Frogs in boiling water
I never conducted this experiment--because that would be just mean--but it simply makes sense that "If you throw a frog into a pot of boiling water, it will either die or else be so badly hurt it will wish that it were dead." It also makes sense that if you "put it in a pot of tepid water and turn on the heat, the frog will climb out -- if it can -- as soon as it gets uncomfortably warm." Cold-bloodedness, after all, doesn't make an animal suddenly invincible to the effects that a swan dive into a vat of boiling water have on bacteria and humans and all organic life, really.
James Fallows is offering a reward "to the person who comes up with the best simple metaphor for the underlying idea: that people get habituated to worsening circumstances that they'd reject if they considered them afresh. Only catch: the metaphor, unlike the frog story, can't violate the known facts."
I don't think I can do much better than frogs or bad marriages. But here are a few things that I do fairly regularly that I would probably be happier--and otherwise better off--not doing at all:
- Hit the snooze button. Repeatedly.
- Wait long stretches of time--when I could easily walk--for buses and trains that are already many minutes late.
- Continue eating the food on my plate long after it feels good.
- Use far more fossil fuels than an average human should if he wants to help forestall the climate crisis.
What I think is so appealing about the frog metaphor is its neutrality. It's just a stupid frog! And cold-blooded! It doesn't know any better. Most other versions of the metaphor, on the other hand, imply some vice--laziness, say, or greed--on the part of humans, who generally don't like to be told these things about themselves.
Comments
Like millions of Americans, I too hit the snooze button repeatedly. 3 times every morning in fact. Why I don't just set my alarm 27 minutes later (each "snooze" on my alarm is 9 minutes) and wake up once and for all is one of the great mysteries of the universe.
A better solution on the alarm clock: don't have one, and create (through the negative effects of conditioned responses) the connection that undoubtedly exists between when you go to bed (and fall asleep) and when you will awake - a very difficult thing to establish, particularly for youngish males (for reasons that aren't clear to anyone, as far as I can tell).
But, back to the 'acclimating incrementalism' descriptions. I don't know how to make this sexy, but inflation in prices is a very good analogy - which is why price inflation is so dangerous to an economy. People will tolerate small regular increases that over time amount to huge increases in costs of living. Who would have thought that $3.00 gal/gas would be the new normal. Now, when you have to take a large container filled with currency to get a loaf of bread, like the Weimar Republic inflation in early 30's Germany, it does get attention, but by then the water is vigorously boiling and the frog is cooked. [see, even another analogy has to be explained in frog-cooking terms!]
Today, oil per barrel is about US$80. US$20 a barrel is not that far back in history. Some are saying that US$150 is coming to a neighborhood near you real soon now. The devil here is monetary devaluation done incremental style (that looks and feels like price inflation), plus a dash of higher demand/lower supply - the salt you put in the pasta/frog water.
Here are a few more:
Laxative abuse
Listening to Motown music
Living in Bakersfield
Living in Washington DC
Living in Baghdad
Deciding to do the dishes "tomorrow". Again.
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