Prawda versus to, co przykuwa uwagę
- annaklis
- Jul 20, 2014
- 3 min read
This column will change your life: interestingness v truth
'Even in the world of academia, most people aren't motivated by the truth. What they want, above all, is not to be bored'
Artykuł - źródło: http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2014/apr/05/this
Tłumaczenie słówek na końcu tekstu.
Do you long to become a "thought leader", thinkfluencing your way from TED talk
to tech conference, lauded for your insights? I hope not. But if so, you could do
worse than consult a paper published in 1971 by the maverick sociologist Murray
Davis, entitled "That's Interesting!" (I found it via Adam Grant.) What is it, Davis asks,
that makes certain thinkers – Marx, Freud, Nietzsche – legendary? "It has long been
thought that a theorist is considered great because his theories are true," he writes,
"but this is false. A theorist is considered great, not because his theories are true,
but because they are interesting." Even in the world of academia, most people
aren't motivated by the truth. What they want, above all, is not to be bored.
Forty-three years on, this feels truer than ever. We live in the Era of Interestingness:
attention is money, and purveyors of the interesting can make millions from Twitter
feeds of amazing facts – even if they're not always true facts – or from books or blogs
offering intriguingly counterintuitive perspectives. (This column's part of the problem,
except I've yet to make millions.) Moreover, Davis argues, there are only a handful of
main ways for an idea to be interesting. To grab people's attention, you should argue
that something we think of as bad is good, or vice versa; that some apparently
individual phenomenon is really collective; that several seemingly disparate things
are actually part of the same thing; and a few others. It's unnerving how many thinkers
can be pigeonholed this way. Christian morality seems good, Nietzsche argued, but
really it's bad. Mental disorders, dreams and slips of the tongue might seem unrelated,
Freud said, but really they're the result of the same inner drives. And on and on.
Clearly, this could be helpful information if you're looking to intrigue friends, fascinate
a potential lover, or keep your students engaged. But it's also troubling. If you care
about the truth, Davis suggests, interestingness can mislead. That new book on how
to get fit – or raise happy children, or invest your savings – caught your eye because
it's interesting. But is it true? (In science, this helps explain the "file drawer effect":
studies with interesting conclusions get published; boring ones, however true, get
locked away.) Ultimately, interestingness is a form of excitement, and we all know
how excitement can lure us off course: consider the thrill of an extramarital affair,
or of driving at 120mph. But it's intellectually respectable excitement, so it doesn't
ring alarm bells.
Perhaps it should. When he gives talks, the spiritual author Eckhart Tolle likes to
warn the audience that they may not find the experience interesting. He's not simply
lowering expectations. He means that constantly to chase after what's interesting is
to miss something crucial about life. Interestingness gives the mind something to
chew on – but the best experiences come when you stop chewing. When you're
watching a stunning sunset, Tolle asks, "could you say, 'This sunset is interesting'?
Only if you were trying to write a PhD about sunsets… Truly look, and then what
you're looking at goes beyond interesting… There's nothing interesting about it,
and yet it's awe-inspiring."
My first reaction to that was, "How interesting! I must explore this topic further!"
which just shows how addictive interestingness can be. The correct reaction,
obviously, is to go and watch the sunset.
By Oliver Burkeman
Vocabulary:
column - rybryka academia - kręgi akademickie thinkfluencing - wpływać swoimi wnioskami na innych tech conference - konferencja technologiczna to laud - wychwalać insight - zgłębienie, zrozumienie maverick - indywidualista, o otwartym umyśle purveyors - dostarczyciele Twitter feed - ściana z nowymi wpisami na 'twiterze' counterintuitive - przeciwny do tego co podpowiada intuicja lub zdrowy
rozsądek (ale nadal może być prawdziwy) argue - przytaczać, przekonywać a handful - garść to grab attention - przykuć do siebie uwagę collective - zbiorowy seemingly - pozornie disparate - niewspółmierny unnerving - deprymujący pigeonholed - zaszufladkowany mental disorder - psychiczne zaburzenie a slip of the tongue - przejęzyczenie unrelated - niepowiązany mislead - wprowadzić w błąd, zwieść to lure someone off course - zwabić kogoś z obranego toru thrill - dreszcz emocji extramarital - pozamałżeński to chase after - gonić za crucial - istotny chew - żuć awe-inspiring - niesamowity, wzbudzający podziw
Oficjalna strona Glorii Steinem: http://www.gloriasteinem.com/
Zdjęcia - żródła: 1. http://publichealthwatch.wordpress.com/2014/06/08/the-new-campaign-to-protect-our-health-care-from-junk-science/
2. http://quotes-lover.com/wp-content/uploads/The-truth-will-set-you-free-but-first-it-will-piss-you-off.Gloria-Steinem-quotes.jpg
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