THE SERENDIPITY DEBATE

~ Posted by Simon Willis, January 20th 2012

Ian Leslie's piece about serendipity defines it as a “subtle blend of chance and agency” that leads to new discoveries. He argues that this enriching quality is under threat from the internet, where “we have our paths, our bookmarks and our feeds and we stick closely to them.”

The debate continues on our comment thread. Bioemeritus writes, “I discover more things that I am ‘barely aware’ of on accumulator sites like Arts & Letters Daily or the Daily Beast than I have ever discovered in my 68 years in any newspaper other than the New York Times. And it is a lot easier to do so than hauling the Times around.”

Leslie also sees a major site like Amazon as an enemy of serendipity. “Wander into a bookshop in search of something to read: the book jackets shimmer on the table, the spines flirt with you from the shelves…You may not find the book you wanted, but you will walk out with three you didn’t."

Will Wedin disagrees. “Bookstores provide a limited selection, favor book covers to reader reactions, and provide far less information on the relatedness of books than Amazon does. Why would I ever go back to that?”

Perhaps the amount of serendipity in your life depends most on where you live. Donna Erickson writes, “Certainly if you live in a dense and varied city, such as certain parts of Manhattan, it’s possible that the outside world will give you the chance to encounter a variety of unanticipated interests. But on the internet, such density of opinion, and variance of taste and interest is everywhere.”

Simon Willis is apps editor of Intelligent Life