I really liked it, lots of fun, action and an interesting premise. Plot could have taken a little more load, but all together, very entertaining. Gotta go and connect a few new synapses.I then checked my Yahoo email and found an email from Luminato regarding the addition of the New Yorker series, which includes one my favourite authors and big thinkers - Malcolm Gladwell. I'm really excited about the opportunity to see him and hopefully hear about his new ideas.
Oh, and the coincidence ? Limitless is based on the plot premise that what if there was a pill you could take that would allow you to use more/all of your available brain capacity. And, if there's anyone who can quickly get your synapses firing and expanding your brain around new ideas, it's Malcolm Gladwell. I'd highly recommend all his books, my favourite being Blink.
1 comment:
I've been listening to several audiobooks and podcasts lately, and in a few cases, they have touched on coincidence and the points you mentioned above.
There is an interesting podcast http://www.radiolab.org/blogs/radiolab-blog/2011/jan/11/universe-knows-my-name/ where they are talking about fate and randomness. One point from the show is about an author named Paul Austen, whose books and life experience contain a lot of coincidence. In his description, he calls these life coincidences Rhymes – where he or someone else repeats a past experience. In the podcast, he talks about a childhood experience of a piano that is missing the F note, just above middle C; and then flash forward a bunch of years to investigating a rundown building, finding an old piano that works perfectly EXCEPT for the F note, just above middle C. There are several other very cool stories that share this eerie 'not just coincidence' feel.
One of the posts from a commenter touches on the idea of Salience: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salience_(neuroscience) . Salience is key in human development as it is key ability of human cognition the facilitates learning and survival; the ability to recognize that something stands out relative to its neighbours. So in a story like the one above, the details stand out because of the one particular detail, the F key on the piano. It brings the experience into sharp focus, and we remember it. In contrast, the many times he may have seen, heard, touched, or otherwise experienced pianos are not remembered because the salience function was not brought into action at that time.
PJMixer and I often joke about a discussion we once had about a particular chapter in a philosophy book. The book was talking about humans thought process as it relates to their experience – they see something X, and wonder about it – why is it here, why is it that colour, etc etc. The book went on to say, a person doesn't say “Why isn't there a giant translucent ball here?” if there is no giant translucent ball to stimulate the thought process in the first place. Consequently, I often ask Pjmixer why there is no giant, translucent ball here – partly to be contrary, but also to myself thinking outside of the box.
Anyway, I'll come to my point about salience and experience as it relates to these coincidences. When a coincidence situation occurs (ie you were reading about a Coldplay in Q, and then you turned on the TV and a Coldplay song is being played in the background of a Masters golf tournament summary montage), the salience reaction occurs and POW! You put two and two together and think that is REALLY cool – and a memory is generated and stored with your relatively small file of coincidences that you have experienced. However, a hundred other times when you read about Coldplay, and nothing happened, you don't form a memory and salience is not triggered – you just don't expect there to be a coincidental occurrence of Coldplay so the fact that it did not happen is not memorable (and is therefore not stored in your potentially overflowing brain file of potential coincidences that did not occur).
In conclusion, (Why isn't there a giant translucent ball here?) I do enjoy these coincidences. I guess this salience thing that we are wired with triggers some enjoyment processes at the same time. I still think that random chance is the causation and (perhaps perversely) enjoy 'debunking' or just considering the variables involved in the happenstance of a particular coincidence. Our experience moment to moment encompasses 86400 seconds a day, with each second having an opportunity for us to make a connection to some other experience in our lives. Perhaps the chance of a particular coincidence is small – ie what are the chances of finding two pianos with no F key 20 years apart? However the chance of finding a coincidence, ANY coincidence, especially given the breadth and depth of our information culture today, I think is VERY likely.
Keep them coming PJMixer!
Post a Comment