up recently to combat <a href="https://social.linux.pizza/tags/brainrot" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">#<span>brainrot</span></a> ?</p><p>"brain rot<br>(n.) the supposed deterioration of a person’s mental or intellectual state, especially viewed as the result of overconsumption of material (now particularly online content) considered to be trivial or unchallenging. Also: something characterized as likely to lead to such deterioration." <br>(Oxford Dictionary).</p><p>This was word of the year in 2024.[1] Now in 2025 with more and more <a href="https://social.linux.pizza/tags/GenAI" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">#<span>GenAI</span></a> assisted tasks, this becomes even worse, as a study suggests.[2]</p><p>It is not surprising; in tech we know something called <a href="https://social.linux.pizza/tags/TutorialHell" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">#<span>TutorialHell</span></a> which discribes the state where you just follow along tutorials believing that you are learning somehting, but as soon as you need to solve a problem yourself, you realize that even after hours of tutorials you can't, because you actually never learned anything, even though you did everything by the letter.</p><p>I realized in ~2016, that I've been working in tech for over 10 years, and being so into it, that even for non-tech tasks I would think like I would when programming something and be even surprised if others did not. That was the moment, where I feared becoming what in Germany we call <a href="https://social.linux.pizza/tags/Fachidiot" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">#<span>Fachidiot</span></a> (i.e. a one-track genious, that's an idiot in everything else).</p><p>To combat this, I picked up <a href="https://social.linux.pizza/tags/%E6%97%A5%E6%9C%AC%E8%AA%9E" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">#<span>日本語</span></a> (<a href="https://social.linux.pizza/tags/Japanese" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">#<span>Japanese</span></a>). Just because I found it a real hard challenge. I think, doing something like this is essential: Learn something new, you've never done: a language, an instrument, a motor skill, or - if that is not your field - programming. Important is, that it get's you into doing something completely new, to animate your brain. Because, as it is well known: The brain works like a muscle: The more you use it, the better your mental and intellectual state gets - the less you use it, the more it deteriorates. And with the temptations of our modern world ( <a href="https://social.linux.pizza/tags/socialmedia" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">#<span>socialmedia</span></a> <a href="https://social.linux.pizza/tags/GenAI" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">#<span>GenAI</span></a> <a href="https://social.linux.pizza/tags/workoverload" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">#<span>workoverload</span></a> <a href="https://social.linux.pizza/tags/populism" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">#<span>populism</span></a> <a href="https://social.linux.pizza/tags/shorts" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">#<span>shorts</span></a> <a href="https://social.linux.pizza/tags/doomscrolling" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">#<span>doomscrolling</span></a> etc.) this has become more important than ever.</p><p>[1] <a href="https://boingboing.net/2024/12/02/brain-rot-is-oxfords-word-of-the-year.html" rel="nofollow noopener" translate="no" target="_blank"><span class="invisible">https://</span><span class="ellipsis">boingboing.net/2024/12/02/brai</span><span class="invisible">n-rot-is-oxfords-word-of-the-year.html</span></a><br>[2] <a href="https://arxiv.org/pdf/2506.08872v1" rel="nofollow noopener" translate="no" target="_blank"><span class="invisible">https://</span><span class="">arxiv.org/pdf/2506.08872v1</span><span class="invisible"></span></a></p><p><a href="https://social.linux.pizza/tags/learning" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">#<span>learning</span></a></p>