As we all know, perceptions are, important to us. Perceptions, as we also all know, are often faulty. How ironic!
The English word perception derives from the Latin capere, “to grasp” or “seize.” It’s the same root word from which we get capture, entering the language through an intermediate word, percipere, “to seize entirely” or “to take possession of” and Anglo-French derivatives. The per, for “thoroughly,” adds the sense of completeness that perceptions rarely have.
Our indefinite access to daily happenings through computers, radios, and TVs exposes us to more information than we have time to—or desire to—fully process. In defense against an overwhelming attack by information, we rely on perceptions as guards protecting the brain’s fortress of calm.
Here’s the hypothesis. Perceptions were obviously important to survival, but the dimensions of modern life have changed their effect. They have always acted as early warning systems in the presence of threatening organisms or circumstances whether real or unreal. So, perceptions became part of a survival mechanism and served for most of human history as a safety function. Humans didn’t wait around to get confirmation of danger when hearing a distant pack of wolves in the woods. The perception that the pack poses an actual threat was a sufficient reason to act.
Then Gutenberg, Marconi, and Babbage entered their rudimentary inventions to human daily life. With increased access to information and information processors, people entered a new world. Perceptions were no longer just about local phenomena, such as interpersonal relationships and potential local wolf attacks. Perceptions became the new knowledge in the face of overwhelming information. Ironically, that meant substituting partial for full comprehension.
What do I mean? Perceived threats from HIV, Ebola, Zika, terror attacks on airplanes, and superbugs suddenly show up to become the new wolves in the woods of information. Perceptions that can serve as protectors suddenly become the source of attack, allowing incomplete information to enter the innermost brain, causing anxiety. “I hear a distant wolf pack. They are coming for me. Run!” We’re looking at an analog to an autoimmune disease, one that attacks mind, attacks comprehension.
You might not like the hypothesis that perception has become as much a disadvantage as it was once an advantage. But as you walk through the woods of story after story on the Internet, in the papers, or on broadcast news, ask yourself how much of what you receive you receive thoroughly and how much time you take to comprehend, to seize, fully. How much of what you daily receive is a distant howling that poses no real threat yet causes you anxiety because of perception?
Are there real wolves in the woods? Sure, they are there. Do you perceive as immediate the threats that are distant wolves whose wanderings through the forest will probably not take them across your path? Probably. You won’t stop checking the news, however. You are most likely addicted to all that information that leaves you with perceptions but without complete comprehension.
Insofar as perceptions serve that ancient purpose, they help us survive in the face of actual threats; insofar as they give us incomplete comprehension, they simply cause anxiety.
The English word perception derives from the Latin capere, “to grasp” or “seize.” It’s the same root word from which we get capture, entering the language through an intermediate word, percipere, “to seize entirely” or “to take possession of” and Anglo-French derivatives. The per, for “thoroughly,” adds the sense of completeness that perceptions rarely have.
Our indefinite access to daily happenings through computers, radios, and TVs exposes us to more information than we have time to—or desire to—fully process. In defense against an overwhelming attack by information, we rely on perceptions as guards protecting the brain’s fortress of calm.
Here’s the hypothesis. Perceptions were obviously important to survival, but the dimensions of modern life have changed their effect. They have always acted as early warning systems in the presence of threatening organisms or circumstances whether real or unreal. So, perceptions became part of a survival mechanism and served for most of human history as a safety function. Humans didn’t wait around to get confirmation of danger when hearing a distant pack of wolves in the woods. The perception that the pack poses an actual threat was a sufficient reason to act.
Then Gutenberg, Marconi, and Babbage entered their rudimentary inventions to human daily life. With increased access to information and information processors, people entered a new world. Perceptions were no longer just about local phenomena, such as interpersonal relationships and potential local wolf attacks. Perceptions became the new knowledge in the face of overwhelming information. Ironically, that meant substituting partial for full comprehension.
What do I mean? Perceived threats from HIV, Ebola, Zika, terror attacks on airplanes, and superbugs suddenly show up to become the new wolves in the woods of information. Perceptions that can serve as protectors suddenly become the source of attack, allowing incomplete information to enter the innermost brain, causing anxiety. “I hear a distant wolf pack. They are coming for me. Run!” We’re looking at an analog to an autoimmune disease, one that attacks mind, attacks comprehension.
You might not like the hypothesis that perception has become as much a disadvantage as it was once an advantage. But as you walk through the woods of story after story on the Internet, in the papers, or on broadcast news, ask yourself how much of what you receive you receive thoroughly and how much time you take to comprehend, to seize, fully. How much of what you daily receive is a distant howling that poses no real threat yet causes you anxiety because of perception?
Are there real wolves in the woods? Sure, they are there. Do you perceive as immediate the threats that are distant wolves whose wanderings through the forest will probably not take them across your path? Probably. You won’t stop checking the news, however. You are most likely addicted to all that information that leaves you with perceptions but without complete comprehension.
Insofar as perceptions serve that ancient purpose, they help us survive in the face of actual threats; insofar as they give us incomplete comprehension, they simply cause anxiety.
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