The Value of Things Undone

While we are otherwise engaged

For of all sad words of tongue or pen,
The saddest are these: “It might have been!”

– John Greenleaf Whittier, “Maud Muller”

Attention is focused awareness. It is intangible, yet we instinctively speak of it as though it were money. We pay attention, give attention, deserve attention. If somebody spoke of lending attention, earning attention or investing attention, those phrases would be a little unusual, but still perfectly understandable.

Following this train of thought, economist Herbert A. Simon coined the term “attention economy” in the 1960s, observing that “a wealth of information creates a poverty of attention.”

Today, the attention economy is not a theory, but a thriving business ecosystem. In it, our attention is harvested by information technology companies who package and sell it to entities that want us to believe and do what they tell us.

In this paradigm, attention is a commodity, refined by the tech industry into a product called “engagement.” In the same way that a gold ring is priced according to both weight and purity, engagement is judged in terms of quantity (duration of attention) and quality (degree of attention). Sustained and dedicated engagement or “captured eyeballs” is the 24 karat gold standard. It’s what advertisers want for their commercials, businesses want for their websites, developers want for their apps, and social media companies want for their platforms.

What do we receive in exchange for this precious resource? As Neil Postman explained in Amusing Ourselves to Death, we receive entertainment. It might be entertainment in the guise of news or games, funny cat videos or gonzo pornography, but it is all designed for the same purpose: keep us engaged.

There’s nothing inherently wrong with amusement. From troubadors and wooden toys to films and penny arcades, our species has always enjoyed a few moments of diversion to help us forget our cares. But, what confronts us now is not a harmless, human-scale step forward in the evolution of entertainment. It is maximally-addictive, industrial-strength distraction.

What does it distract us from? Everything else. And that’s the problem.

Opportunity costs

Since this is, at root, an economic issue, let us consider what economists call opportunity costs. Essentially, an opportunity cost is the value of what you didn’t choose. When we say yes to doomscrolling, binge-watching, or interrupting what we’re doing to check every alert that dings or buzzes our devices, we are saying no to every other use for those minutes, hours, and seconds of focused awareness.

To put it another way, an opportunity cost is the value of whatever you chose, minus the value of what you didn’t choose. The problem with attention is that we are often unaware of how we might have used it differently. Therefore, it’s difficult to determine exactly what we gained vs. exactly what we lost.

But, while exact valuation is difficult, a general estimate is quite easy. What do we gain from engagement with our glowing screens? We receive amusement. Maybe, on occasion, useful information. But what might we have chosen instead? A conversation, a chapter of a book, practice toward some skill or pastime of interest, even playing a game with physical pieces, taking a nap, or simply staring out the window at the sky. These are all options left unchosen.

Thus, if we quantify, with even the roughest of estimates, the value of what we receive, and subtract from it the value of a plausible alternative to which we might have directed the same duration and degree of engagement, is there any chance that the result is favorable? Does screen time provide our body, mind, or spirit with the benefit it would receive from doing almost anything else?

The answer, uncomfortably, is an unequivocal no.

A terrible deal

Viewed in this way, the truth becomes painfully clear. Recreational screen time is not harmless. It is not neutral. It is, in fact, one of the worst possible wastes of our time and energy. Even worse, neuroscience research indicates that the more attention we pay to technology, the less able we are to pay attention to anything else. In other words, the attention economy is strip-mining our brains, consuming our cognitive resources while destroying our capacity to replenish ourselves.

Like any other addict, we continue this behavior despite the adverse effects. Worse yet, we allow children to do the same. The opportunity costs for an adult are severe. For a child, they are tragic.

There is no magical solution that will immediately and completely free us – individually or collectively – from the harmful effects of addictive information technology. It takes a conscious choice to put down the phone or close the computer, and pick up a book, a tool, a pencil, a deck of cards, or some other tangible object that facilitates authentic experience, unmediated by an electronic screen.

That choice can be hard to make. The millennia humans have spent struggling to survive has given us neural architecture dedicated to conserving energy whenever possible. We instinctively take the path of least resistance. With screen time, that difficulty is compounded by algorithmic customization, gamification, intermittent reinforcement, and other psychological tricks that maximize compulsive habit formation.

But, as with any addiction, there comes a point when suffering the consequences of the behavior becomes more painful than changing the behavior. We hit rock bottom, we become disenchanted, and decide that we need to change. The question then becomes: is it too late?

Renegotiating

Opportunity costs, once incurred, can not be erased. There is no second chance at an hour lost. In that respect, yes, it is too late. However, while we can not renegotiate yesterday, we do have the power to renegotiate today and tomorrow. Each day brings new opportunities, more chances to get it right – another shot at making the most of this precious and fragile gift called life.

In other words, as long as we are alive, it is not too late. In the immortal words of Led Zeppelin’s Stairway to Heaven, “there's still time to change the road you're on.”

Attention has value. In monetary terms, that value is tremendous. It cannot be taken from us by force, it can only be stolen from us through deception. So, let us remember to guard it, to prize it, and to spend it wisely – not on addictive amusements, but on the people and things that truly matter.