Abstract
The Onlife Manifesto rightfully points to the emergence of new forms of subjectivity in the digital age and how ICT calls for the re-distribution of tasks and responsibilities between humans and their technologies. However, attention is still conceived in the Manifesto in modernist terms, as a problem of distraction. Within the terminology of attention economy, the Manifesto is critical about the abuse of traditional forms of attention, but does not make the next step to develop an alternative. In this chapter, I elaborate on the notion of attention and think of its new form in the digital age. A genealogy of the notion shows how attention reflects the dominant technologies of a period. In the age of the printed book, attention meant focusing on one activity at a time, and the background had to be silent and unnoticeable. In the age of radio and television, when stations and channels were switched with a single button, attention was still focused on a single item but for shorter periods of time. Today, in the age of multi-processor computers and cell phones, attention is distributed among tasks. In its distributed form, attention can provide a subversive answer to the attention economy that requires our undivided attention.
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Notes
- 1.
This genealogy was originally presented in Wellner (2014).
- 2.
For example, Yiannis Laouris in his commentary simply lists attention among “cognitive constraints” and “individual human rights and freedoms”. All these are aspects of subjectivity that should be protected in the digital age (Laouris, 2015a, p. 32). In his detailed chapter, Laouris bluntly states his starting point: “our attentional abilities are … quite limited!” (Laouris, 2015b, p. 131). However, this point is not further developed. Likewise, Charles Ess in his concluding sentences mentions in passing the “diminishing attention” as a problem to be solved (Ess, 2015, p. 107).
- 3.
The criticism of Broadbent and Lobet-Maris against digital information systems can be roughly grouped into four arguments: (a) these systems standardize users’ actions (pp. 114–5). But they ignore the standardisation offered by the printing press and its acceleration in modernity and the industrial revolution. (b) These systems are “shifting boundaries of the self” (p. 116). (c) Fragmentation: “What is new, and may have an even more distinctive effect on the definition of self, is the fragmentation of information and activities among networks of people through the digital systems” (p. 116). (d) When we are attentive, “time sucks” (p. 119). However, this is not unique for digital environments. When we are immersed in a book, or in a TV show, “time sucks”.
- 4.
It is not clear from their chapter if there is a difference between “joint attention” and “collective attention” mentioned in Sect. 4.7 of the Manifesto. Citton (2017) suggests that collective attention includes the social background, while joint attention is on a smaller scale and refers to a group of people who share the same space.
- 5.
This approach has been criticised by Merleau-Ponty for being too rigid and fixed. First, the reference to a searchlight that “shows up objects pre-existing in the darkness” (Merleau-Ponty, 1962, p. 26) assumes the priority of the objects over the attention. For Merleau-Ponty, the searchlight approach postulates that the objective world already exists and thus is fixed and unchangeable. Second, not only is the world fixed too but also is the searchlight effect. He writes, “The searchlight beam is the same whatever landscape be illuminated” (p. 26). Merleau-Ponty maintains that this formulation of attention is a uniform revealing force that only scans the surface of the world. As a result, a second “visit” of attention-as-searchlight should yield the same impression. However, in practice, a second visit does yield a different impression, and therefore, this model of attention, according to Merleau-Ponty, is a flaw.
- 6.
Cognition researchers Green and Bavelier demonstrate how playing in computer games trains even old people to track multiple objects, thereby distributing their attention (Green & Bavelier, 2008). The distribution of attention, they claim, can be learned, and is not “mission impossible” for the brain.
- 7.
Even the critical thinkers who describe the damages of the distribution of attention, like Carr (2010), admit that the combination of two senses improves the efficiency of the brain.
- 8.
Sartre refers to reading a book as a figure-ground attention and examines the effect of a pain in the eye on this state of being. This example usually serves in the discussion of self-awareness . Although one should not mix between consciousness, reflection and attention (Zahavi, 2005), it may still serve to clarify the distribution of attention. Zahavi brings Sartre’s case study to demonstrate a split of reflection and multiplicity of egos that transforms the experience of reading a book. My analysis focuses on the role of the book in reshaping the pain experience, instead of examining the structure of Sartre’s consciousness.
- 9.
Vision scientist Tripathy and neuropsychologist Howard analyse football players who keep track of their teammates, opponents and the ball at the same time (Tripathy & Howard, 2012). Yet, they leave open the question of whether it is a matter of multi-attention or a single attention supported by tracking and memory mechanisms.
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Wellner, G. (2019). Onlife Attention: Attention in the Digital Age. In: Otrel-Cass, K. (eds) Hyperconnectivity and Digital Reality. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-24143-8_4
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