attention is sacred
exploring the sacred nature of "attention"
sari and
attention is sacred
There comes a moment in life, often in the quietest of hours, when one realizes that the world will continue on its wayward course, indifferent to our desires or frustrations. And it is then, perhaps, that a subtle truth begins to emerge: the only thing we truly possess, the only thing we might, with enough care, exert some mastery over, is our min... See more
Bill Wear • The Quiet Art of Attention
The limitations and possibilities of using computational models, specifically AI, in environmental inquiry and the implications of a systems view of the environment.
Linkclose attention inevitably facilitates transformation. Tsing calls this “the arts of noticing”, tactics for thinking without either the abstraction produced by quantification or deeply held assumptions of progress. If we are “agnostic about where we are going, we might look for what has been ignored”
Compassion, in contrast, means that I identify with the afflicted individual so fully that I feed him for the same reason I feed myself: because we are both hungry. In other words, I have paid him attention.
Robert Zaretsky • Simone Weil’s Radical Conception of Attention
The fastest growing sector of the culture economy is distraction . Or call it scrolling or swiping or wasting time or whatever you want. But it’s not art or entertainment, just ceaseless activity.
The key is that each stimulus only lasts a few seconds, and must be repeated.
The key is that each stimulus only lasts a few seconds, and must be repeated.
Ted Gioia • The State of the Culture, 2024
Instead of movies, users get served up an endless sequence of 15-second videos. Instead of symphonies, listeners hear bite-sized melodies, usually accompanied by one of these tiny videos—just enough for a dopamine hit, and no more.
This is the new culture. And its most striking feature is the absence of Culture (with a capital C) or even mindless entertainment—both get replaced by compulsive activity.
We have been co-evolving with ravenous attention predators forever. This is not a fight we can, or should want to, opt out of. We already live in a universe with church, slot machines, and Rhianna. The Sorrows of Young Werther. The Beatles. The bigger and more successful they get, the more boring they become, and the easier they are to ignore.
Frank Lantz • Unpluggers, Deflators etc. pt 3: Why Not Both?
taste is the business end of attention - we will need to learn how to use it to survive. humans are not helpless creatures who must be protected from the grindhouse of optimized infotainment. we are attention warriors.
Attention is our Vitality. Our quality of life is equal to quality of our attention.
If you want to change your life, change what you pay attention to.