It was really cold in Montreal for most of January and February. On some the especially cold days - minus 20 celsius, not accounting for wind chill - I noticed that some businesses that have automatic door-opening push-button devices elected to turn them off. This was, I learned from one security guard, in the interest of saving money on the heating bills. Signs went up around town saying "Only use if necessary" or "Use Door Handle."
Despite these requests, I noticed that a lot of people continued to push the buttons. Of course, some people need the push-button opening, but let's be frank, most of us don't. Now, I can account for some of these disobedient folks' actions on the assumption that they just don't read signs - they have mastered the art of selectively editing out much of the visual media around them. However, lots of people just don't want to open a door themselves, or at least, 'effortfully' open it themselves.
I have a number of 'problems' with this behaviour. However, what I will offer in my polemic / quickly expiring minute today is a series of questions: Why not open the door yourself? Why not build a tiny bit of strength, burn some calories, and save some collective/public power? Use your power within - to use a most irritating, misused and abused, new age phrase.
So, why not stop using elevators and escalators when stairs are available? Use your own power and 'save' the out-sourced power.
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4 comments:
Hi Danielle!
Somehow I stumbled upon your blog. It’s incredible what paths we find procrastinating on a Friday afternoon.
I think an interesting question at the root of the ones you ask about people’s behaviour is why these “comfort technologies” are available anyway? Obviously, as you indicated, some people require automatic door openers and elevators, but the majority of us don’t. However, we are a very opportunistic species and always seem follow the path of least resistance. I don’t know if this behaviour is just lazy or actually rational.
The design process for years has revolved around making people comfortable. In reality, of course, it should be a balance of many factors and only technologies with a significant net benefit should be pursued. I have a particular beef with escalators. Generally speaking, anyone able bodied enough to ride an escalator can climb a single flight of stairs. The benefits of an escalator include what? Comfort? Ease? Absolution of a tiny bit of work? However, there are a plurality of downsides to escalators: they take a lot of space; disrupt traffic flow; are unsightly; prevent office people from getting a bit of exercise and of course they are particularly wasteful of energy as they run non-stop (they keep trucking all weekend and all night at my building, I suspect).
Perhaps what we need as much as an attitude shift is more serious consideration to why and how these comfort technologies are deployed in the first place. Some people may just need to have their choice made for them.
Escalators seem to fit right in there with moving sidewalks, though the latter hasn't been integrated into urban existence anywhere near the degree to which escalators have (I am aware that they can be found in some airports). Both are technologies of the modern age, and part of a general drive toward automation in pursuit of the ideal of efficiency. Of course, as Mark points out, neither are really all that efficient at all. Both indeed gesture toward a general obsession with comfort and convenience, and it is unsurprising that these ideals should arise with such force in North America, land of plenitude. Where 'resources' are seemingly unlimited, and spaces vast, technologies that offer quicker, easier movement are readily received. Such is the case here; there are important differences between North American and Europe both geographically and politically that influence technological development. I'm not sure whether ecological crisis is a necessary condition to the formulation of the question: Do we have a right to be this confortable and convenienced. I tend to think that philosophers have been asking this very question for a long, long time.
Hi Mark,
I'm glad you found the blog and thanks for your comments. I was thinking along similar lines, but I can't include all my thoughts in my one-minute polemics (hence, my reference to them as polemics - they aren't always well backed up or argued). The nature of the beast is that many things get left unsaid.
About escalators - this is actually what tipped the proverbial scale for me. I get so frustrated when I see them just running endlessly when no one is on them! Can't someone (at least) invent an escalator that stops when no one is on it? All you need is a sensor (I think, I mean I'm no engineer).
It's funny that you brought up the path of least resistance, because I agree with you on this but would add that this path is one-way and leads to another path of incredible resistance. But, then again, we are also a short-sighted species!
This discussion relates to my post regarding the irrationality of capitalism. To keep the 'system' going it must increasingly extract resources from a finite source, this is ultimately an unsustainable economic model - but under the 'logic' of capitalism, such a suggestion is not only inadmissible but is also seen as naive since we cannot stop or change what capitalism 'is,' its nature. To add fuel to the fire we have faith that a technological fix is just around the corner. Or that some day we'll just move to the moon.
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