Delight Springs

Tuesday, April 30, 2024

The Battle for Attention

The pre-eminent philosopher/psychologist of flights and perchings would be fascinated by the "Birds" who make a deliberate effort to guide and manage their thoughts and "reveries"…
"…In many people's view, it is William James, Henry's brother, who supplied the first comprehensive American model of attention. In a chapter devoted to the subject in his "Principles of Psychology" (1890), James portrayed attention as a restless thing. When we think we're holding it, our mind is winging out on errands and returning; sustained attention is, in effect, a stream of attentional moments. Thus, despite the complexity and multiplicity of the world, "there is before the mind at no time a plurality of ideas." (This insight went on to frame James's philosophical work.) When we look at a statue, the stone doesn't change, but the art work we see does, because we are continually noticing different things. James's model pushes against the idea that attention is something you pay out, free of wandering thoughts and individual reverie..." Nathan Heller

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