Attention selects which technical developments get pursued, forming a recursive loop with the brain
Evidence
The most important echosystem for our attention echology is nevertheless the one whose dynamic is described by Katherine Hayles in terms of technogenesis. Like Cathy Davidson, her colleague at Duke University, she highlights the equal importance and the complementarity uniting deep attention and hyper-attention. Like Nicholas Carr and all those who gravitate towards these questions, she recognizes the dynamic interaction that links the evolution of our technical devices with neuronal plasticity: through the process of synaptogenesis, ‘synapses are pruned in response to external stimuli, with those that are used strengthening, and the neural clusters with which they are associated spreading, while the synapses that are not used wither and die’. While recognizing the determining role played by our technical devices in the stimulation, and so the structuring, of our brains’ attentional operations, she nevertheless highlights the importance of the feedback effect that constitutes this recursive loop: from the vast range of functions that our machines are able to carry out, our attention selects only a very small number – and it is this selection that orients the pursuit of certain technical developments, at the expense of other possible developments. — Yves Citton, The Ecology of Attention, 532
Categorization
- XREF: The recursive technogenesis loop is the core mechanistic bridge to Hayles and Carr; ties to medium-theory lineage (McLuhan/Innis) via the two-way device-brain dynamic. — connects to: Today’s attention choices shape the devices that will condition tomorrow’s attention — Yves Citton, The Ecology of Attention, 533; Attention and technology co-evolve through reciprocal causation — Yves Citton, The Ecology of Attention, 534; Attention is a filtering mechanism that shapes decision-making — Thomas Davenport & John Beck, The Attention Economy: Understanding…, 12 (+1 more)
Broader Connections
- Attention and technology co-evolve through reciprocal causation
#corroborates(0.95) — Yves Citton, The Ecology of Attention, 534 - Attention is a filtering mechanism that shapes decision-making
#expands(0.80) — Thomas Davenport & John Beck, The Attention Economy, 12 - Intensive learning physically rewires brain structure and perceptual habits.
#expands(0.72)