Morning Glory: Put down your phone, darn it

Christine Rosen is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, a columnist for Commentary and a frequent contributor to the magazine’s podcast, and a fellow at Virginia’s Institute for Advanced Studies in Culture. Rosen is also the author of "The Extinction of Experience: Being Human in a Disembodied World," a book that has changed my life.

Every book changes every reader’s life for, at a minimum, reading any book consumes time you cannot get back. But some books have far-reaching impacts. I chanced, for example, upon "One Day In The Life of Ivan Denisovich" among my oldest brother’s books when, long ago, he came home for the summer after his freshman year in college. That short, riveting novel by Alexander Solzhenitsyn had quite an impact on me. Until reading it, I had no idea of the Gulag or the vast suffering of those imprisoned in it or the menace of totalitarian ambitions. (I hadn’t begun high school yet so no criticism of my teachers in the 1960s, though it would be a fine book for every youngster in junior high to read.)

Of the thousands of books I’ve been lucky enough to read, very few suggest explicitly that I change my own behavior much less successfully do so. But Rosen’s subtly does just that, and she succeeded even before I had finished it. 

"The Extinction of Experience" is about technology and its many impacts on the world writ large and on every reader. An example: "Our personal technologies, particularly the cellphone, are a massive drain on civil attention." Hard to argue with that, of course, but as one reads anecdote after anecdote and study summary after study summary, it is hard not to indict yourself as a willing and probably unthinking participant in the ongoing conquest of everything in your life  by technology if indeed you are using your phone to, say, spend time scrolling or texting while waiting in line at the supermarket or pharmacy. 

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Much more broadly, Rosen explores in a compact but wonderfully conversational style the impact on our world of the many byproducts of the accelerated infusion of technology everywhere and all at once, from decline of drawing—by children and adults—the end or handwriting, the exile of boredom, the increase in road rage and pedestrian-on-pedestrian collisions. "A large part of our daily lives has already been colonized by technology as we constantly look down at our smartphones and computers," Rosen noted as she reviews how museum-going has changed radically in the years since the iPhone appeared. And not just that specific set of experiences —everything else too has been, if not bent, then shaped by technology. 

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No Luddite, Rosen is not inveighing against technology itself.  Like Jonathan Haidt in his important "The Anxious Generation," she is observing but unlike Haidt, Rosen is not focused exclusively on children but much more on adults (and as noted above, she is not making policy specific recommendations though it’s hard to miss her message.)

I heard about the book when John Podhoretz, editor-in-chief of Commentary, called it "terrifying" on the podcast. That raised my eyebrows so I asked my booking producer to get the book sent to me and then inhaled it, looking up long enough to engage my wife and our house guests about specific passages. They were not annoyed but everything I brought to their attention spurred excellent conversation that also elicited personal anecdotes. A fine test of a book, I think, and certainly one that will encourage her publisher. 

In the strongest possible terms, since you are reading this column online, go and order the book. It won’t stop you from checking your phone or getting your news and opinions here. I am fairly certain, however, that you will look at your phone differently when you are finished with "The Extinction of Experience" —very differently.

Hugh Hewitt is host of "The Hugh Hewitt Show," heard weekday mornings 6am to 9am ET on the Salem Radio Network, and simulcast on Salem News Channel. Hugh wakes up America on over 400 affiliates nationwide, and on all the streaming platforms where SNC can be seen. He is a frequent guest on the Fox News Channel’s news roundtable hosted by Bret Baier weekdays at 6pm ET. A son of Ohio and a graduate of Harvard College and the University of Michigan Law School, Hewitt has been a Professor of Law at Chapman University’s Fowler School of Law since 1996 where he teaches Constitutional Law. Hewitt launched his eponymous radio show from Los Angeles in 1990.  Hewitt has frequently appeared on every major national news television network, hosted television shows for PBS and MSNBC, written for every major American paper, has authored a dozen books and moderated a score of Republican candidate debates, most recently the November 2023 Republican presidential debate in Miami and four Republican presidential debates in the 2015-16 cycle. Hewitt focuses his radio show and his column on the Constitution, national security, American politics and the Cleveland Browns and Guardians. Hewitt has interviewed tens of thousands of guests from Democrats Hillary Clinton and John Kerry to Republican Presidents George W. Bush and Donald Trump over his 40 years in broadcast, and this column previews the lead story that will drive his radio/ TV show today.

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