> The more I consume, the more I need to consume, the more bored I feel. I often turn to video games to release the tension. I can spend two solid hours shooting at virtual objects until I start to feel less entertained. I then find myself pulling up my phone closer to consume more scrollable content while still playing the game. Only when all my sense are stimulated at the same time, I feel relieved.
> This becomes the new norm. Anything less will result in that acute sense of boredom. Have a conversation with a friend, you'll feel bored. They can't possibly compete with a video game, a political rant and a funny video at the same time. Right in the middle of a conversation you hear that familiar beep from your phone and you have to pick it up. It's not that you ignore your friends, or the dinner conversation, it's that you need to have them all occur at the same time to feel normal.
That quote presents a good story, but I don't think it is true. I could hardly be more engaged than I was this evening sitting at my brother's kitchen table, drinking wine while he cooked and talking about the endeavor of providing food for the family. That I watch two screens sometimes when the TV is on has hardly changed that. If anything it has made my enjoyment of in person conversation more acute.
That's fair but it also doesn't mean much to be able to provide an exception to his general statement, since we still don't know if it's not the case for the majority.
I found that I have changed my ideas on "enjoyment" per-activity, but not overall. For example: I've developed the habit of watching a movie while exercising in the evenings and listening to discussions on YouTube while gaming. As a result the idea of sitting down for a couple of hours to just watch TV or a movie is almost painfully boring.
But I don't (seem to) have that need for sensory saturation with other activities. I have no problem just sitting down to read for hours.
> That I watch two screens sometimes when the TV is on has hardly changed that. If anything it has made my enjoyment of in person conversation more acute.
I'm certain this isn't what the OP means, but from my own personal experience I think it's one of utility. Since you posted this 8 hours ago and no one's replied yet, it can't hurt to give you at least one other illustration.
When watching something on television with family or friends, if a question ever comes up about how something works (what it does, or what it is) that may not be made clear by the show, looking it up on another screen (e.g. mobile device) can lead to a much deeper conversation and better enjoyment of the subject matter. It can also lead to conversations afterwards discussing what we watched in greater detail than if we knew only what was presented in the show.
As an example that happened to me over the holidays, I was watching Alaska Aircrash Investigations with my parents as my mother has a fascination with investigative things, and she spent part of the time on her tablet looking up information on the NTSB staff in the show and, occasionally, some of the accident reports (if she could find them). This lead to both an interesting series of conversations about the people involved and greater appreciation for the program since we collectively knew more about the investigators and their backgrounds.
Tangentially, this is also why I think streaming YouTube to a television is such a beautiful thing (sometimes having the comments on a second screen while watching can be hilarious or depressing).
As if nobody ever read the newspaper while the radio is on. Or watched the tv and listened to the radio. Or talked to other people while scanning the newspaper. All of that is old as dirt. Come on...
At least for sports, muting the TV and listening to the radio broadcast of the same game can greatly improve the experience. Muting the weather channel and a few others is already a net gain even without the radio.
Not OP but I think that the comment about both TV and radio on at the same time was more generic than that.
I'd argue that it's a known fact, at least for anybody that follows any mainstream sport, that sports radio commentary is a lot more exciting that its tv counterpart.
I used to play a lot of Team Fortress 2 on half my wide screen with Seinfeld playing on Plex on the other half.
It was very zen and relaxing, to the point where I did it with other shows and games. For example, Dynasty Warriors 4 on a PS2 emulator, with NewsRadio reruns playing on the other half.
For some people it's just relaxing, not really about boredom.
Yeah, there's nothing more relaxing for me than putting on a comedy podcast and working through a 2D metroidvania game on DS or my hacked Switch. For some reason the two parts of my brain that process audio and that style of game are completely independent.
It's no different than knitting or solving a crossword while listening to the radio 100 years ago.
The only problem is that I only have one more DS and GBA Castlevania game before I've beaten all of them. I've already worked through every Metroid and 2D Zelda game as well as Hollow Knight.
Comparison to knitting and crosswords seems fair for stimuli, I think the difference is during a dinner conversation your knitting wouldn’t be vibrating in your pocket luring you into a “bathroom break” to work on it.
I speedsolve Rubik's cubes. For the longest time I listened to podcasts while solve; two different parts of my brain. But recently I've noticed that in order to break the next big time barrier for me, I need to dedicate my full attention. No more podcasts. Two different parts of the brain still, but now it's only one active part.
I did nearly the same thing for a long while, except it was Dynasty Warriors 3 on the TV and Mr. Show reruns on my computer. Although Newsradio is a show I rewatch and use as a background show often.
I felt very similar, like it was a zen feeling. I didn't get a similar feeling with another game until Minecraft, where I could just carve out giant holes in the land while watching TV shows.
I think boredom has been redefined many times over human history. That's where leisure activities are borne from.
There was a point in our collective history when "where will my next meal come from?" is the overarching concern of every member of the species. Becoming a producer in such an environment would be nearly unthinkable, yet it's not a second thought today.
Tribal societies had time for stories, music, dance, art and ritual. Kids still had time to play. You’d have to go pretty far back or during extreme times to find a period when our ancestors had no time foe leisure.
It depends mostly on the period, the availability of food etc.
One anecdote: I visited the (replica of) Chauvet Cave, in France, a few months ago, in which some of the best-preserved cave paintings in the world can be seen. They were painted around 30000 years ago from now by the Aurignacian, people very similar to us modern humans, including in height. We were told that they would spent only 4 to 5 hours a day hunting or gathering the necessary raw materials to survive. The rest of the time could be dedicated to the making of splendid clothes, a large variety af daily items, art, etc.
> The more I consume, the more I need to consume, the more bored I feel. I often turn to video games to release the tension. I can spend two solid hours shooting at virtual objects until I start to feel less entertained. I then find myself pulling up my phone closer to consume more scrollable content while still playing the game. Only when all my sense are stimulated at the same time, I feel relieved.
> This becomes the new norm. Anything less will result in that acute sense of boredom. Have a conversation with a friend, you'll feel bored. They can't possibly compete with a video game, a political rant and a funny video at the same time. Right in the middle of a conversation you hear that familiar beep from your phone and you have to pick it up. It's not that you ignore your friends, or the dinner conversation, it's that you need to have them all occur at the same time to feel normal.
[1]: https://idiallo.com/blog/im-bored-what-do-i-do