Attention

Visualizing the modern media experience

Attention determines what your consciousness experiences, since you can only focus on a single thing at a once. Your subjective experience follows your attention from one thing to the next. That attention is commanded by your biological drives, which determine the salience of different objects in the environment.

"This is the first, wildest, and wisest thing I know, that the soul exists, and that it is built entirely out of attention." -Mary Oliver

Increasingly, attention is being commanded by the forces of capitalism which seeks to monetize it. The information and social media economy runs on attention. Time spent on the platform means money, especially when it depends on advertising. Gamified algorithms use artificial intelligence to figure out exactly what will keep your attention the longest, and eventually lead to addiction. The addicted customer is a goldmine, generating exponentially more revenue compared to casual users.

"The moment one gives close attention to any thing, even a blade of grass it becomes a mysterious, awesome, indescribably magnificent world in itself." -Henry Miller

Attention is a skill. Being able to focus your thoughts on a single thing for long periods is essential for completing complex tasks.The more you do long attention span things like reading books, the better your attention will be. The more you do short attention span things like social media and multitasking, the harder it is to sustain your focus. Attention is a muscle that must be regularly exercised.

Several good books addressing the attention economy and the way modern media has fractured our focus have been published recently. Chris Hayes book The Siren's Call does a great job of itemizing all the ways our attention is hijacked by modern technology. Jenny Odell's How to Do Nothing: Resisting the Attention Economy gives more practical advice for ways to break free from the hamster wheel of attention capitalism and hustle culture.

Why We Can’t Focus - with MSNBC’s Chris Hayes