Your Life — Before a Screen
Imagine that in olden days shepherds tended flocks, never moving when a wolf drew nigh. Or woodsmen meditated on tall oaks, axes motionless at their sides. Or hunters let deer pass. None who did so would have called it work — or life. Why do we, who sit hours-long before a flickering screen?
Yesterday, en route via subway to view museum treasures on the national mall, we spied a young man sitting alone, smiling as he paged through messages on his iPhone. His immersion in the tiny screen struck me as a pose. No one likes to be or look alone. As a toddler, he was likely tucked in with a teddy bear for companion to guard against the solitary peril of night terrors. Now he has an iPhone.
I thought about him that afternoon as I peered through a glass case at the Hope Diamond. I, too, was just looking. But at the real Hope Diamond, not an image.
Without doubt, the Web, mobility and social media are among the wonders of the age. Wherever we go, whatever we do, we have instant access to galaxies of information. To the extent these technologies augment our lives they are true marvels. It’s when they become a simulacrum of life that I find myself pondering whether the “Information Age” has some unintended meaning or consequence, and if “IP” might also stand for Intellectual Pollution.
In a few minutes we’ll be off to Fedex Field, to “watch” our beleaguered Redskins take on the Denver Broncos. To the extent possible, we breathe our own life and energy into this spectator sport — screaming and yelling support for the team, hollering “DE-fense!” when the Broncos have the ball, jumping and high-fiving when Clinton Portis zigzags across the goal line. In-between the live action, I will not be watching instant replay on the outsized TV monitors.
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