Seriously though, if you say "akrasia" is a codeword for "lazy as fuck" (or whatever), you've just replaced one symbol with another. Have you made any progress?

Well, for starters, you aren't using a who-knows-where-it-came-from word. You're thinking more simply, which is good.

If you found yourself going to bed an hour or two later than is optimal, and you said "aha! I'm not akraitic, I'm lazy as fuck!", how would that help you?

Second.. that's not going to help you. You should've gone to bed already. But that means you're aware of the problem.

People often say "just have some self discipline!", but that is like saying to a beggar "just cause money to exist in your pocket!" - it's stating the obvious.

Then, why do you not do it? You're aware of both the problem and the solution - why aren't you implementing them?

Having an app that shuts the phone down is a way of achieving your goals with the self discipline you already have, and it is something you can actually do. It's specific and actionable.

With respect to anything that's not your brain, I think you still should self-improve rather than rely on other things. You've yourself said that you haven't found anything optimal and even admitted that it might not exist, so I think the self-improvement way is probably more reliable.

Another problem I have with this is that it seems to be badness-avoidance, rather than goodness-maximizing. Again, once you've shut off your phone, what are you going to do?

Well if you don't know what it is then how do you know ... Anyway if you don't care about any of this then why are you even participating? The internet is a big place man with plenty of other fora...

Because when you post links instead of being able to explain things yourself means that you cannot explain why you hold a certain belief or perform a certain action, but it's all justified as long as you have that piece of information somewhere.