My first post (other than the introduction): A discussion on the obsession with seemingly relevant, yet probably meaningless numbers (like "first").
This idea can be applied on other cultural phenomena, especially anything annual, like birthdays and anniversaries, but these examples are redundant. Other non-annual applications of this idea include a romanticized view on the nth event, where n is supposedly a significant integer. Sports articles featuring a player's 500th point/goal/match, political events such as a certain country's 60th independence day, and so on, are just a couple of good examples of this unfounded fascination.
The same line of reasoning can also be applied to Korean dating culture, where couples count the days they were together in a relationship and celebrate every 100 days or so. What makes the 100th day worth celebrating, but the 85th day not? Bizarre as it is, I will say no more on this issue, as I may be jeopardizing my potential relationships and hurting old ones.
Mystified numbers are ubiquitous in our culture. What caused this prevalence? Religion is one cause. A quick search will show that many religious texts and beliefs regard certain natural numbers as significant. Another important cause is the satisfaction achieved through familiarity.
Satisfaction from familiarity means that we are used to the system, whatever the system is. People celebrate New Years on January 1st because they were born into the Gregorian calendar. Even though January 1st may be an arbitrary starting point for a year, people view the day as the starting point of a year. Knowing that there is no natural starting point in a year does not prevent one from making new year resolutions on a specified time of the year.
People are also more familiar with certain sequences of numbers than others, which they call random. 00:00:00 looks fresher than, say, 09:13:55. I suspect that people stay up to watch the clock turn to 01/01 00:00:00 before going to bed partly because the numbers look cool. The familiar string of zeroes may seem to imply that a new chapter has begun.
I tried to ignore this familiarity. Instead of deeming a certain moment as more significant than others because of its "better number" that comes attached with it, I tried to treat moments in a special manner only when they truly are special. In this way I deromanticized numbers. I am not claiming that not doing anything special on New Years or paying no special attention to numerical events makes the world a better place. But I still think that celebrating New Years is silly.
Should We Stop Celebrating New Years?
Over the last few years, I tried not to take notice of New Years. I thought it was silly of us to celebrate the fact that a 4 digit integer reached its successor. I am not saying that rather than celebrating, we should instead despair the fact that we are a year closer to our deaths (though this is true). Nor am I trying to stop anyone else from celebrating. I am simply perplexed about the fact that we celebrate an event that is, upon reflection, quite ordinary. Celebration of a new year every year suggests that there is not that much to celebrate in life and too much need for celebration.This idea can be applied on other cultural phenomena, especially anything annual, like birthdays and anniversaries, but these examples are redundant. Other non-annual applications of this idea include a romanticized view on the nth event, where n is supposedly a significant integer. Sports articles featuring a player's 500th point/goal/match, political events such as a certain country's 60th independence day, and so on, are just a couple of good examples of this unfounded fascination.
The same line of reasoning can also be applied to Korean dating culture, where couples count the days they were together in a relationship and celebrate every 100 days or so. What makes the 100th day worth celebrating, but the 85th day not? Bizarre as it is, I will say no more on this issue, as I may be jeopardizing my potential relationships and hurting old ones.
Satisfaction from familiarity means that we are used to the system, whatever the system is. People celebrate New Years on January 1st because they were born into the Gregorian calendar. Even though January 1st may be an arbitrary starting point for a year, people view the day as the starting point of a year. Knowing that there is no natural starting point in a year does not prevent one from making new year resolutions on a specified time of the year.
People are also more familiar with certain sequences of numbers than others, which they call random. 00:00:00 looks fresher than, say, 09:13:55. I suspect that people stay up to watch the clock turn to 01/01 00:00:00 before going to bed partly because the numbers look cool. The familiar string of zeroes may seem to imply that a new chapter has begun.
I tried to ignore this familiarity. Instead of deeming a certain moment as more significant than others because of its "better number" that comes attached with it, I tried to treat moments in a special manner only when they truly are special. In this way I deromanticized numbers. I am not claiming that not doing anything special on New Years or paying no special attention to numerical events makes the world a better place. But I still think that celebrating New Years is silly.
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ReplyDeleteHaha, you'd be shocked if I told you how many times I've had this topic as a conversation with other people. I agree with everything you've written. I found myself just nodding as I read and a feeling of satisfaction to see that someone else had the same line of thinking as me. I'm sure if we gave it more thoughts, we'd come up with an astounding number of reasons as to why we celebrate these so called numeric milestones. I think a big part of it has to do with our inner human nature wanting to feel satisfied. The feeling of having accomplished something. The feeling of having reached this milestone. The feeling of successfully finishing a flight of stairs. The satisfaction that comes with reaching that 25 reps on the bench press. And I think that feeling comes better when we place it on a numeric value that isn't cheap but extravagantly drastic at the same time. A year isn't short but not too long. 100 days is actually quite long (because if it wasn't I'd be done with military after 6 of those only). Gaining a digit on your birthday takes time. You said you try to treat "moments in a special manner only when they truly are special." A year, 100 days, etc. is special because it's not short but not too long at the same time. Just the right challenge? As to why we choose these whole integers, I think your explanation suffices. I'm sure culture and tradition is probably what explains it the best but there is something inside us that makes us want the "better fit". Babies have shown to pick up objects that are organized and neatly arranged and stuff... Maybe a year, every 100 days, etc. has something to do with that. Or it could be something mathematical and geometry and how our brain works.
ReplyDeleteAs kind of a side note, one of the few quirky things I still do since high school in response to this (I'm not even kidding), is call time like this: 11:34:59. Like whenever I called for a meeting with the RAs, I always said something along the lines of, "Let's meet at 8:58 42 seconds." I still message my close friends, "I'll arrive at the cafe in 7 minutes 27 seconds," or "I'll see you in 3 minutes 22 seconds." I used to add miliseconds but I stopped doing that in college because now that's just dumb.
P.S. Why does it say "Unknown" -_-;
Thanks Hajong. Quirky people like you make me feel "normaler". I think that's a good thing.
DeleteI'm glad I wasn't the only person who noticed and was bothered by the fact that people like these numeric milestones. I'm also glad that you mentioned the babies' tendencies, because as I grow older I'm beginning to think that people stay the same. We don't really mature; we just (hopefully) act more mature. So the baby who holds out her hands and smiles after successfully counting all her fingers will grow up to think that 10 is a more meaningful number than 11. Maybe that's why the world agreed to use a decimal system, when base 8 or 12 may have been better.
success. now to get a picture uploaded.. bah. -_-;
ReplyDelete