Welcome to Attention Space, my place for thinking slow.
This website is inspired in part by the example of Michel de Montaigne, a French Renaissance man. From 1570 he spent much of his time in his library, where studied, thought deeply and wrote about whatever stirred his lively curiosity. He called his writing “essais”. He wrote them in a spirit of exploration and enquiry. The “essais” are a record of Montaigne paying attention to the world outside, and to his own thought processes and experience.
This website is a place for what has attracted my attention, what I have noticed, and some of what I have produced.
Short Form
We are all enrolled in the university of life, with the best possible teacher: experience.
Medium Form
Subtitles train us to tolerate slight difficulty. Not hardship, just friction. A tiny delay between sound and meaning. A need to stay present. In that sense, subtitles are almost a micro-practice in attentional discipline.
AI works best as a supplement, not a substitute. Good for brainstorming, organising thoughts, exploring options, but the real transformation happens in relationship with another human who can challenge, witness, and attune to you.
If you’re a native English speaker, you already knew how to pronounce these words, but could you have explained the rules? I certainly couldn’t have explained them until a day ago because I didn’t know them.
Faith, language, and science. Each has its own incantations — words that carry the weight of mystery, pointing beyond themselves to something immense. “Viking, North Utsire…” or “Isua Greenstone Belt” — they open a window to worlds far from sight but close to wonder.
Long Form
It has been widely asserted that the impulse to make meaning is one of the most characteristic attributes of human beings.