Today’s Binary Response is in response to this article by Christopher Butler earlier this month defending the use of screens.
Let’s start by giving his article context. He is a graphic designer, which means he spends a lot of time using his computer and other devices.
Upon reading his article, there is strong disagreement from the perspective of a website developer who also frequently uses various computing devices.
He leads his article off saying, Screens get a lot of blame these days. They’re accused of destroying attention spans, ruining sleep, enabling addiction, isolating us from one another, and eroding our capacity for deep thought. “Screen time” has become shorthand for everything wrong with modern technology and its grip on our lives.
He is correct about screens destroying sleep cycles and attention spans and capacity for deep thought as well as allowing people to become addicted and isolated. However, screens are not the direct reason for these issues. Beacause in many cases those who become addicted to using their various computing devices are becoming isolated and losing sleep as well as having much shorter attention spans.
Butler continues his article saying, The screen itself is obviously not to blame—what’s on the screen is. When we use “screen” as a catch-all for our digital dissatisfaction, we’re conflating the surface with what it displays.
While there is truth to this some out there believe that the problem lies in the ability to turn to our internet connected devices in literally a heartbeat to remember historical facts, look up current—and past—sports scores, read news, watch TV shows, etc. Therefore the screen itself is to blame for the issues of isolation, shorter attention span, and less sleep.
Near the end of his article Butler uses Einstein’s office at Princeton as an example of why screens are not to blame for the aforementioned issues which are blamed on the use of screens:
Think of Einstein’s office at Princeton, with its blackboards covered in equations. Those boards weren’t distractions from his thought — they were extensions of it. They allowed him to externalize complex ideas, manipulate them visually, and free his mind from the burden — the impossibility — of holding every variable simultaneously.
Our digital screens serve the same purpose, albeit with far greater complexity and interactivity. They hold vast amounts of information that would overwhelm our working memory. They visualize data in ways our minds can grasp. They show us possibilities we couldn’t otherwise envision. They hold them all in place for us, so that we can look away and then easily find them again when we return our gaze.
Many people across all professional practices do not own an Android/iOS tablet, use their smartphone for phone calls as well as texting, and rarely touch their computer outside of business hours who complain of the issues Butler mentioned in the opening of his article.
Here’s the thing folks: Just look back at 2020 and 2021 when we were essentially locked in our houses cause of COVID-19 as an example of being isolated. It probably goes without saying that your screens likely caused you to get less sleep and have a shorter attention span during the pandemic shut down; that’s the only reason Butler’s argument is valid. However, lack of sleep and attention span can and usually are directly linked to being isolated.
With that, it’s important to recognize that while Christopher Butler makes some thoughtful points about how screens can function as tools to extend and enhance our cognitive capabilities—much like Einstein’s blackboard—they also act as portals to environments and behaviors that are not always in our best interest.
When you use your devices for a living that does not mean you should be defending the potential to overuse them outside of your work.