Via lots of places, a story about the recent San Francisco subway shooting has luddites everywhere lamenting how smartphones have changed Who We Are. What prompted this was footage of a man brandishing a gun on the subway and pointing it at people none of whom noticed a thing since they were all paying attention to their smartphones.
“They’re just so engrossed, texting and reading and whatnot. They’re completely oblivious of their surroundings,” an official said.
This incident sets off all the favourite luddite fears about smartphones. Yes they’re a waste of time. Yes they’re frivolous. Yes they have negative social consequences. Yes they Change Our Kids’ BrainsTM! Yes they diminish our worth and make us less human. But now, we get to think they pose a risk to our very lives in the most dramatic way imaginable – by supposedly getting us shot in the head.
Let’s assume that during this incident, it would have been better to pay attention and see the gun (definitely not a given). Then I guess the problem is being too wrapped up in something. Except that society generally sees total absorption in something as noble, praiseworthy and possibly a sign of genius. There’s a famous apocryphal story of Archimedes being killed by an invading Roman soldier upon telling him — without looking up from his drawings in the sand — “do not disturb my circles”. This story was NOT intended as an attack on geometry.
But Archimedes was unique!, we think. There weren’t entire populations too wrapped up in sand drawings to notice invading soldiers. Then I invite you to honestly consider what your reaction would have been if the people of that train carriage were instead all reading books. Perhaps books you really approve of. If the reaction would be different (ie. not starting to worry that books are taking over our lives) then it’s really all that other negative affect about the phone you might have built up that’s just using the incident as an excuse.
Now, I’d be an idiot if I ignored the genuine dangers that phones pose. People talk, text and browse on their phones while driving. They crash and kill each other and that’s fucked up. In fact, Google recently made a change to their terms to remind people not to use Google products while performing tasks requiring your full attention.
But if you think that extends to train travel, you’re in effect saying that train travel is a task requiring your full attention. Which probably says a lot more about the dangers and violence that we’re willing to accept in society than it does about phones.
My biggest problem with recent luddite arguments is that they seem to ignore the benefits entirely. It’s easy to shit all over something if you just bring up examples that fit into the intended morality play. The truth is, even if paying attention to your phone during travel increases your chance of danger in the (very unlikely) case of an emergency, people might still decide that it’s worth it. And be rational about it. For example, it’s easy to understate the damage that boredom and frustration during commutes does to public health. Studies do suggest that commuting is generally stressful and harmful. Although driving’s probably the most stressful commute, I think having something to fiddle with on public transport (something that requires less concentration than a book) could plausibly improve public health.
Finally, we shouldn’t ignore the judgement and elitism implied by much of phone panic. I’ve felt it myself when I look around and think “does everyone on this bus really have nothing better to do than play Candy Crush Saga”?
Then I remember that I don’t actually know about people’s lives and interests and intellects from what game they choose to play on the bus. Assuming that I do would make me a classist asshole — which is an attitude definitely not endangered by smartphones.
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