Muscle Memory
May. 24th, 2025 01:18 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
enujaOne of my favorite authors, Rebecca Solnit, made a long argument in one of her books that we shouldn't use computer metaphors for human thought, that we should use biological metaphors instead of artificial metaphors. Usually, I agree with Solnit, but not in this case. I think computer metaphors are quite effective for communicating many things about human thought. Is the analogy perfect? No, it is not. No analogy is perfect, and that's fine.
We often think of computers as being very divorced from our squishy, biological selves. But we use computers in very squishy, biological ways. I use muscle memory for entering PIN numbers, for opening specific apps on my phone, lots of specific work tasks on my portable device, and of course, for touch typing. A long time ago I remember sitting in front of my computer, reading a physical book, and my hand reached up and hit the page down button on the keyboard instead of turning the page, because I'd been doing so much reading on the screen at that time. Sports are an obvious example of muscle memory, but so is skipping, and each person's idiosyncratic walking gait, tying knots, chopping vegetables, and so many other things.
It often feels like we live in an entirely different world than the one our pre-electricity ancestors lived in, but we, ourselves, are essentially unchanged.
The physical learning we used to use to collect vegetables, throw spears, tend fires, knit, weave, and do so much else is the very same physical learning we use to type and to open apps. And we continue to do so many tasks that our ancestors did.
We often think of computers as being very divorced from our squishy, biological selves. But we use computers in very squishy, biological ways. I use muscle memory for entering PIN numbers, for opening specific apps on my phone, lots of specific work tasks on my portable device, and of course, for touch typing. A long time ago I remember sitting in front of my computer, reading a physical book, and my hand reached up and hit the page down button on the keyboard instead of turning the page, because I'd been doing so much reading on the screen at that time. Sports are an obvious example of muscle memory, but so is skipping, and each person's idiosyncratic walking gait, tying knots, chopping vegetables, and so many other things.
It often feels like we live in an entirely different world than the one our pre-electricity ancestors lived in, but we, ourselves, are essentially unchanged.
The physical learning we used to use to collect vegetables, throw spears, tend fires, knit, weave, and do so much else is the very same physical learning we use to type and to open apps. And we continue to do so many tasks that our ancestors did.
