How Do We Combat Brain Rot? Heed Thoreau’s Advice to Live More Deliberately

The Oxford Word of 2024 was declared to be ‘brain rot.’ What actionable solutions does a 19th-century hermit offer us to curb this modern social contagion?

Jan 17, 2025

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*Image generated using Canva from the prompt Henry David Thoreau sitting at Walden Pond on iPhone.*

“The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation.”

-Henry David Thoreau, Civil Disobedience

Solving the problem of “brain rot” seems to me … a no-brainer. The obvious answer is: Put the phone down and live the life that’s already in front of you. I do not mean…

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