The Grammar of Hubris

Problem Practices, Rhetorical Mastery, , , , , , , , ,

verb word cloudIt’s natural that we will place ourselves and our institutions in the driver’s seat.  We assume we can be in charge because our language lets us imagine it.   

Rhetoricians like to say that language has its way with us. The phrase is meant as a reminder that everyday language steers us to conclusions that usually promise more than we as individual agents or nations can deliver.  Word choice can easily create perceptions that can make the unlikely more likely, the improbable possible, the fantasy an imagined outcome that will surely happen.  We can tie a wish to an action verb and we are off and running, creating expectations for things that probably will not materialize. Who knew that simple verbs like “is” and “will” can be phantoms of deceit?

I was reminded of this by a recent article in The Atlantic by Stephen Biddle and Jacob Shapiro. Their thesis is the title of their piece: “America Can’t Do Much About ISIS.” (April 20, 2016).  The article includes a solid analysis of the roots of ISIS in the civil wars affecting Syria and neighboring states. Their point is that internal struggles like these have to “burn out” from the inside.  This kind of civil war cycle might take nine or ten years to complete, an outcome outsiders can’t change very much.

What seems inescapable is that the rhetorical ease of committing ourselves to the control or transformation of complex political forces is too easy. That’s something we’ve come to know all too well since the Vietnam era, reconfirmed more recently in Afghanistan and Iraq. The military and social problems associated with nation-building are unforeseeable.  Substantive reasons for caution tend to get lost behind the neon glow of action verbs.

Blame our overly-deterministic language.

We construct the world as a web of causes and effects.  It’s natural that we will place ourselves and our institutions in the driver’s seat.  We assume we can be in charge because our language so easily lets us imagine it.  Blame our overly-deterministic language, along with the hubris that comes with being the world’s preeminent military power.  Both set up tight effects loops that seem clear on the page but elusive in real life.

If we put individual culprits in a lineup they all look more or less innocent: verbs like affect, make, destroy, brake, results in, causes, starts, produce, alters, stops, triggers, controls, contributes to, brings about, changes, and so on.

In the right company these can be companionable terms.  But let them loose within the rhetoric of a leader determined to make his or her mark on the public stage and they can turn lethal. This is the realm of the familiar idea of “unintended effects.”  Fantasies of power and control impose more order on human affairs than usually exists.  They depend on verbs that flatter us by making us active agents.

This is ironically aggravated by our devotion to the scientific method. As Psychologist Steven Pinker has observed, we can’t do science without buying into the view that we can identify first causes. That’s surely fine for discovering the origins of a troublesome human disease. But even though this logic is diffused through the culture, it cannot hold when we immerse ourselves in the infinite complexities of human conduct.  Discovering the reasons and motivations of others is far more difficult.  Add in entities such as nations or tribes, and first causes are often unknowable.  And so strategic calculations based on efforts to influence or control behavior are bound to produce disappointment.

It’s a great paradox that we are easily outgunned by ourselves: by the stunningly capricious nature of the human condition. Take it from someone who has spent a lifetime studying why people change their minds.  We have models, theories, tons of experimental research and good guesses.  But making predictions about any specific instance is almost always another case of hope triumphing over reality. We may be able to say what we want, giving eloquent expression to the goals we seek.  Our verbs may sing their certainty, but forces we can’t predict are going to produce their own effects.

Comments: Woodward@tcnj.edu

cropped-Perfect-Response-logo.jpg

Coping with the E-Mail Tide

Models, , ,
Image: Kevin Phillips
                              Image: Kevin Phillips

For most of us something like a “rule of 10” applies: for every 10 messages in our inbox there may be one with some relevance to our lives.

Nearly everyone is overwhelmed with too many emails.  Those that work in large organizations are especially likely to face the same daily high tide that rushes in at a rate of one or two every few minutes.  So this requires a daily routine that includes clearing out our inbox, which means getting rid of a lot ‘fishing’ emails from outside groups, not to mention missives from fellow workers who use the “send to all” button as an easy claim to institutional relevancy.

The simple problem is that the system feeds on itself.  The more emails we answer the more we get. And for most of us something like a “rule of 10” applies: for every 10 messages there is one that may have some relevance to our lives. Sometimes the ratio seems more like 100 to 1.  The bigger problem is that email is usually a distraction that keeps us from doing more useful things.

How can we deal with this sponge on our time?  The strategies vary, none of them perfect. Oliver Burkeman in The Guardian recommends a solution tried by Tony Hsieh, the President of Zappos.

He calls it “Yesterbox,” because the premise is that you should stop focusing on email received today, except when urgent, and instead try to deal with everything that came in yesterday. It’s an idea so simple, your first response might legitimately be, “Huh? What difference could that make?” A big one, it turns out.

The logic is that a “closed list” of yesterday’s emails is easier to get through.  Burkeman notes that “in your Yesterbox, you’re no longer on a treadmill: one email dealt with means one fewer to deal with; the target you’re aiming for isn’t receding constantly into the distance.”  That may be true, but it’s small comfort and a minor psychological advantage gained over working from the most recent to the oldest.

Here are some additional suggestions that can result in spending less time each day on stuffed in-boxes, even within an organization that treats email as the “official” channel of communication.

  1. Turn off the audio email notifications on your computer.  They feed our curiosity and can break the rhythm of more significant work.
  2. Check email only once or twice a day.  Give it the lower priority it usually deserves.
  3. Save email for the low part of your daily productivity curve.  If you are the most creative and energetic in the morning, don’t waste your time on it then.  The tedium of going through it can probably wait until that after-lunch miasma kicks in.
  4. Don’t substitute texting for email.  The norm of instant response for texts can be a major time-killer, intensifying the problem you are trying to solve.
  5. Spend more time in “airplane mode,” even when you are on the ground.  Our addiction to screens is real and growing.  In order to tame it, set aside sizable segments of the day when you are more available in real space more than virtual space.  Anyway, you look smarter when not seen by friends and coworkers frozen into a “screen thrall,” which looks only slightly better than drooling in public.
  6.  Like most most forms of communication, emails from co-workers usually have an expressive purpose that outweighs the need to respond.  For these a simple acknowledgment is enough.
  7. Some groups are serial offenders in over-sending messages.  Attempts to unsubscribe or block them will probably not work.  Learn to be fast with the delete key for these groups.  And if you do reach a live body at the organization, express your displeasure with their abuse of your inbox.

Now, if I can just get with the program myself. . .

Additional Suggestions? Comment at Woodward@tcnj.edu
Perfect Response logo