Not too long ago I watched a spider trap and eat an ant. I think this is the first time I've actually watched a web-making spider eat something. But I've seen lots of video of hapless prey becoming entangled and spiders deftly wrapping them in web. So how much does vicarious experience through video count as experience, and how does it influence more direct experience?
Oddly, I'm not even positive whether this was the first time I watched a spider eat something -- I guess because I've seen it on video a lot (yeah, I grew up in a PBS household) and might not remember the difference. And often the number of representations we've seen outweighs firsthand experiences. Most people probably see at least dozens of movie kisses before they have a first kiss. Most children probably glue bright yellow petals on a lot more stylized paper sunflowers than they see real sunflowers (which, in contrast to the paper ones, have a lot more petals, aren't uniform colors, and are also hairier than a wookie using Rogaine).
Representations (such as video footage of spiders) allow us to see a lot more of the world than we otherwise would, but they filter it through another observer's selective perspective. This applies to a lot of literature and art. Video may be a little less subjective than other representations, but it's not raw data -- even at the lowest level of artistic tinkering, what we get to see is what somebody else considered the good parts.
Which is why we watch it, of course, rather than watching the unfiltered live 3-D imaging of the living room. The fact that somebody else noticed this stuff and recorded it on purpose lends interest and credibility. Like the part in Browning's "Fra Lippo Lippi" monologue where Lippi (the painter) is talking about how people don't notice things until they've been painted. The fact that someone wanted to represent stuff gives us a reason to look at it.
But there's clearly a difference between looking at someone's representation and experiencing the content firsthand. The representation is really neat because you get to experience another person's choices as well as the content and because it's usually pared down to give you the most interesting parts. But the selection process, of course, also leaves a lot out -- and who decides what's interesting? Also, the represented version is often stylized or streamlined to make it easier to deal with.
To return to the spider -- video versions I'd seen usually cut out parts of the process, because in actuality it takes a long time for a spider to wrap something up and eat it. If the fact that it takes a long time is interesting, the represented version missed that part. In the very act of trying to keep to the interesting parts, it inevitably left out a big one. Which means that while the representations I'd seen were pretty cool, and they let me have some experience of spiders eating things before I personally happened across one, they don't substitute for firsthand observation.
However, the way representations are made to be so easy to deal with makes the substitution tempting. Video versions of spiders eating things often have a lovely black background and optimal camera placement and lighting so that you can actually see all the fibers of the web. But when I watched the spider, a cluttered background made the web invisible in places. I could tell it was there because I could see the spider crawling along it, but (even though I have very good near vision) I couldn't see the strands of web. Watching a quality video of a spider is a lot easier than watching a real spider, because the representation streamlines perception -- everything is clear, and you know where you're supposed to look, and it won't take too long.
So I think the inundation of representations can make us lazy about doing the real work of perception. I'm not going to go so far as Baudrillard and say that representation outright destroys reality. But I think that if we rely on it too much, it can make us bad at dealing with reality. Especially since the representations stay with us and inform our perceptions later. It's easy to go into mental shorthand and substitute one of the many simplified images on hand for the actual complexity we're looking at. We (especially artists who want to do some representing and not be trite with it) have to keep open mental dialogue between representations and our own perceptions so we don't get lazy or continue to miss interesting bits just because other people did. It can be rewarding to notice how the spider web is invisible and the sunflower is hairy.
And if you don't write nature poetry, of course, apply this to whatever grander matters you like. Relationships with other people, for example.
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