what boredom does
Out of boredom have sprung many of my projects and hobbies. Over the years, patches of evening downtime have served as fertile ground for budding interests like playing chess, playing guitar, singing, beatmaking, programming, and writing. A crucial factor here is lack, space for something to grow. (That, for example, would have been a good point for
Michael HarrisThe End Of Absence (2014)
by Michael Harris
In his book The End Of Absence, Michael Harris laments the everpresence of digital technology. He writes stylishly and gracefully, but he struggles to get a grip on the argument he wants to make. I feel his yearning for mindfulness and relate to his distrust for apps and devices that leech on our attention for profit, but I balk at his dismay at seeing a toddler attempt to zoom in on the cover of a magazine as if it were an iPad screen.
He’ll grow up thinking about the Internet with the same nonchalance that I hold towards my toaster and teakettle.
This observation’s lack of consequence hints at the lack of clarity in the author’s critique of digital technology. Most frustrating is his lack of self-awareness when recounting past technology alarmists. He tells us of Hieronimo Squarciafico, who in the 1400s decried the printing press for making too many books available, and of Socrates before that, who warned that writing was bad for one’s memory.
Kids these days, for Socrates, were rotting their brains by abandoning the oral tradition.
Harris seems to recognize these two as cynical luddites, but then refuses to acknowledge them as his forerunners. Instead, he sidesteps into a discussion about how tools reshape the psychologies of their wielders. It’s a real shame, because a serious take on the role of digital technology in our lives cannot ignore either its usefulness or its permanence.
It is clear that this technological revolution like all others cannot be evaded without exit from society and that it will continue to transform us. The question is: how do we incorporate these new technologies into our lives? How do we retain their usefulness while minimizing the harm they might do to us?
There are signs, earlier in the book, that the author won’t really be trying to sort out this knot and will content himself merely with perusing and picking at it. He mourns the “end of absence”, but never makes it clear where his concept of “absence” even begins. His vignettes hint at some possible meanings – time without digital technology, time alone out in nature, time to think. Is that all? These goals seem perfectly achievable with a little time management. Has he tried the Pomodoro Technique? Why ring the alarm bell when a simple kitchen timer will do?
to make when discussing the ills of digital distraction).
Writing is one of these projects that erupted out of the seemingly lifeless terrain of boredom. I would be farther behind in my writing output if I hadn’t been so bored with my first full-time software engineering job. Instead, I found in writing a channel of expression for my energy and ambition for craftsmanship. Years later, if I wasn’t stranded in an unfamiliar and uninteresting city while visiting my girlfriend, I wouldn’t have made my website or, more importantly, this site. My main programming projects – Muze Radio, Music Lib Bot, and Song Scrounger – owe their existence to periods of restlessness.