The Phrenological Slope of the Post

Do some blog-brains have a pronounced proclivity propelling profuse postings, and can the inclination be felt in the shape of their skulls? A blogger has fallen from grace with the blogging sea. I’ve been meaning to post on the phenom, and even though it’s old news in today’s Blogger Ocean, where tides rise and fall every few minutes instead of twice a day, here goes.

Phrenology was taken for a serious science in the late 1800s, and occupied thinkers from all occupations. I first learned about phrenology back at CSUDH, reading “Moby Dick” in an American Lit. class taught by Abe Ravitz. The idea behind phrenology was that a person’s predilections, proclivities, and personality could be read by feeling the shapes of the person’s head, its bumps and curves and slopes. The person doing the feeling was the phrenologist. There may be some basis for comparing the phrenology of the 19th Century to the neuroscience of the 21st.

Can a blogger post too much? Frequent blogging appears to be an acceptable practice as long as the blogger does not repeat posts, but there are rules within rules, so it is okay to repeat a post as long as the previous post is properly cited, even if the post is one’s own. A post of one’s own should not (recent criticism makes clear) with a change of venue be presented as a new post. So, what bump within the neuroscience journalist Jonah Lehrer’s head provoked the young but already venerable writer and speaker from doing just that? What pressures build in the brain from the habit of frequent posting?

I’ve been reading Jonah’s blog, The Frontal Cortex, for some time. The first time I mentioned it in the Toads, I hasten to cite, was on November 21, 2009, in a post titled “This Is Your Brain on Books.” Your brain on posts, apparently, looks and feels differently. I still like Jonah’s work, and find much of the recent criticism following his reposting old posts and ideas previously sounded elsewhere to his blog following a change of venue to The New Yorker somewhat opportunistic (taking advantage of the breaking news to call out Jonah on issues having nothing to do with the current topic), exaggerated (sounding like the Queen in “Alice”), and off point.

The electronic world never sleeps. Surely, the brain feels this, and posting can be addictive, and so can the attention a writer might crave. Over at Twitter, we find writers whose followers number in the thousands. One simply can’t “follow back” that many tweeters, certainly not at the frequency many tweeters are known for. This is seen in blogs also. Does the blogger really want to write the blog everyone follows? In blogs begin responsibilities (follow link, and see Delmore Schwartz).

The best critical review of the Jonah Lehrer self-plagiarism issue I found at Slate, in an article by Josh Levin titled “Why Did Jonah Lehrer Plagiarize Himself? Because he stopped being a writer and became an idea man.” Levin says, in the last paragraph of his article: “A blog is merciless, requiring constant bursts of insight.” This is true of the daily blog, the hourly post, or every minute the blogger is awake blog. But Levin is even more brutally honest: “Most of us journalists have one great idea every few months….” But there are so many different kinds of blogs, dedicated to so many pursuits. But maybe all blogs break down to two basic kinds, the serious (series, < Latin, promotions; ex ordine, no break) and the not so serious (enough posting for today; want to do some yard work). And where will the Toads go, adrift on the Blogger Ocean?

Follow-up, Jul 31, 2012: My sister Barb just sent me this from a Guardian blog: “Journalist resigns for fabricating Bob Dylan quotes.” The journalist? Jonah Lehrer.