Angels in the Architecture; Why Play is a Competitive Advantage
“There was formerly a capacity for light-heartedness and play which has been to some extent inhibited by the cult of efficiency. The modern man thinks that everything ought to be done for the sake of something else, and never for its own sake. Serious-minded persons, for example, are continually condemning the habit of going to the cinema, and telling us that it leads the young into crime. But all the work that goes to producing a cinema is respectable, because it is work, and because it brings a money profit. The notion that the desirable activities are those that bring a profit has made everything topsy-turvy.”
Normalwise
About forty years ago, an unassuming Kiwi was poring over IQ tests of World War 2 soldiers. Something struck him; as he compared these findings to modern tests he noticed a steady but discernable increase in score averages. It was as though the population was getting smarter over time. We named the phenomenon after the professor who discovered it; the Flynn Effect.
This uncomfortable fact isn’t because milennials are better people than boomers (there are many dimensions of intelligence). But we can find an explanatory clue for the phenomenon in another study, this time in the wilds of Soviet Russia, just as the tendrils of modernity were reaching tribes heretofore isolated. Anthropologists and psychologists jumped on the unique opportunity.
One named Alexander Luria, found that tribe members - who had no explosure to modern concepts like mathematics - had trouble with certain questions; specifically, patterns between unrelated categories. For instance, Luria would ask; “In Siberia, animals are colored white to camoflage against the snow. What color do you think bears are in Siberia?” One man, pondering the question, slowly answered “Who could say? I have never been there myself.”
In a world rapidly growing in complexity, the ability to organize abstract concepts - software, the economy, social justice - is a rare constant in a workforce trying to keep up. This suggests that the Flynn effect is a natural byproduct of such an environment; abstracting relationships between seemingly disparate concepts is a prized skill, and analogizing is a vital way of clarifying ideas.
Putting aside important questions about types of intelligence and what we ought to value, there’s something simpler and more delightful to be gleaned here. Our brain’s natural proclivity to leap at the connections between seemingly disconnected things is a source of pleasure and insight. Einstein had his epiphany about relativaty as he pondered a train moving toward a platform; Newton watched the falling apple; Yoky Matsuoka used her love of tennis and drawing to develop early artificial limbs. And we seem to be getting better at training this natural cognitive muscle.
In my own experience as a poetry tragic, the deepest pleasure in a well-written metaphor is it’s unexpected relatedness to the familiar, a delightful jolt of recognition as the whole leaps out from the parts. You might notice how frequently I urge play in NormalWise. It’s because play sets the stage for connections. From childhood, where we made pirate ships out of settes, to adulthood where we find associations on lazy strolls, discovering patterns in the chaos is a delight transcending art and science.
So consider this another exhortation, in this world of productivity and bullet lists, not to forget your own capacity for creating meaning. If the world feels interconnected, trust your instinct; your children will understand this better than you.
Book Recommendation
This week I recommend not a book, but an essay. Bertrand Russell was a creature of a different time. He was writing against the crushing industrialism of 1930s Britain, advocating for the anxieties of the working class. But In Praise of Idleness is an ode for loving things as ends in themselves - occassionally, on days where my duties have me resigned, this little essay is a hot water bottle for the soul. The title is wonderfully clickbait-y. It fits NormalWise like a glove.
Want to support me? Forward to others and they can sign up from this link.
Missed one? I publish them all on my microblog for your reading pleasure.