The famous French and Christian philosopher Blaise Pascal once said, “All of humanity’s problems stem from man’s inability to sit quietly in a room alone.” Pascal seems to be flirting with deep philosophical truths in this insight, but I want to tamper with Pascal’s statement: A good number of our problems today stem from our unwillingness to sit quietly without a phone in a room alone. Why do I — and Pascal — believe this behavior is a problem?
When people are unwilling and unable to be alone with their thoughts, that speaks, I think, to the deep level of insecurity and angst stirring inside them. When I look at myself in a mirror, for example, oftentimes I have to battle deep anxieties about my appearance. To be honest, I try to avoid mirrors, mostly because I don’t want to recognize those bleak feelings. But that is exactly my and Pascal’s point: Humans are in constant motion, are constantly seeking a form of distraction, simply because they do not want to stare their own shame and self-loathing in the face. We busy ourselves with small and trivial pursuits in order to restrain the feelings of inferiority that consume us when we are still.
But it is not healthy, psychologically or spiritually, to constantly avoid one’s angst. Indeed, I think a life centered on self-distraction is not a fully human life. At some point, we all must realize what we are fleeing from, what we are seeking to avoid in all of our activity: We dislike who we are.
What other truth would we be trying to avoid? It is too painful a thought to bear, and yet I feel its poison plaguing my conscience. I wonder if you do, too.
This column, however, is not a philosophical treatise on human identity but a meditation on technology. I want to explore this theme of how technology’s soaring influence has impacted our cultural setting in the upcoming weeks. It seems to me one of the biggest effects technology, specifically the smartphone and social media, has created today is the enabling of people to escape from themselves. People never need to be alone anymore, because at the tip of their fingers is a device that connects them to the ends of the earth.
In fact, a person never really is alone anymore. There never is any true silence in a person’s life. There is always music in the background or in my headphones, or I’m playing “Pokemon Go,” or I’m on Facebook, or I’m watching a YouTube video — but rarely am I surrounded by silence. What are we too afraid to hear when we are not actually listening to anything?
I wonder what we have lost in this respect, in losing the ability to reflect in solitude. I find that during the last moments of my day, before I drift to sleep, I am on Facebook when I should be praying or reflecting on my day. Social media certainly keeps us connected with people whom, in an earlier time, we would not be able to see or communicate with. But I fear people are slipping into dangerous behavior. Instead of supplementing real life with social media, it appears to me more and more people are trading real life for the social media experience.
It seems modern people are rather bored with reality. It doesn’t match the thrill of getting likes or keeping up with celebrity gossip or watching a friend’s hilarious Snapchat video or live-tweeting MTV’s Video Music Awards. Real life has limits; it’s brutal, and people can immediately see my flaws. However, life through my phone and computer screens is limitless; it’s jovial, and people can only see the side of me I decide to make known. The effects of this growing attitude I hope to explore next week.
Scott Stinson is a UF English and philosophy sophomore. His column appears on Wednesday.
