Distracted: The Erosion of Attention and the Coming Dark Age

434 Pages·2008·6.12 MB·English

by  Maggie Jackson

MAGGIE JACKSON
Foreword by BILL McKIBBEN
For Emma and Anna

Foreword 9
Introduction 11
PART I. LENGTHENING SHADOWS: EXPLORING OUR LANDSCAPE
OF DISTRACTION
Chapter One. Wired Love © 1880-Tracing the Roots of an Attention-Deficient
Culture 29
Chapter Two. Focus-E-mailing the Dead and Other Forays into Virtual
Living 45
Chapter Three. Judgment-Of Molly's Gaze and Taylor's Watch: Why More Is
Less in a Split-Screen World 71
Chapter Four. Awareness-Portable Clocks and Little Black Boxes:
The Sticking Point of Mobility 97
PART II. DEEPENING TWILIGHT: PURSUING THE NARROWING
PATH
Chapter Five. Focus-Invisible Tethers: The Delicate Art of Surveillance-Based
Love 127
Chapter Six. Judgment-Book and Word on the "Edge of Chaos" 153
Chapter Seven. Awareness-The Post-Human Age: A Battle for Our
Attention 183
PART III. DARK TIMES ... OR RENAISSANCE OF ATTENTION?
Chapter Eight. McThinking and the Future of the Past 213
Chapter Nine. The Gift of Attention-A Renaissance at Hand 237
Acknowledgments 267
Endnotes 269
Index 311
s I settled down at my desk to write this brief foreword, a light on the
computer blinked to indicate that a new e-mail had arrived. This left me with a
quandary that by now must afflict most Americans most days of their lives:
continue with the train of thought that I'd begun to follow or see who was hailing
me and for what purpose. The quandary was easily resolved-I of course clicked
on my inbox, finding a message from someone asking if she could call me right
now to discuss a piece of climate change legislation making its way through the
Senate. I said yes, the phone rang, a half hour disappeared, and now I am back.
I can't add up with any precision the costs and benefits of that small
exchange, repeated constantly. On the one hand, I was able to link up with
someone far more easily than I would have even a few years ago. On the other
hand, I was unable to keep thinking a thought -any thought-straight through.
Distraction has always been a human condition. Sages have always been
quick to point out how even a few minutes of meditation prove the jumpy nature
of our consciousness-our monkey minds. But now every force conspires to
magnify that inattentiveness: technology has made distraction ubiquitous. We're
almost always within reach of something to fill our brains-how often do you sit
in the car without turning on the radio? How often do you enter a hotel room
without turning on the TV or, now, looking for the Ethernet cable? Places that
once offered some respite-the coffee shop, the waiting room-are now among the
most connected.
Since this is the water we swim in, it's hard to notice it unless some artificial
condition interferes. Some artificial condition like ... nature. The occasional
blackout is a nuisance, but also a gift. A long solo backpacking trip is a
revelation-for two or three days your internal CNN continues to chatter away,
but at a certain point it starts to run out of opinions, plans, screeds, and begins to
fall silent a little. It's weird, unsettling.
This book, remarkably impressive both for its wealth of detail and the clarity
of its synthesis, forces our attention on that inattention. And in so doing, it asks
us implicitly the uncomfortable question about what our lives are for. Are they
measured in busyness, the accomplishment of many and random tasks? Or do
they require some kind of more artful arc to be whole? Writing powerfully and
subversively, Maggie Jackson raises issues that go straight to the core of what it
means to be human in the early twenty-first century, questions that we need to
think about clearly, slowly, deeply.
The inbox is flashing again, clamoring for my attention. Loving novelty, I
head in its direction; craving depth, I do so with a tinge of regret.
-Bill McKibben