The Battle for Attention: A New Crisis or a New Normal?

In a fascinating New Yorker piece, Nathan Heller explores our modern attention crisis through multiple lenses. From advertisers measuring eye movements to a secret society dedicated to staring at art, the article reveals how attention has become both a commodity and a contested space for human experience.

While studies show plummeting attention spans, the real story isn't so simple. Are we losing our ability to focus, or are our systems creating this scattered reality? The article suggests both - and points to emerging solutions. From radical attention schools to new ways of teaching focus, people are finding ways to preserve deep attention while navigating our distracted age.

Next time you're doom-scrolling, remember: attention isn't just something you pay - it's something you can reclaim.

The article mentions Yves Citton, a Swiss literary scholar, in the context of his work "The Ecology of Attention," which argues against reducing attention to purely economic terms. Citton suggests that attention has traditionally been valuable because of its ability to bestow value - essentially, the act of paying attention to something makes it interesting and valuable. By treating attention merely as a market currency, we undersell its true potential and nature. This perspective stands in contrast to the modern advertising industry's approach of quantifying and commodifying attention as a measurable resource to be captured and traded.

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2024/05/06/the-battle-for-attention