Recreation’s value scales with intensity and contrast, not user counts

Evidence

There are those who decry wilderness sports as ‘undemocratic’ because the recreational carrying capacity of a wilderness is small, as compared with a golf links or a tourist camp. The basic error in such argument is that it applies the philosophy of mass-production to what is intended to counteract mass-production. The value of recreation is not a matter of ciphers. Recreation is valuable in proportion to the intensity of its experiences, and to the degree to which it differs from and contrasts with workaday life. By these criteria, mechanized outings are at best a milk-and-water affair. — Aldo Leopold, A Sand County Almanac, 684

Categorization

• XREF: Directly extends the ch21 claim that recreation value is contrast with mechanized work, now articulated against the mass-production critique. — connects to: Mass recreation dilutes what it seeks, making the search self-defeating — Aldo Leopold, A Sand County Almanac: With Other…, 576; Aesthetic experience succeeds or fails on attentional quality, not object traits — Yves Citton, The Ecology of Attention, 431
• recurring: this claim recurs 2 times within its source

Broader Connections

• Aesthetic experience succeeds or fails on attentional quality, not object traits #corroborates (0.85) — Yves Citton, The Ecology of Attention, 431