“1/3 of Smartphone Users Check Facebook and Twitter Before Getting Out Of Bed” – source
I believe Tim Challies may have diagnosed the chief idol of our age (or at least one of my chief idols):
We have begun to believe that the accumulation of information somehow leads to wisdom, that more information will solve society’s ills and improve our lives. We place our faith in information.
We find joy and life in that information — not in using that information or turning that information into useful action, but simply in its constant flow.
Quentin Schultze, professor of communication arts and sciences at Calvin College, observes the godlike importance we attach to information and coins the word informationism to describe it. According to Schultze, informationism is
“a non-discerning vacuous faith in the collecting and dissemination of information as a route to social progress and personal happiness.”
What we are finding is that more information does not necessarily lead to more wisdom. In fact, the very opposite may be true.
More information may lead to less wisdom.
– from Chapter 7 of Tim Challies’ book The Next Story.
A few steps (from Challies) toward breaking free from information worship:
Measure and Reduce Input —
- “Try to quantify the information that comes your way; seek to understand how much of it serves a tangible purpose and how much of it is really just noise.”
- Unfollow some people.
- Trim down your RSS feed.
- Look beyond the surface to really ascertain what heart idols compel us to compulsively check Twitter, Facebook, Blogs.
Get Wisdom —
- “Without the distraction of dealing with vast amounts of information and without overtaxing our brains with hundreds of sources of information, we will have the time to know more about less.”
- “Though it cost all you have, get wisdom.” Proverbs 4:7
Success in life “is not in the accumulation of facts, but in living a life marked by wisdom, by the application of knowledge.” – Challies
What steps are you taking to deal with informationism?
photo courtesy of heathbrandon