Staying Disconnected

Nowadays,  hikers in the most isolated and remote places can be instantly tracked by use of a satellite phone.  Everyone lives in the instant always connected, so much so that there is fear when contact is lost.  People have become used to _ addicted is another term _ a constant stream of information from email, cellphone, and various feeds like twitter.

Not long ago, most people sought independence _ from childhood or past or parents.  The goal was to stand alone, to meet the world directly.  Some would travel and lose contact for days, or years.  Of course, some others, as always, never moved more than 20 miles from where they were born.  But wanting to be always part of something immediate seems a change in the American attitude, a diametric opposite of being self-sufficient.

Going somewhere remote or dangerous without means of contact is of course an act of either incredible heroism or deepest stupidity.  What might happen, and how would help be called?  But there are parallel extensions even when personal danger is not involved.  What might happen to the world,  or interests, or family if connection (and possible intervention) is not maintained?  What disasters might be missed, what opportunities lost?

Of course, nobody can affect most of the news _ wars and starvation and disaster in far off (or even not that far off) places.  Mostly nothing learned matters in day-to-day life and decisions.  And the trade off is that if connection must always be available, whatever enterprise requires it is more fragile than it should be.  Even the ancient emperors knew the value of delegation and power autonomy.  Everyone ends up in a kind of modern neurosis of false importance.

In the really old days having a key meant someone was powerful.  Then locks became numerous, and fashion and custom directed that the most wealthy would carry no keys at all (a job for servants) and you could always tell the person with the most keys was the lowest in social standing _ often the janitor.  Maybe connection fads will eventually trend the same way.  Right now, the novelty has not yet worn off.

Soon enough everyone may be tracked habitually anyway, always known, always capable of being found.  Such a condition is beginning already.  Society will adapt, probably by ignoring worry.  After all, if the powers that be want to get you, they always could.  The concept of privacy is more a chimera than real.

Perhaps it would be well, nevertheless, for more folks to try to disconnect a little bit, to become important within themselves and to themselves.  Nothing to pay attention to by the cosmos, inner being, and meditation on beliefs and existence.  There may be strength in being disconnected.  A short vacation from the constant chatter may be rich, useful, and invigorating.
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I have always been jealous of my own time, always aware that although it seems infinite it is truly limited, and now that I am older I am even more keenly so.  I hate interruptions to moments when I am engaged in profound thoughts,  or enjoying and experiential immersion.

Yes, engagement with the world is necessary, and interaction with society is required to remain sane.  That means that I cannot go around forever with my head in the clouds.  There are chores to be done and things to accomplish and necessities to remaining alive and other tasks that are just expected to be done.  The complex patterns of human existence and life itself do not let anyone retreat into coma and continue for long.

But it is still possible to value those moments when you cannot be interrupted.  Not long ago, that was when you were away from work or on vacation or even doing certain chores.  You could go out of touch for a while and nobody thought anything of it.  I have resisted the trend of constant connection for a long time, I continue to be happy when I am off the map.

Lately, I have begun to be infected by the bug, a little.  When I am the only person spending hours alone in Manhattan or in a state park with no cell phone _ well “What might happen?  How would I get help?  What if….”  It is folly to go somewhere to die because of lack of aid.  And yet _ in all those places I go there are people.  If I get hit on the head and robbed, my only real protection during and after the event are the people around me.  Likewise if I get hit by a bus, or fall with a heart attack on a trail.  It is only in isolation from everyone else (who are, naturally, themselves wired into everything) that I would be in real danger _ and where I live, there is no isolation from everyone else, ever.

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Ringring, buzzbuzz, chimechime, tweettweet,

In restaurant or home or street
What has happened or could be
Important news affecting me
Far off or near entrancingly
Already past and obsolete
But I must know or possibly
Be lost in flow and fall behind
While others reap and treasures find
Gain advantage purse and mind
It’s late, must rush, oh dear, I see
Too old, I guess I must delete.

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You probably like the concept of always being aware of what is going on.  What you don’t know might hurt you.   Like all animals, the more aware you are of your environment, the more likely you are to remain in control of it, to use its signals to survive and thrive where others may fail.

The first question, however, is whether any of this constant connection actually makes you more aware of YOUR environment.  The world and cosmic environment is in some ways an illusion _ you can know the exact instantaneous price of a stock and the exact instantaneous news from Japan and yet be hit by a truck you are paying no attention to as you cross a busy intersection.  Much of what comes pinging in on the electronic network _ even from your friends and relatives and employment _ is pretty remote from your actual momentary surroundings.

The second question is whether any of the people you think depend on your constant updates and analysis are actually helped by your constant intervention.  It is important to grow, and the first rule of any robust organization is to make no particular individual indispensable.  Having a single chokepoint for all decisions _ from your spouse or your children or your friends _ puts them in a particularly fragile position _ and if you depend too much on them you are likewise less solid and real.

Finally, there is the question of choice.  If you happily drape the chains of constant interactive communication about your shoulders that is one thing.  If it is forced on you by an organization or by a group or by a nagging feeling of guilt that you might be missing something, that is simply a horrible curtailment of your freedom.

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The variation in how much people feel they need to interconnect socially provides an illustration of the rich fodder used for imaginative (and probably imaginary) anthropological evolutionary speculation on the origins of human traits.  Of course, it is always obvious that women in most societies seem to be the tribal center, and cluster more or less together, while men spend more time roaming alone or in packs.  So women are typically more social/gossip oriented and the question is mostly whether this is a role forced on them by the social and physical pressures of childbearing, or whether this is an innate wiring of neural difference between sexes. 

Even in those roles, however, there are extremely wide fluctuations, especially when age is taken into account.  There are old hags that like to wander by themselves, and old misanthropic men who do likewise.  There are young men and women who prefer to be by themselves, hunting or doing crafts in a dark workshop somewhere.  There are young men as well as young women who spend each hour surrounded by fellow workers or bar companions.  But _ and here is the interesting but _ all that variation seems to be easily ignored as story telling from the presumed experts comes into play.

Then there are explanations that men evolved to be more alone because they had to leave the tribe to find food.  That women had to band together to protect the young.  That a lone explorer or scout could be valuable to the tribe by finding and communicating information about the environment.  That a socially dangerous individual could become bonded into group strength.  And any of these can have long stories, illustrations from studies of “primitive” societies, extrapolations from the meager siftings of campsites, references to “animal cousins” who seem to have similar behavior.

The thing is, people have always found it possible to explain anything.  The species is composed of master story-tellers.  If not to each other, than each to themselves.  Stories are satisfying, and seem to provide an easy and rational explanation for mysteries.  That does not, of course, make them historically or scientifically true, but they can still be usefully satisfying.  Why people like to be connected as they do _ and why some people at certain times resist being connected _ are just slotted into whatever grand narrative happens to be handy today.

The human race is defined by having few controlling instincts.  Instincts guide learning, but learning defines culture.  Instincts are buried deep in drives that _ by the time they wend their convoluted way to surface behavior _ have no resemblance from one person to another, and no finite explanation for how they become manifested.  So some people love to be connected and interrupted; some people hate to be connected and interrupted; and everyone adjusts to what is necessary and learns to make the best of it _ regardless of what was shaped over eons past and deep in the cauldrons of our infinite neurons.   The fascinating fact is that everyone does actually adapt, and the tribal mob does actually manage to integrate and accommodate individual variation so well.

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Anne-Helene and Elise spun their webs in the French countryside, which except in travel brochures nowadays looks a great deal like countryside anywhere else.  Of course they spoke spider-French, but since you know neither spider-French nor spider-English, it will all be the same to you.  Anne-Helene was a thoroughly modern spider, keeping up with all the trends of the outside world, while Elise liked to concentrate on the dew of the morning and the clouds overhead and the life generally just around her.  But they had grown up together and were great friends.

Their webs reflected their interests.  Anne-Helene’s was vast and connected to just about everything she could find, including other webs.  It swooped over the yard in great sheets, trying to be ready for anything at all that might wander in.  If she learned something from one of her connections, she would incorporate a new thread to keep track of what was going on over there, as if it might affect over here.

Elise, on the other hand, wove more tightly and in a more restricted space.  She tried to cover one area, and cover it well, so that no insect that came into it escaped, but also so that only insects she actually needed were caught.  In her spare time she sat, and watched, and dreamed.

There were times when Anne-Helene needed to share her food, for the bugs might shift away from the place Elise had prepared.  She constantly told Elise to be more aware, and more open to understanding the effects of what she was learning, about pesticide application in the meadow, changing climate, industrial agriculture.  But Elise only shrugged and said “Eh bien, there is nothing we can do about that, my friend, so why concern ourselves.”

Eventually there was a great storm, with high floods and strong wind gusts, trees falling and destruction everywhere.  Anne-Helene’s huge masterpiece was ripped to shreds and scattered elsewhere.  As the insects returned from their secure hiding places, Elise’s strong little net captured enough food for them both.  And then she said “You see, it is sometimes good to concentrate on what is within our power to do.”

Being French, they developed ongoing and fabulous philosophies based on their convictions, published them and became the leaders of new intellectual movements which caused arguments for centuries to come.  The obvious fact (to anyone who was not French) was that they were both right, and the world of spiders needed both giant fragile webs and tiny strong ones.  Also, being French, they never let their differences get in the way of having a nice drop of wine together in the evening.

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Being connected may be a hallmark of civilization.  Just as cities allow more connectivity and specialization, and thus foster culture, so might a person become more of a part of society by being  joined to the community.  The  only real question is should there be limits.  How much connectivity, if any, will break a normal human pattern of self-introspection and necessary internal autonomy.

Getting lost in trivial news feeds or updates from outside any reasonable environment may actually be no more than passive entertainment disguised as important data.  What, after all, is the difference between knowing the every thought of celebrities as they eat lunch while walking down the street as opposed to just sitting on a couch and mindlessly accepting that by watching a talking head one is “doing something.”  Only time will tell.

In the meantime, for some people, there is a grand freedom in letting it go, fully disconnecting, escaping from civilization.  That no longer requires trips to Everest or the Amazon or camping in the wilderness (because the tendrils of electronic connectivity reach everywhere), but simply turning off a few switches, leaving a device behind, and roaming nakedly alone for an afternoon or a day.  Perhaps it should be enjoyed while it is still possible _ the future may hold mandatory and permanently implanted connectivity as a necessary requirement of a civilized lifestyle.