The Molecule of More

THE MOLECULE OF MORE

WHY WE LIVE IN A WORLD OF PHANTOMS

When Andrew saw an attractive woman, getting her into bed became the

most interesting thing in his life. Everything else faded into dull gray. He typ-

ically met women in bars, and when he wasn’t working, bars were where he

wanted to be. Sometimes he told himself he was going to just relax and have

a few beers. He liked the ambience, and there were times when he fought hard

against the temptation to pick someone up. He knew that as soon as the sex

was over, he would lose interest in the young woman, and he disliked that feel-

ing. But in spite of knowing how things would turn out, he usually gave in.

After a while things got even worse. He was losing interest the moment

the woman agreed to go home with him. The chase had come to an end,

and everything was different. To his eyes, she even looked different, a trans-

formation that occurred in the blink of an eye. By the time they got to his

apartment he no longer wanted to have sex with her.

In a broad sense, saying something is “important” is another way of
saying it’s linked to dopamine. Why? Because among the many things
it does, dopamine is an early-warning system for the appearance of
anything that can help us survive. When something useful to our con-
tinued existence appears, we don’t have to think about it. Dopamine
makes us want it, right now. It doesn’t matter if we’re going to like it, or
if we even need it at the moment. Dopamine doesn’t care. Dopamine
is like the little old lady who always buys toilet paper. It doesn’t matter
if she has a thousand rolls stacked in the pantry. Her attitude is you can
never have too much toilet paper. So it is with dopamine, but instead of toilet
paper, dopamine urges you to possess and accumulate anything that
might help keep you alive.
This explains why the man on the diet wanted that hamburger even
though he wasn’t hungry. It explains why Andrew couldn’t stop pursu-
ing women even though he knew that in just a few hours, maybe in just
a few minutes, it would make him unhappy. But it also explains more
nuanced things; for instance, why we remember some names but not
others. There are all sorts of tricks one can use to make remembering
easier, such as using the person’s name in conversation a few times.