#MYLDN (714)

Me and my camera in my home town, my capital city, my london

Our brains are aware of everything that is going on around us but only alert us to things that are different or are important. For example, your brain will flag up that the guy who always stands outside your local shop isn’t wearing his usual furry hat or the fact that there is a car heading straight for you. The rest is zoned out by your attentional filter so anything that gets through must somehow registers in either category, change or importance. (i learnt this in a fascinating book I read on neuroscience by daniel J levetin  called “The organised mind” in case you are interested in my sources)

So when you actually notice someone out of the corner of your eye as you are bombing around the street there is undoubtedly a very good reason for it. You can’t put your finger on it but you just feel something isn’t quite right. All the subjects in this week’s posts broke through my attentional filter and registered on my weirdometer (that isn’t from my brain book btw – I made that up, fyi). The guy above for example stood still for so long that I thought he was some sort of art installation or a living statue, even the other woman in the photo was eyeballing him with intense curiosity. I actually watched him till he eventually moved which was kind of a relief as he was beginning to freak me out big time. Even Paddington bear looked weirded out.

So next time you notice someone and something doesn’t feel right about them, trust your observation. Although please bear in mind your brain tends to notice things that are important to you, highlighting things that will re-enforce your existing world view whilst dismissing everything else. We must appreciate that we aren’t getting the full story, the bigger picture. We are only being made aware of a minuscule fraction of reality. In many ways the brain sees what we want to see. Our vision feels objective but it is really anything but.

Its a bit like the internet these days. It is, without our consent, forever fine tuning what it thinks we want to look at and filtering out the rest. The brain works in exactly the same way. Its annoying in some ways as we are really only getting a very fine slice of the world around us which is then re-inforced perpetually. Although not half as annoying as getting endless pop up adverts trying to sell you something you have already bought. I would so love a button on my keyboard which sent an instant message to all prospective online sellers: “You’re late, I already bought it, stop trying to sell me something I already own and leave me be!