On Becoming an Individual in an Age of Distraction

https://lareviewofbooks.org/review/can-jazz-musicians-and-short-order-cooks-make-you-less-narcissistic

by prostoalex • 11 years ago

45 16 11 years ago

If you read articles from previous decades about the previous decades before them, I think you will find yourself a Crawford after Crawford. Woody Allen in Midnight in Paris nailed this. Statements like "People used to talk to each other", "People used to meet up and enjoy company", "People used to know real skills and critical thinking", are all false. This generation might stare and screens all day, but communication is easier than ever and people are communicating. People may not know how to be motorcycle mechanics, but they know how to develop programs, build electric drives etc... I strongly believe we have a capable and driven society, and the people are not "drunk on there screens".

givan• 11 years ago

This decade brings something new, communication is mostly done through devices, this wasn't possible before and this type of communication has a very narrow channel and a lot of information like body gestures, eye contact etc are lost.

flexie• 11 years ago

I communicate way more face to face rather than through devices. Are you sure you don't do that as well?

And communication through phones for hours a day was normal for most people in the 90s too. Even in the 50s.

FreedomToCreate2• 11 years ago

Be in a management role for even a day. Trust me, body language is extremely important for communication, even in todays world.

iamcasen• 11 years ago

While I agree with what you're saying, I think the point of the article is lost on you. I don't think the author was implying technology has us "drunk on our screens.", but rather, the ability of technology to act as a buffer between us, to create a world where we can have images, messages, opinions, from all walks of life constantly pouring into our minds through our hand-held devices.

I can only speak for myself here, but I noticed how after I started a professional career as a programmer and a tech-geek, I became more and more isolated; preferring alone time, and being in my head. It's just easier, to take in all the information and opinions you prefer, and ignore what you don't want. To engage in activities you want to do yourself, rather than compromising with others.

Perhaps this new society that emerges will not be WORSE than any previous one, but it will be different. I think it is important to understand those differences. I can already feel the growing pains caused by old institutions struggling to keep up with the pace of technology. We should keep an eye on those millennia old social institutions as well (like politics, community building, and voting).

cobaltblue• 11 years ago

You may find the pattern of complaints repeated decade after decade, but as the other commenter mentioned that is just as easily explained if it is in fact getting worse and worse. If you believe that, and believe that pretty much everything people point out as better that even our ancestors before the 20th century would agree with is better (less homicides for instance) is simply due to technological (incl. medical and scientific) improvement, then you're basically a neoreactionary. Give the authors in that field (or just writers from before the 20th century) a serious read sometime if you want a very different perspective on the world you live in.

agumonkey3• 11 years ago

I'd love to believe this, and I agree things weren't that better in the past (some form of nostalgic bias)[1], but when I hear people from the 60s, 70s talk, they have finer way to express themselves in more straightforward style. Especially politics (at least in my country), it's disarmingly sad to hear debates of that era, people seemed like far subtler and sophisticated compared to those in place now (they can't even hold a simple argument without resorting to low fallacious tactics).

I'm fairly convinced that when society is too comfortable (while being messier at the same time) then you see diminishing returns in people's existence.

[1] how society repeats itself, new tech bad for work, old good ways are dying; these are recurrent generational waves.

TeMPOraL2• 11 years ago

Personally, I ascribe differences in political talk to things being new. Democracy has a natural tendency to vote all competence out of the office, but it takes decades. Politicians of the past may have seemed smarter just because there weren't that many players specializing in persuasion tactics yet, and the "media experience" wasn't so streamlined.

Chris20483• 11 years ago

Arguably, people today have more sophisticated politics. Resorting to fallacious tactics isn't a failing if it works. Maybe the problem is a moral one?

cafard• 11 years ago

Which country? I don't remember the US political discourse of the 1960s and 1970s as being subtle or sophisticated.

Chris20483• 11 years ago

I'm always a little sceptical of these arguments too, because I wonder if the difference is this:

Now, when people are bored with what you're saying, instead, of their eyes glazing over, they might start to become increasingly attentive to their phones; In other words, they now have a physical bore-shield.

I think people meet and talk as much as they did - They just don't necessarily prioritise the pleb in front of them - and for some people, who like to monopolise their audiences, this is a problem.

On Becoming an Individual in an Age of Distraction

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