Aurora Health Co.

10/23/2026

www.labsandlifestyle.com

10/23/2026

10/23/2026

10/23/2026

As a brain surgeon, I can tell you almost everything you’ve heard about dopamine is wrong. It is not the pleasure chemical.

Dopamine is about prediction, not pleasure. It fires hardest when something turns out better than you expected.

Dopamine goes up when things are better than predicted, does nothing when things go exactly as predicted, and goes down when things are worse than predicted. That is not a pleasure signal. That is an error signal. Your brain is constantly making predictions, and dopamine reports the gap.

It’s why the second cookie is worse than the first. Nothing about the cookie changed. Your prediction did.

It’s why the raise stopped feeling like a raise. You adjusted. The new number became the expectation, and expectations generate no signal.

10/18/2026

Regarding psychiatric medication withdrawal. Interesting read.

We talk a lot about what psychiatric drug withdrawal looks like.