Three Monkeys
As a follow up to last nights live blog. Philter48 thought this post would be a good quick read. Plus it will help point out how and why we ad noise to our life. Once upon a time there were three monkeys.
They all lived and played together in a laboratory. The people who studied them were kind and made sure they had food to eat and water to drink and toys to play with. The toys kept the monkeys running around in their environment and imagining new ways to play and learn.
The environment itself had many open spaces where they could feel the sun on their little monkey faces and let the rain fall on their little monkey bodies. They could smell all the wonderful smells on the breeze and hear the birds sing.
And the monkeys were happy.
One day, the people who kept the laboratory introduced a new toy to the monkeys. This one looked strange and it didn’t really do much. In fact, only one of the monkeys was really interested in it at first. This monkey began to play with the toy and he liked the sounds it made and the bright lights it displayed. He realized very quickly that he didn’t have to work as hard to play with this toy, and because it was so easy to play with, he began to play with it all day long. He would stay up late at night missing out on his monkey sleep in order to play with the new toy.
After a while though, he became bored with his toy and just as he was ready to cast it aside, the people from the lab gave him a new toy to play with. The monkey quickly threw the first toy to the side of his environment where it was picked up by a second monkey who began to play with it. The first monkey was now playing with his new toy and this one was so much better than the old one. The lights were brighter and they moved faster and it made new and different sounds. And best of all, he discovered that if he made monkey sounds into the toy, his little monkey friend with his old toy could hear them. And if she made monkey sounds into the old toy her monkey friend with the new one could hear them.
This delighted both the monkeys and they made all sorts of monkey sounds back and forth into the toys and never had to actually communicate face-to-face like they did before, which they thought was so much easier.
The third monkey, who did not have a toy, was not so delighted. He was upset because now his two monkey friends didn’t make monkey sounds to him any more. All because he didn’t have a new toy. They also didn’t want to be in the sun so it could shine on their faces because the lights on their toys didn’t shine as brightly in the sunshine and they didn’t want to feel the rain on their little monkey bodies because they were afraid it would get their new toys wet.
This made the number three monkey very sad. But the other monkeys were happy…for a little while.
Soon they became bored with their new toys. They threw them away in disgust. But just as they did, the people from the lab gave all three monkeys brand new toys! These were even faster than the old ones. And they were brighter, and they played music instead of just sounds, and they flashed pictures too! All three of the little monkeys were so excited about their new toys that they chattered back and forth to each other on them all day long.
Their chatter was different now though. They comminicated in “grunts” and “eeks” and in quick little bursts of sound instead of the beautiful monkey chatter they used before. It was just easier and faster to communicate this way and soon they forgot how to make the beautiful monkey chatter they had made in the past.
Sometimes they would think about the things they were losing because of their new toys and this would make them feel a little sad. But they had become so fascinated with the toys, they never thought about what they were giving up to have them for long.
Soon, although they didn’t understand why, the little monkeys didn’t want to talk to each other much at all. All they wanted to do was press some buttons on their new toys which would send symbols to the other monkeys that communicated what they wanted to say. They thought this was so much easier than actually making monkey sounds and it was fun too. Sometimes they would all stand in a circle and instead of chattering they would just send monkey symbols back and forth to the toys which were now in their hands all the time.
The monkeys quickly became irriated with each new toy the people in the lab gave them. Sometimes the toys didn’t work right. Sometimes they took way too long to flash a light or make a sound, or show a picture. And so each time they got irritated with their toys, the people in the lab gave them new ones that were a little faster, a little flashier, and with more pictures and sounds.
Soon, it seemed like as soon as they got a new toy, they would be bored with it and want another one. The little monkeys were always looking for the next new toy and if one of them got a new toy even a split second faster than another, the other monkeys became very jealous and angry and would sometimes try and take the toy away.
The monkeys had long since stopped spending time in the sun and the rain. They didn’t care about the cool breezes, and they didn’t even notice the birds singing anymore. They just kept their little monkey faces staring at their toys, playing with them all the time, growing bored and wanting a new one.
Soon, their whole environment was filled with the discarded toys and no matter how fast the people in the lab gave the monkeys new toys, they were still angry and frustrated and wanted more.
And the monkeys were no longer happy.
A Note of Explanation: Today I was in the hallway at my place of business and I saw three people come out of another office. They walked single-file to the elevator on their way to lunch together. None of them were talking to one another but were instead furiously punching buttons on their individual Crackberries. I laughed to myself and immediately thought; “Once upon a time there were three monkeys.” The rest of this little story flowed from that.
