Insomnia and early rising don’t mix. In fact, insomnia doesn’t mix with much, except perhaps a slow slide towards psychosis and the occasional rage-induced homicide. But having scored some work experience at the London offices of a major publisher (saying it that way obscures the fact that I’m still on work experience at 25), I’ve got to get up in the morning. The fact that I don’t live in London doesn’t help. It’s especially jarring as my last commute to work involved walking to the end of my road and then climbing over the wall into the pub car-park.
Even after a (at this point probably mythical) good night’s sleep I’m not a morning person. So a broken 5 hours leaves me crusty-eyed and pale and, more importantly, venomously spiteful. I was seriously worried that, even if I didn’t straight-up murder somebody on the tube, I might still catch myself being horribly rude to some undeserving passenger or barista or shop-assistant. It has since dawned on me that even if I were to be so unpleasant, nobody would notice. It seems like the rest of the world can’t stand mornings either.
I first realised it while trying to take a seat on the train. The scenario was one most people would recognise: only one seat – a window seat – was available, and a suited and briefcased gentleman was sprawled in the aisle seat next to it. His coffee was on the shared table, his newspaper supplements spread over the free chair. I lingered nearby, waiting for him to notice me and let me by. I continued to wait. It became obvious that he had noticed me. It is doubtful he misinterpreted my reason for standing there (“Man, this new cologne is really excellent!”), and so he was clearly waiting me out, hoping I would give up and leave the free seat in his churlish employ.
Bastard, I thought (not, I hope you’ll agree, unreasonably). I grunted aloud, preparing to give him my patented ‘I’ll kill you and all your relations’ death-glare. But the look in his eyes startled me right out of it. It was a version of my own murderous stare, with a trace of desperation and shame in it too. He needed that seat. Really needed it. And he obviously begrudged me my selfish, unnecessary attempt to wrest it from him. His eyes spelt out a self-righteous, self-justified, class-A fuck you.
The venom in his glance had me momentarily taken aback. But my legs were tired and my bag was heavy and most importantly screw you mister so I awkwardly clambered over his legs and then stood hovering above him: a strange tableau that threatened to become sexually charged if he took no action. Suitably abashed, he removed his magazines and I sat down next to him. We spent the next hour avoiding each other’s gaze, frowning fixedly, and hoping against hope that our latent telekinetic powers might finally manifest so that we could slam our antagonist like a ragdoll against the ceiling of carriage. Hate condensed in the air around us. The train lights flickered and sparked with pent-up aggression. People in the seats around began to develop radiation-induced tumours.
Since then I have noticed a palpable undercurrent of malice in my morning interactions. It filigrees through our communications like a fracture in glass, a tiny but visible flaw in our otherwise transparent connections.
“Can I take your order? …please ask for ritual suicide.”
“Just a cup of coffee please…and you have ten seconds before I throttle you.”
“I’m terribly sorry, but could you move down inside the carriage slightly… or a swift death will be your greatest blessing.”
People aren’t rude to each other, heavens no. They are either frostily, mockingly polite or stony-silent. Occasionally a tourist might commit the cardinal sin of British bad manners (pointing out someone else’s bad manners), and then develop a gushing nosebleed as they suddenly find themselves the subject of a collective psychic assault. The rest of the time we all just sit and stew…
… and then when we get to work we swallow it all down, compose ourselves into smiles and ‘How was your evenings,’ and get on with our lives. The train home is better, but only because most people appear too dog-tired to conjure the energy for physical violence.
There’s an easy happy-clappy message here: do as you would be done by, if-that’s-how-you-feel-how-do-you-think-they-feel etc. Well, for your own safety I suggest you drop all that joy to the world crap and think practically about it.
Look at it this way. You are a paragon of self-restraint and justice. You are a strap-hanging saint, a paladin of the platform, the ethical emblem of the escalator. And when that guy accidentally jarred you with his suitcase it was all you could do not to light him on fire and dance around the flames.
So do you really want to risk pushing that bald man with gimlet eyes and his bag on the seat, or try reading over the shoulder of that clearly psychotic woman with the iPad? They don’t look quite so well-balanced.
Morning people? How morning are we talking? We are biologically programmed to wake at sunrise. There are no morning people when, like most commuters, you have to leave in the dark for much of the year. Think about your personal safety. Let’s just assume that, before 9am, everyone we speak to is a short-fused passive-aggressive timebomb. Why risk turning your trip on the Northern Line into a scene from The Hurt Locker? Follow my example. In maudlin, eyes-to-the-floor silence.
See you at work, everybody.
Updated only when you aren't looking.
Monday 24 October 2011
Monday 10 October 2011
Gig in 100 words
Nero have got the monochromatic look, and a hot singer who’s also a midwife which helps probably, and they sound like their keyboard has the major chords highlighted and only responds to two fisted hammer-blows. A number one record gives them an earworm or two and a lightshow that few one-word remix artists past deadmau5 are allowed. They might be accused of being cheesy, and with reason, but their drops stimulate the part of the human neuro-cortex that makes you throw your gun fingers about like Eminem before he got sad all the time.
Thursday 6 October 2011
The Employment Gambit
My life has been in the hands of statistics recently. I’m one of the 1 in 5 graduates currently out of work. Proper work, not dealing drugs work, or medical testing work, or get paid to build your neighbour’s brick wall and don’t tell the taxman about it (if the Inland Revenue is reading this, then I’m joking. If).
Since I’m applying for jobs at least 3 days out of 5, and maybe 1 in 10 of these jobs I’m actually qualified for, statistically I should eventually find employment, even if I don’t score that job as editor of the Financial Times, or that astronaut thing I keep seeing on Milkround.
Except that isn’t how statistics work. Statistics only tell you how things currently stand: applying for jobs 3 days out of 5, qualified for 1 in 10 means exactly that; there’s no inherent likelihood of finding work. For that you need to delve into the dark and nefarious world of probability.
There is no ancient god of probability, but only because that kind of mathematical thinking is a relatively new development in human history. Love, war, archery, natural imagery, playing the lyre, cheating at stuff, all that has been around for millennia, and there’s normally a pantheistic deity either devoted to it or ready to take it under his/her mantle (in the ancient Greek pantheon Apollo is god of about thirty things. He also has a pretty workmanlike attitude to what he patronises, being the god of both plague and medicine).
It’s easier to pray to some higher being than it is to accept the sheer mathematical cruelty of the world. If gravity had been conceptually realised a bit earlier then we’d have a god of gravity (his name would be Crash, his avatar a man on crutches). If we’d come up with probability sooner I’m certain there would have been a god of probability. It’s the perfect gig for a deity: no heavy lifting like that Atlas guy, no work at all really; you just hang about being capricious and humans will worship you because their brains are hardwired that way. When they occasionally win, it’s because you smiled upon them. When they mostly lose, it’s because... well, that’s probability, folks!
Let’s imagine a god of probability. Let’s call him... I don’t know, Gambit, since he was always third favourite X-Man. Let’s say he looks like this:
Back to my job hunting. Firstly I haven’t got a clue what 3/5 x 1/10 equals, but I’ve got a feeling it’s going to be quite a low fraction. If we take the above sum as true for now, then I’ve got a small probability of being successfully employed any time soon. No problem, right? I just have to keep trying. The more jobs I apply for, the more chance I have of being successful. Just gotta keep on truckin.’ Hell, the only reason I’m here talking to you is because Indeed.com has crashed, and I can’t watch porn in Cafe Nero.
Except that isn’t how probability works either. It’s what our brains are programmed to understand, because they are pattern recognition machines, designed to help us react to environmental changes. Unfortunately mathematics isn’t an environmental change, it’s the ancient Greeks’ way of ruining primary school.
So let’s be generous and say I have a 1 in 10 chance of getting an interview out of every job I apply for. The gambler in me says “no problemo, capitan, you need to apply for ten jobs and bingo-bango, you gonna get at least one.”
This tells us two things: firstly that the gambler in me sounds like a dickweed, secondly that 1/10 is a very misleading series of symbols. What is implied is that 1/10 times 10 equals 1, which is unfortunately guffins. Not true. No dice, to use a gambling term. 1/10 is always 1/10, no matter how many times you try. So no matter how many jobs I apply for, I always have the same small chance of success.
I don’t really have any other options, but you can see why gambling is so insidious. Our brains tell us that the more times we try, the greater our chance of winning, which is patently false. Einstein’s theory of how to win at roulette was to “steal the money from the table while the croupier isn’t looking,” and if one of the leading scientific minds of the last century can’t figure it out, I doubt your can-do attitude and lucky rabbit’s foot is going to do jack when it comes to making mathematics pay out. While I don’t lose anything from multiple job enquiries, if I had to bet something in order to play I’d soon be even broker than I am now (something that is unfortunately possible, since some jerk invented negative figures. This is why nerds are bullied at school).
I don’t believe in god, but prayer to a deity is preferable to the repeat misery of my inbox every morning (Dear Milkround. I DO NOT WANT TO BE A RECRUITMENT CONSULTANT. Please leave me alone).
The best thing about the ancient pantheons (Greeks especially, and those thieving Romans), is that they were almost human, fallible; like Eastenders but with more smiting. They were forever falling in love with humans, playing tricks out of spite, meddling with things they shouldn’t be meddling with. And because they were fallible they were knowable, and therefore worth praying to. They could be cajoled, bargained with, even bribed (Zeus especially was amenable to a flash of boob now and again, the horny old goat).
So that time you almost fell over in the bath but didn’t? That’s the god of gravity smiling upon you, or off having a fag or something. He’s got a lot on his plate, what with all those aeroplanes around nowadays. I need a job, and so my pilgrimage to Cafe Nero has become a trip to Gambit’s temple, my every wheedling cover-letter a sacrifice of sorts (of my dignity, mostly).
And that means I can ignore the basic laws of probability, and not get downhearted. I just need to keep playing the game, keep rolling the dice, and Gambit will take pity on me eventually. And when I get my first paycheck I’ll go out and buy a dozen lottery tickets, so that he knows I am grateful. Infinite is his patience, long are his odds, blessed be unto snake-eyes, Amen.
Since I’m applying for jobs at least 3 days out of 5, and maybe 1 in 10 of these jobs I’m actually qualified for, statistically I should eventually find employment, even if I don’t score that job as editor of the Financial Times, or that astronaut thing I keep seeing on Milkround.
Except that isn’t how statistics work. Statistics only tell you how things currently stand: applying for jobs 3 days out of 5, qualified for 1 in 10 means exactly that; there’s no inherent likelihood of finding work. For that you need to delve into the dark and nefarious world of probability.
There is no ancient god of probability, but only because that kind of mathematical thinking is a relatively new development in human history. Love, war, archery, natural imagery, playing the lyre, cheating at stuff, all that has been around for millennia, and there’s normally a pantheistic deity either devoted to it or ready to take it under his/her mantle (in the ancient Greek pantheon Apollo is god of about thirty things. He also has a pretty workmanlike attitude to what he patronises, being the god of both plague and medicine).
It’s easier to pray to some higher being than it is to accept the sheer mathematical cruelty of the world. If gravity had been conceptually realised a bit earlier then we’d have a god of gravity (his name would be Crash, his avatar a man on crutches). If we’d come up with probability sooner I’m certain there would have been a god of probability. It’s the perfect gig for a deity: no heavy lifting like that Atlas guy, no work at all really; you just hang about being capricious and humans will worship you because their brains are hardwired that way. When they occasionally win, it’s because you smiled upon them. When they mostly lose, it’s because... well, that’s probability, folks!
Let’s imagine a god of probability. Let’s call him... I don’t know, Gambit, since he was always third favourite X-Man. Let’s say he looks like this:
 |
| *Pant* There are a lot of pictures of Gambit kissing Wolverine online, but I think I found them all. |
Back to my job hunting. Firstly I haven’t got a clue what 3/5 x 1/10 equals, but I’ve got a feeling it’s going to be quite a low fraction. If we take the above sum as true for now, then I’ve got a small probability of being successfully employed any time soon. No problem, right? I just have to keep trying. The more jobs I apply for, the more chance I have of being successful. Just gotta keep on truckin.’ Hell, the only reason I’m here talking to you is because Indeed.com has crashed, and I can’t watch porn in Cafe Nero.
Except that isn’t how probability works either. It’s what our brains are programmed to understand, because they are pattern recognition machines, designed to help us react to environmental changes. Unfortunately mathematics isn’t an environmental change, it’s the ancient Greeks’ way of ruining primary school.
So let’s be generous and say I have a 1 in 10 chance of getting an interview out of every job I apply for. The gambler in me says “no problemo, capitan, you need to apply for ten jobs and bingo-bango, you gonna get at least one.”
This tells us two things: firstly that the gambler in me sounds like a dickweed, secondly that 1/10 is a very misleading series of symbols. What is implied is that 1/10 times 10 equals 1, which is unfortunately guffins. Not true. No dice, to use a gambling term. 1/10 is always 1/10, no matter how many times you try. So no matter how many jobs I apply for, I always have the same small chance of success.
I don’t really have any other options, but you can see why gambling is so insidious. Our brains tell us that the more times we try, the greater our chance of winning, which is patently false. Einstein’s theory of how to win at roulette was to “steal the money from the table while the croupier isn’t looking,” and if one of the leading scientific minds of the last century can’t figure it out, I doubt your can-do attitude and lucky rabbit’s foot is going to do jack when it comes to making mathematics pay out. While I don’t lose anything from multiple job enquiries, if I had to bet something in order to play I’d soon be even broker than I am now (something that is unfortunately possible, since some jerk invented negative figures. This is why nerds are bullied at school).
I don’t believe in god, but prayer to a deity is preferable to the repeat misery of my inbox every morning (Dear Milkround. I DO NOT WANT TO BE A RECRUITMENT CONSULTANT. Please leave me alone).
The best thing about the ancient pantheons (Greeks especially, and those thieving Romans), is that they were almost human, fallible; like Eastenders but with more smiting. They were forever falling in love with humans, playing tricks out of spite, meddling with things they shouldn’t be meddling with. And because they were fallible they were knowable, and therefore worth praying to. They could be cajoled, bargained with, even bribed (Zeus especially was amenable to a flash of boob now and again, the horny old goat).
So that time you almost fell over in the bath but didn’t? That’s the god of gravity smiling upon you, or off having a fag or something. He’s got a lot on his plate, what with all those aeroplanes around nowadays. I need a job, and so my pilgrimage to Cafe Nero has become a trip to Gambit’s temple, my every wheedling cover-letter a sacrifice of sorts (of my dignity, mostly).
And that means I can ignore the basic laws of probability, and not get downhearted. I just need to keep playing the game, keep rolling the dice, and Gambit will take pity on me eventually. And when I get my first paycheck I’ll go out and buy a dozen lottery tickets, so that he knows I am grateful. Infinite is his patience, long are his odds, blessed be unto snake-eyes, Amen.
Tuesday 4 October 2011
The hazel-eyed monster
Gore Vidal had it pegged when he said: “Every time a friend succeeds a piece of me dies.” At the moment a large part of my ego is circling the drain, thanks to the glorious success of a friend.
Said compadre is DW Wilson, who recently became the youngest winner of the BBC’s National Short Story Award, helping himself to some critical acclaim and a very tidy cash prize. While I’m here I’ll plug his book Once You Break A Knuckle, which is available on Amazon.com and will see a UK publication soon.
DW is certainly deserving of his award. His short story, The Dead Roads, is a perfectly crafted tale of love and youth and adventure with a smidgen of betrayal thrown in, all set in the richly painted and somewhat bizarre backwoods landscape of DW’s native Canada. It’s about as good a short story as you’ll read; it’s a proper tale, full of big things and ass-kicking, none of the navel-gazing nonsense that clogs up my Granta subscription. Although seriously, go read Granta. There’s some good shit in there.
So I suspect I’d be jealous of DW even if he hadn’t won a big slice of pie, because he’s written a short story I could only dream of penning. The success of The Dead Roads ought to be measured on how good it is, not how much it is worth. And it’s plenty good enough to get jealous over.
I pondered briefly why DW’s success would cut me so close. I mean, plenty of other people I know are successful, and most of them are young. Some people I don’t know have levels of success I can only goggle over, and they hardly keep me awake at night. It could be the cash DW has deservedly won, but lottery winners have all the money they could dream of and I don’t mind. If I did I’d be out there egging their mansions, the lucky buggers.
Partly it’s because DW is successful in what I might petulantly call my field: he’s a writer, and I want to be a writer (anyone who tells you just writing things is enough to make you one is sadly deluded, and probably as broke as I am). He’s doing the thing that I want to be doing, and doing it well; better, probably, than I ever will.
But there are thousands of successful writers, and I manage to keep my jealousy in check. If I met, say, Pat Barker I’d probably gush over her work, rather than seethe and plot her downfall (that’s right DW, watch every shadow from now on). I know plenty of writers personally and many (most) are as talented or more talented than I, and I have perfectly cordial relations with them. What is it about this piece of news that makes me boil with envy? (apart from the money thing, that’s obvious).
The answer is because DW earned it. Straight up. His work ethic is something I should seek to emulate, and he put a lot of labour into that story. It shows. It shows in the silky sharp cadence of every sentence. It shows in his indiscriminate verbing, that makes it sound as if the narrator were sat in the next seat to you. It shows in his funny, sweet dialogue, that makes me nostalgic for a place I’ve never been and experiences I never had. It’s a work of art, of craft, and it damn well got that way because DW spends hours staring at his laptop every day, making sure it turns out like that.
That’s the problem, that’s where the jealousy comes from. I ought to be doing it that way, and I’m not. The work ethic, the dedication, the sheer toil that leads to success is on display in front of me and I’m not taking the hint because I’m lazy, or bolshy, or unsure, or whatever feeble adjective I feel like justifying it with.
That’s why I’m not really jealous of lottery winners. They didn’t do anything to earn their prize. And if they won it by chance, then so can I, maybe. It could be you. It won’t, but it could. I don’t have to do anything to be in with a shot.
So I’m not really jealous of DW’s prize, the recognition or the money. I’m not even really jealous of the story, I’m just grateful I had the chance to read it. It’s the reward, not the prize, that’s ripping me wide open. The reward for diligence and hard work and talent. The reward that I might deserve if I could only show those same qualities. I’m jealous of what he’s doing, not what he’s done.
Now I just need to make myself do the same.
Said compadre is DW Wilson, who recently became the youngest winner of the BBC’s National Short Story Award, helping himself to some critical acclaim and a very tidy cash prize. While I’m here I’ll plug his book Once You Break A Knuckle, which is available on Amazon.com and will see a UK publication soon.
DW is certainly deserving of his award. His short story, The Dead Roads, is a perfectly crafted tale of love and youth and adventure with a smidgen of betrayal thrown in, all set in the richly painted and somewhat bizarre backwoods landscape of DW’s native Canada. It’s about as good a short story as you’ll read; it’s a proper tale, full of big things and ass-kicking, none of the navel-gazing nonsense that clogs up my Granta subscription. Although seriously, go read Granta. There’s some good shit in there.
So I suspect I’d be jealous of DW even if he hadn’t won a big slice of pie, because he’s written a short story I could only dream of penning. The success of The Dead Roads ought to be measured on how good it is, not how much it is worth. And it’s plenty good enough to get jealous over.
I pondered briefly why DW’s success would cut me so close. I mean, plenty of other people I know are successful, and most of them are young. Some people I don’t know have levels of success I can only goggle over, and they hardly keep me awake at night. It could be the cash DW has deservedly won, but lottery winners have all the money they could dream of and I don’t mind. If I did I’d be out there egging their mansions, the lucky buggers.
Partly it’s because DW is successful in what I might petulantly call my field: he’s a writer, and I want to be a writer (anyone who tells you just writing things is enough to make you one is sadly deluded, and probably as broke as I am). He’s doing the thing that I want to be doing, and doing it well; better, probably, than I ever will.
But there are thousands of successful writers, and I manage to keep my jealousy in check. If I met, say, Pat Barker I’d probably gush over her work, rather than seethe and plot her downfall (that’s right DW, watch every shadow from now on). I know plenty of writers personally and many (most) are as talented or more talented than I, and I have perfectly cordial relations with them. What is it about this piece of news that makes me boil with envy? (apart from the money thing, that’s obvious).
The answer is because DW earned it. Straight up. His work ethic is something I should seek to emulate, and he put a lot of labour into that story. It shows. It shows in the silky sharp cadence of every sentence. It shows in his indiscriminate verbing, that makes it sound as if the narrator were sat in the next seat to you. It shows in his funny, sweet dialogue, that makes me nostalgic for a place I’ve never been and experiences I never had. It’s a work of art, of craft, and it damn well got that way because DW spends hours staring at his laptop every day, making sure it turns out like that.
That’s the problem, that’s where the jealousy comes from. I ought to be doing it that way, and I’m not. The work ethic, the dedication, the sheer toil that leads to success is on display in front of me and I’m not taking the hint because I’m lazy, or bolshy, or unsure, or whatever feeble adjective I feel like justifying it with.
That’s why I’m not really jealous of lottery winners. They didn’t do anything to earn their prize. And if they won it by chance, then so can I, maybe. It could be you. It won’t, but it could. I don’t have to do anything to be in with a shot.
So I’m not really jealous of DW’s prize, the recognition or the money. I’m not even really jealous of the story, I’m just grateful I had the chance to read it. It’s the reward, not the prize, that’s ripping me wide open. The reward for diligence and hard work and talent. The reward that I might deserve if I could only show those same qualities. I’m jealous of what he’s doing, not what he’s done.
Now I just need to make myself do the same.
High Culture + Low Culture = THE Culture.
A combination of circumstances has left me without internet this week (this post comes from a Cafe Nero near you), a deprivation I might normally have relished with monkish pride (escape from social networking, more time to read, get outside in the sunshine etc etc) had I not been looking for employment. It turns out that looking for work is rather challenging without access to the web.
As the days go by I have noticed other, even more trivial endeavours hobbled by my lack of internet. I don’t know when any social events are occurring, for instance (Facebook does my calendar for me). Simple meals have become more challenging as I rack my brain for measurements and cooking times. I feel a little disconnected from the world (I can’t get Radio 4 on the laptop anymore). Several times I have left investigating a minor piece of information (phone numbers, cinema listings, directions to a bar) until the last minute, confident that I would be able to discover each fact with only the briefest of searches, remembering far too late that I can’t just jump online to find out, and here is the thing, I honestly don’t know how else to find out.
How do I find out cinema times without the internet? Is there a number you can call? And how do I find out what that number is? Do I just ask people in the street until one of them has it? Or do I go and ask the neighbours? If someone gives me an address how do I find it? My girlfriend doesn’t have a map of London in her house; she just has old issues of Heat I pretend I don’t read when she’s at work.
I’m not completely stymied. There is free wifi at several bars and cafes in the local area (which is a good thing, else you might not be reading this). My trip to Cafe Nero has become a daily pilgrimage, partly because they let you grossly abuse their loyalty card system. (“I would like eight of your cheapest green teas, please. And now for my free drink, I would like an extra-large hot fudge sundae macchiato with extra cream, another shot of espresso, and a dash of any particularly interesting syrups you’ve got back there.”)
But my reliance on the internet is worrying, not to mention debilitating. Every day I go to Cafe Nero and trawl Guardian jobs and Milkround and Indeed.com looking for work, like the good little graduate I am. But I don’t look up every piece of information I might conceivably need in a day. So then when I get home I am baffled by a seemingly innocuous question. I didn’t think I really used the internet much, and now I find I can’t get by without it.
I’m not the only one in this predicament, obviously. As a society we have moved away from what might be termed ‘fundamental knowledge:’ that which allows us to cook things from basic ingredients, to fix things when they break, where to find regular and multiple sources of information, so that if one is unavailable we are not completely foxed.
If I were a Daily Mail columnist I might at this point bemoan the above fact, confess my yearning for a simpler time when everyone knew how to make an apple pie from scratch, use a mangle, ride a horse to work or some such nonsense. Stuff that, frankly. I’d quite like to know how to make an apple pie, but I don’t want to frickin’ memorise it. I’d just rather look it up, thanks.
There are two reasons why people seem to know less about their fundamental processes. The first is the centralization of, and easy access to, all sorts of information. We don’t need to know off-hand how to get engine oil out of cotton trousers any more than we need to memorise the cinema listings in the paper in case we feel like going in the week. The information is right there online waiting for us. It feels like a new development but it’s not, really. It’s simply a more egalitarian arrangement. In days gone by rich people might have the sum of all human knowledge kicking around in their library, if they were bothered to look. Several of the more traditional (read: bigoted) politicians and aristocrats of the later 19th century worried what free access to libraries might do to the minds of the working class. They phrased their arguments as concern over the brain capacity of the poor, as if learning French or classics might make them forget to how to use a hammer, but what they were really panicking about was the idea that extra knowledge might awaken the working class to how well and truly they were being stiffed by their supposed betters. The emancipatory effect of common access to knowledge is one of the main arguments used at the moment by those trying to defend our libraries against the public service cuts of the current austerity government. But the public’s current access to information via the internet must have those old lords and ministers spinning in their graves. While the information available on the internet might be of lower edited quality than that found in the average library, it’s certainly more pernicious; just ask China. (Don’t bother, they don’t write back. I’ve tried).
The information provides emancipation is indirectly related to the second reason why we have less basic knowledge: the emancipation of women from the home.
Let’s face it, when anyone harks back to the days when we knew how to tailor our own clothes and cook from scratch and all that stuff, they mean when women knew how to do it. For at least the last couple of centuries the employment routine of men hasn’t really changed: wake up, perform basic ablutions, eat, go to work, come home, go to pub, eat, perform basic ablutions, sleep. That’s it. Men have never known how to make apple pies and sew on buttons because the women did it all for them. If we’ve forgotten these simple pieces of knowledge as a society it’s because women have forgotten them, and women have forgotten them because they’ve got better things to be doing.
Why should anyone need to devote themselves to basic pieces of knowledge when it is all readily available for them? Why bother with memorising how to cook or clean or fix things except for convenience’s sake: unless you decide you want to. The rest of the time you can just look it up, and save your time for doing things you want to do.
Let’s forget about an apocalypse or something equally dramatic. Let’s assume we get the Star Trek future where humanity keeps progressing, solving its own problems and social ills and eventually devoting itself to knowledge and ethical pleasure. You think Captain Kirk has a fucking clue how to make an apple pie? He probably doesn’t even lace his own shoes; he’s too busy discovering energy fields and banging space babes.
We don’t need to get by without the internet when it’s doing such a good job for us. It’s supposed to be a time saver, and used properly it really is. That other methods for doing things may have fallen by the wayside is disconcerting but shouldn’t necessarily concern us. It’s a bugger that most graduate jobs are posted online if you don’t have internet access, but I can see how it’s the most convenient method for everyone involved. The solution is to make sure that everyone has access to the internet, so that everyone can take advantage of meritocratic information transfer.
The only downside is this: when information is so readily available, how do we separate what is trivial from what is meaningful?
In days gone by the stuff you had to learn to get through the day was necessary, but trivial. You don’t glory in the knowledge of how to mop a floor. The other stuff, the bits you had to find out for yourself, were what was recognised as important. That these scales have reversed themselves somewhat is a sign of the time we live in. But meaningful information is the same as it ever was: information that improves the life and intellect of its discoverer, either emotionally or physically. I’d bet you’re a damn sight more likely to remember how to make an apple pie if you get some sort of pleasure from doing it. It’s easy to get high and mighty about types of culture, but if an encyclopaedic knowledge of TOWIE makes you the envy of your friends and makes you beam with pride than to hell with anyone who might tell you it’s not worthwhile.
We aren’t taught to learn from the internet, though. Older people scoff at the idea that schools might have classes dedicated to how to use the internet, but that strikes me as very short-sighted. Surely people deserve to know how to make the most of the greatest human development in years? Information is now easy to get at. People are only just beginning to realise that, I think. It’s why the internet has spent the best part of a decade languishing in an intellectual doldrums of pornography and funny cats. But think about how many people use Wikipedia every day. You think that, a hundred years ago, those people would have used a regular encyclopaedia so voraciously? Or that they might own one at all?
I rely on the internet for all my information. But it’s about so much more than cinema timings and Google maps. I didn’t realise how flippin’ useful the whole thing was until it was taken away. So I’m taking more time to read, to go outside in the sunshine. But as soon as I get my internets back, I’m going to go and learn something.
As the days go by I have noticed other, even more trivial endeavours hobbled by my lack of internet. I don’t know when any social events are occurring, for instance (Facebook does my calendar for me). Simple meals have become more challenging as I rack my brain for measurements and cooking times. I feel a little disconnected from the world (I can’t get Radio 4 on the laptop anymore). Several times I have left investigating a minor piece of information (phone numbers, cinema listings, directions to a bar) until the last minute, confident that I would be able to discover each fact with only the briefest of searches, remembering far too late that I can’t just jump online to find out, and here is the thing, I honestly don’t know how else to find out.
How do I find out cinema times without the internet? Is there a number you can call? And how do I find out what that number is? Do I just ask people in the street until one of them has it? Or do I go and ask the neighbours? If someone gives me an address how do I find it? My girlfriend doesn’t have a map of London in her house; she just has old issues of Heat I pretend I don’t read when she’s at work.
I’m not completely stymied. There is free wifi at several bars and cafes in the local area (which is a good thing, else you might not be reading this). My trip to Cafe Nero has become a daily pilgrimage, partly because they let you grossly abuse their loyalty card system. (“I would like eight of your cheapest green teas, please. And now for my free drink, I would like an extra-large hot fudge sundae macchiato with extra cream, another shot of espresso, and a dash of any particularly interesting syrups you’ve got back there.”)
But my reliance on the internet is worrying, not to mention debilitating. Every day I go to Cafe Nero and trawl Guardian jobs and Milkround and Indeed.com looking for work, like the good little graduate I am. But I don’t look up every piece of information I might conceivably need in a day. So then when I get home I am baffled by a seemingly innocuous question. I didn’t think I really used the internet much, and now I find I can’t get by without it.
I’m not the only one in this predicament, obviously. As a society we have moved away from what might be termed ‘fundamental knowledge:’ that which allows us to cook things from basic ingredients, to fix things when they break, where to find regular and multiple sources of information, so that if one is unavailable we are not completely foxed.
If I were a Daily Mail columnist I might at this point bemoan the above fact, confess my yearning for a simpler time when everyone knew how to make an apple pie from scratch, use a mangle, ride a horse to work or some such nonsense. Stuff that, frankly. I’d quite like to know how to make an apple pie, but I don’t want to frickin’ memorise it. I’d just rather look it up, thanks.
There are two reasons why people seem to know less about their fundamental processes. The first is the centralization of, and easy access to, all sorts of information. We don’t need to know off-hand how to get engine oil out of cotton trousers any more than we need to memorise the cinema listings in the paper in case we feel like going in the week. The information is right there online waiting for us. It feels like a new development but it’s not, really. It’s simply a more egalitarian arrangement. In days gone by rich people might have the sum of all human knowledge kicking around in their library, if they were bothered to look. Several of the more traditional (read: bigoted) politicians and aristocrats of the later 19th century worried what free access to libraries might do to the minds of the working class. They phrased their arguments as concern over the brain capacity of the poor, as if learning French or classics might make them forget to how to use a hammer, but what they were really panicking about was the idea that extra knowledge might awaken the working class to how well and truly they were being stiffed by their supposed betters. The emancipatory effect of common access to knowledge is one of the main arguments used at the moment by those trying to defend our libraries against the public service cuts of the current austerity government. But the public’s current access to information via the internet must have those old lords and ministers spinning in their graves. While the information available on the internet might be of lower edited quality than that found in the average library, it’s certainly more pernicious; just ask China. (Don’t bother, they don’t write back. I’ve tried).
The information provides emancipation is indirectly related to the second reason why we have less basic knowledge: the emancipation of women from the home.
Let’s face it, when anyone harks back to the days when we knew how to tailor our own clothes and cook from scratch and all that stuff, they mean when women knew how to do it. For at least the last couple of centuries the employment routine of men hasn’t really changed: wake up, perform basic ablutions, eat, go to work, come home, go to pub, eat, perform basic ablutions, sleep. That’s it. Men have never known how to make apple pies and sew on buttons because the women did it all for them. If we’ve forgotten these simple pieces of knowledge as a society it’s because women have forgotten them, and women have forgotten them because they’ve got better things to be doing.
Why should anyone need to devote themselves to basic pieces of knowledge when it is all readily available for them? Why bother with memorising how to cook or clean or fix things except for convenience’s sake: unless you decide you want to. The rest of the time you can just look it up, and save your time for doing things you want to do.
Let’s forget about an apocalypse or something equally dramatic. Let’s assume we get the Star Trek future where humanity keeps progressing, solving its own problems and social ills and eventually devoting itself to knowledge and ethical pleasure. You think Captain Kirk has a fucking clue how to make an apple pie? He probably doesn’t even lace his own shoes; he’s too busy discovering energy fields and banging space babes.
We don’t need to get by without the internet when it’s doing such a good job for us. It’s supposed to be a time saver, and used properly it really is. That other methods for doing things may have fallen by the wayside is disconcerting but shouldn’t necessarily concern us. It’s a bugger that most graduate jobs are posted online if you don’t have internet access, but I can see how it’s the most convenient method for everyone involved. The solution is to make sure that everyone has access to the internet, so that everyone can take advantage of meritocratic information transfer.
The only downside is this: when information is so readily available, how do we separate what is trivial from what is meaningful?
In days gone by the stuff you had to learn to get through the day was necessary, but trivial. You don’t glory in the knowledge of how to mop a floor. The other stuff, the bits you had to find out for yourself, were what was recognised as important. That these scales have reversed themselves somewhat is a sign of the time we live in. But meaningful information is the same as it ever was: information that improves the life and intellect of its discoverer, either emotionally or physically. I’d bet you’re a damn sight more likely to remember how to make an apple pie if you get some sort of pleasure from doing it. It’s easy to get high and mighty about types of culture, but if an encyclopaedic knowledge of TOWIE makes you the envy of your friends and makes you beam with pride than to hell with anyone who might tell you it’s not worthwhile.
We aren’t taught to learn from the internet, though. Older people scoff at the idea that schools might have classes dedicated to how to use the internet, but that strikes me as very short-sighted. Surely people deserve to know how to make the most of the greatest human development in years? Information is now easy to get at. People are only just beginning to realise that, I think. It’s why the internet has spent the best part of a decade languishing in an intellectual doldrums of pornography and funny cats. But think about how many people use Wikipedia every day. You think that, a hundred years ago, those people would have used a regular encyclopaedia so voraciously? Or that they might own one at all?
I rely on the internet for all my information. But it’s about so much more than cinema timings and Google maps. I didn’t realise how flippin’ useful the whole thing was until it was taken away. So I’m taking more time to read, to go outside in the sunshine. But as soon as I get my internets back, I’m going to go and learn something.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)