“All of humanity’s problems stem from man’s inability to sit quietly in a room alone,” wrote the French mathematician and philosopher Blaise Pascal. Written back in the 1600s, it sounds like Pascal could very well be talking about our 21st century. With the addition of the information age, smartphones and the internet could prove to be the largest cause of this problem yet, but is it the problem?
Hold the phone for a minute; what are we dealing with here? Can putting down the device really draw back the curtain to reveal the universal truths we are all searching for? Not exactly, but let’s rewind a little bit to see how we got here in the first place.
An experiment in 2014 led by Timothy Wilson of the University of Virginia set out to test this exact problem: do people hate to sit quietly in a room alone? First, students were asked to sit alone in a room for about 6-15 minutes (depending on the study) with nothing but their thoughts. On average, participants reported to have not enjoyed the experience, and more than half found it very hard to maintain concentration.
In other studies, older people, and those less likely to use smartphones, reported the same results. In a later experiment, participants were given the same conditions, except this time they were given the option to administer an electric shock to themselves. Over 60% of men and 24% of women opted for these negative stimuli instead of remaining in isolation with their thoughts.
The experiment should not come as a surprise to many of us. During a recent debate held by UBC Okanagan, two of the four debaters mentioned they are not on social media. Their main reasons concerned censorship, free speech impeachment, and the information collected by the platforms; information which among other uses, collects data to create algorithms to keep our attention as best they can. Is then a smartphone detox the best way to combat this problem and allow more people to grow the ability to sit alone with their thoughts?
For one, many people rely on their phones for work. An inconvenience for some may be impossible for others. As well, limiting screen time for most of us would mean slower responses in general, and unless explicitly stated to peers, radio silence and the lack of contact can be stressful for both parties. Most importantly, timely responses can be essential to building relationships.
In the competitive market, applying for a job means you must be accessible on some front to build a network. The aforementioned debaters have been industry professionals for decades now, and they have had the option to build trust with their companies and establish other ways of being contacted, which isn’t always an option for individuals seeking employment or those breaking into an industry. Above all, some people just don’t want to give up their time with their phones. Are we then insane?
If the answer to that question is yes, it’s a socially acceptable insanity. We are all victims of an increasingly-loud technological-dependent society that is now a part of our world. Taking one more look at a social media feed is more fun than dwelling on the inherent loneliness which haunts so many of us. But that does not mean we lost the ability or rather ever had the need to sit quietly in a room alone.
In a time so dependent on constant productivity, sitting alone with our thoughts does not yield tangible results. This ability however is still within all of us. It may be regarded as lazy to scroll through a feed and gaze upon the lives of friends and family, but being a human is to radiate influence. Being part of a social species means we see what we desire in others, and sometimes we identify apathy. However, it is enough to remember these are our differentiating factors. No animal can contemplate like we can, and no computer can feel what it is like to be human among other humans. So, what is our quiet room?
Our quiet room has changed. We are ever conscious of the world around us, more so than any time that has come before. That being said, we never lost our ability to wonder. Our thoughts don’t have to be perfect or even productive, they can just brush freedom. Knowing we can sit and imagine proves we are still here. Our distractions will come in many forms, as well as our potential. Our quiet room can still be a 17th-century French room, or it may be a 21st-century commute where we notice a leaf hitting our windshield. But we can still breathe.