Mindful Awareness and the Rising Tide of Information
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- Опубліковано 28 вер 2024
- We live in a world of increasing information that threatens to overwhelm our attention. We will see how a 1971 paper foresaw the rise of what has come to be called the "attention economy", and how some of its recommendations may point us towards a sophisticated internal practice of mindful awareness to help solve the problem.
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References:
en.wikipedia.o...
Herbert Simon, “Designing Organizations for an Information-Rich World”. In M. Greenberger (ed.) Computers, Communications, and the Public Interest. (Johns Hopkins Press, 1971): digitalcollect...
Sutta mentioned:
suttacentral.n...
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Thank you, Doug! You've brought up really hot topic for modern people. For some time I was a true information addict, I spent hours every day browsing web, posting to forums and social media. But one day I realized that I really don't neet all of that stuff, it doesn't do me any good. I worked hard for some time to get my information flows under control and excluded most of it from my life and I didn't lost anything significant with it. On other hand I've gained a lot of time and energy to spend on what's really imporant. I think it is very imporant to educate people how to cope with all that inforamtion load.
You’re very welcome! Yes, that flow of information can be very seductive, and many of these online companies count on that. We have to be mindful enough to tell when it’s useful to us though, and if not, to strive to deemphasize it in our lives.
A poverty of attention, what a compelling perspective!
I have to make a point not engaging in real-time updating media, like social media and online newspapers. It's not just that it sucks up my attention, but current events commentary, in particular, generates the least skilful states of mind in me (anger, contempt, pride, greed, jealousy, fear, confrontation). Ick!
The Buddha, I am told, was no fan of gossip. The Kathavatthu Sutta says that he didn't like "conversation about kings, robbers, and ministers of state; armies, alarms, and battles; food and drink; clothing, furniture, garlands, and scents; relatives; vehicles; villages, town, cities, the countryside; women and heroes; the gossip of the street and the well," so we can be pretty sure he would not have liked Twitter or, for that matter, the New York Times.
Yes indeed photistyx. We have to recall that one part of "right speech" is avoiding gossip. That said, I think there is a difference between a monastic who indeed is expected to avoid the sort of talk that the Buddha mentioned (I'm not finding it in AN 7.67, but I have seen it elsewhere), and the layperson who may need to talk about "kings, robbers", etc. in the course of their job or business. Either way though we should be leery of spending too much time with such matters.
Dear Doug, thank you so much for making this video 😊🙏🏻 i think it is a very opening mind video. 🙂 sharing my personal view, I think we live in a “knowledge society”. I mean, there is this public sense that if you have many information, you will be successful and even rise the chances of being happy. However, the amount of information gives you knowledge, which is very different from wisdom. So, in modern societies, we confound knowledge with wisdom and success with happiness. That’s why we became “information’s addicteds” somehow... we need to realize that we may be wiser reducing the input of information in our minds and souls. 🙂thanks for reading! Hugs from Portugal
Absolutely so HumanityIn1Minute, thanks! I did an earlier video comparing knowledge and wisdom where I came to some very similar conclusions. 🙏 ua-cam.com/video/gFcP0ZnqHSQ/v-deo.html
So glad I found this channel!
Me too! Glad to have you here Prithvi. 🙏
Brilliant! Thank you for another great video
Very welcome Lucas!
Yes, Google is helping us to find information., but many times it is the information that "they want" us to find, and they delete the information that "they don't think is good for us to know."
Quite right James. I don’t know how the Google algorithm works, but there is a role to play for deemphasizing false, misleading, or needlessly divisive material in favor of material that is true and beneficial. To what extent Google does this I’m not certain, though I know it has played a role in UA-cam search.
This is absolutely one of your most fascinating topics, although I think it such a broad topic that it couldn't be fully covered in a single video.
A good example of the issue is that when I was in school, if you were doing a research paper, a trip to the library was inevitable. With the internet, that has dramatically changed.
I like your view of google as a mind and the discussion of filters. One thing I was hoping you might emphasize is the danger of letting google be your filter. The movie 1984 provides a good depiction of the dangers of this.
Ironically, in your videos you typically do a good job of fighting this problem by referencing your sources. I often go read the suttas you reference. In other words, I want to get to the basic information without always relying on Doug's interpretation. That isn't to say you are either right or wrong, but rather it is getting closer to the original source. I find this extremely valuable. Thank you for doing this. It has been very helpful to me and I do appreciate your descriptions.
Yes, that's something I got from having good scholarship drummed into me at university and in grad school. At the end of the day, a claim is only as good as the references that back it up.
You must always question, everyone and everything to decide for yourself if it is true and beneficial.
Doug! Aren’t you talking about addiction? We wish to distract ourselves from dukkha - distract ourselves from ourselves and the undertow of suffering by creating an addiction to interrupts from media (my iPhone for instance)
Yes I think it can be described as a kind of addiction Bob, indeed addiction to distraction!
Well filtering information is not exactly concieousness. Understanding interpreting however is what we do and there is no reason why computers one day couldn't do, we are after all, made out of the same stuff. I cant imagine one aspect of life where mindfulness wouldn't be a game changer xD. As far as filters go - there is a darker side > propaganda, manipulation to change public and/or opinions. As for the understanding of self - our society would move forward if we stopped fearing psychadelics. =D
The concensus is to reach conciousness without the use of mind altering substances.
Filters are exactly choice. Meditation is choiceless awareness🤷🏼♂️
I've done it before especially if they talk about politics at dinner table I find that rude
Ah, Doug, I should wait before commenting. You did get to the value of choiceless awarenss. Very good sir
Attention is all you need!
How fortunate that this video popped up, this first day of 2020. Resolution: watching far fewer entertaining vlogs.
This video reminded me of Aldous Huxley's novel: Island. ATTENTION, ATTENTION!!
Thank you, Doug, as always. Best of everything in the coming year.
To you as well Sid! Have a healthy and happy 2020.
Wow. This was extremely interesting. I'm glad this video was not filtered out of the barrage of information I'm hit with on a daily basis! The efficient filters also explain how people can get sucked into information echo chambers. Great video!
Thanks so much! Glad you enjoyed it. 🙏
Information overload is a symptom of our desire to not focus on what's important. What is really important is the information that defy our points of view, but this information is filtered out.
Yes Jorge, it certainly makes it easier for us not to focus on what’s important!
This has helped me solidify the pricelessness of attention/awareness. Maybe what is being referred to here is unlearning the filters
Yes, thanks DJ! There is some unlearning of the filters but to be clear everyday life requires filtering. There is too much info for us to deal with otherwise. The question is how we can set up our own filters that work most skillfully, and this takes some practice, as well as mindful awareness.
The speech by Herbert Simon & the Attention Economy is uber interesting
Isn’t it? Yes I thought the same!
Just curious, how old is that statue you have?
Good question! I have no clue. 😄
Hi, Doug. You are building a formidable corpus of buddhist knowledge that is really useful for people like me who wants to know "what would Buddha do", basically. This being said, I wanted to ask you what do you think about the use of mindfulness techniques in corporative world and capitalist elites that are really into bringing meditation as a tool to enhance results and diminish workers complaints (McMindfulness, they call it). Saludos desde España y enhorabuena por el buen trabajo que has hecho estos años.
¡Gracias Isidro! The question of "McMindfulness" is big and probably something I should do a video on. In general any strategy of betterment can be misused, but my own knowledge of mindfulness teachers hasn't led me to believe any of them are really teaching "McMindfulness". The ones I know anyway are deeply interested in ethics as well as meditation.