On my morning bus into town， teenagers and grown-ups alike sit there staring into their little infinity machine： a pocket-sized window into more words than any of us could ever read， more music than we could ever listen to， more pictures of people getting naked than we could ever get off to. Until a few years ago， it was unthinkable， this 1）cornucopia of information. Those of us who were already more or less adults when it arrived wonder how different it must be to be young now. “How can any kid be bored when they have Google？” I remember hearing someone ask.

The question came back to me recently when I read about a 23-year-old British woman sent to prison for sending rape threats to a feminist campaigner over Twitter. Her explanation for her actions was that she was “off her face” and“bored”. It was an ugly case， but not an isolated one. 2）Internet trolling has started to receive scholarly attention—in such places as the Journal of Politeness Research and its counterpart， the Journal of Language Aggression and Conflict—and “boredom” is a frequently cited motive for such behaviour.

It is not only among the 3）antisocial creatures who 4）lurk under the bridges of the Internet that boredom persists. We might no longer have the excuse of a lack of stimulation， but the vocabulary of 5）tedium is not passing into history： the experience remains familiar to most of us. This leads to a question that goes deep into Internet culture and the assumptions with which our infinity machines are packaged： exactly what is it that we are looking for？

“Information wants to be free” declared 6）Stewart Brand， 30 years ago now. Cut loose from its original context， this phrase became one of the defining 7）slogans of Internet politics. With idealism and 8）dedication， the partisans of the network seek to liberate information from governments and corporations， who of course have their own ideas about the opportunities its collection and control might afford.

But before there was a web for search engines to index， Brand had co-founded the WELL （the“Whole Earth Lectronic Link”）， a bulletin board launched from the Whole Earth offices in 1985. Its members pushed through the limitations of the available technology to discover something resembling a 9）virtual community. At the core of this group were veterans of 10）the Farm， one of the few hippie communes to outlast the early years of idealism and chaos.

Journalist John Markoff， himself an early contributor to the WELL， gave a broader history of how the counterculture shaped personal computing in his book What the Dormouse Said （2005）. The Internet needed a story that would make sense to those who would never be interested in the 11）TCP/IP， and the counterculture survivors gave it one： turn on， tune in， drop out. In this new version of the fable， information took the place of 12）LSD， the magic substance whose consumption could transform the world.

The trouble is that information doesn’t nourish us. Worse， in the end， it turns out to be boring. Though， however boring， knowledge can give rise to meaning. And if there is an antidote to boredom， it is not information but meaning.

Information is perhaps the rawest material in the process out of which we arrive at meaning. But the journey from information to meaning involves more than simply 13）filtering the signal from the noise. And boredom is not an 14）inherent quality of the human condition， but rather it has a history， which began around the 18th century and embraced the whole Western world， and which presents an evolution from the 18th to the 21st century.

When the Internet arrived， it seemed to promise a liberation from the boredom of industrial society， a 15）psychedelic jet-spray of information into every otherwise tedious corner of our lives. In fact， at its best， it is something else： a remarkable helper in the search for meaningful connections. But if the deep roots of boredom are in a lack of meaning， rather than a shortage of stimuli， and if there is a subtle， multilayered process by which information can give rise to meaning， then the constant flow of information to which we are becoming habituated cannot deliver on such a promise. At best， it allows us to distract ourselves with the potentially endless 16）deferral of clicking from one link to another. Yet sooner or later we wash up downstream in some far corner of the web， wondering where the time went. The experience of being carried on these currents is quite different to the patient， unpredictable process that leads towards meaning.

The latter requires， among other things， space for reflection—allowing what we have already absorbed to settle， waiting to see what patterns emerge. Find the corners of our lives in which we can unplug， the days on which it is possible to refuse the urgency of the inbox， the activities that will not be rushed. Switch off the infinity machine， not forever， nor because there is anything bad about it， but out of recognition of our own 17）finitude： there is only so much information any of us can bear， and we cannot go fishing in the stream if we are drowning in it. As any survivor of the 1960s counterculture could tell us， it is best to treat magic substances with respect—and to be careful about the 18）dosage.

每天上午乘坐公共汽車進城，我都會看到，坐在車上的大人小孩都盯著手中那無遠弗屆的小設備：一個口袋大小的窗口，潛藏著多不勝讀的信息，多不勝聽的音樂，還有目不暇接的裸露照片。直到幾年前，能獲得這么龐大的信息量簡直不可思議。我們這些在信息時代到來時已然長大的人會想，有了這些科技，孩子們的生活肯定是大不相同了?！坝辛斯雀?，哪有小孩還會無聊？”我記得聽誰這么問過。

這個問題在我最近讀到某個報道時又引起一番反思。一名23歲的英國女子因通過推特微博向一位女權主義活動家發(fā)送強奸威脅而被捕入獄。她對自己此種行為的解釋是自己“喝醉了”，覺得“窮極無聊”。這是個惡劣的案子，但卻并不鮮見。網(wǎng)絡黑子這種現(xiàn)象已經(jīng)開始受到學者們的注意——在諸如《禮貌研究期刊》和與之相似的《語言攻擊與沖突期刊》中，“無聊”是一個頻繁被引用來解釋此類行為的動機。

其實不僅僅是潛伏在互聯(lián)網(wǎng)橋底下伺機出擊的反社會群體悶喊無聊。我們或許不能再以缺乏刺激為借口，但是單調乏味這個詞卻并未遁入歷史：我們大多數(shù)人還是常感生活乏悶。由此產(chǎn)生了一個疑問，其涉及網(wǎng)絡文化的深層意義，直指這些無界電子設備捆綁并存的概念思維：我們到底在尋找什么？

“資訊渴望自由”——30年前斯圖爾特·布蘭德曾這么說道。抽離其原文本背景，這句話已儼然成為網(wǎng)絡政治的典型口號之一。秉承著理想主義和奉獻精神，網(wǎng)絡上各門各派試圖把信息從政府和企業(yè)的桎梏中解放出來，當然，政府和企業(yè)對于信息收集和信息控制所能提供的機遇有著自己的見解。

而在供搜索引擎索引信息的萬維網(wǎng)出現(xiàn)前，布蘭德就跟其他人共同創(chuàng)建了“WELL”（“全球電子鏈接”簡稱）——一個由全球電子鏈接辦事處于1985年發(fā)布的電子論壇。其成員打破可用技術的局限性，發(fā)掘出類似虛擬社區(qū)的空間。這個組群的核心成員是美國嬉皮士聚落“The Farm”的元老人物，那是經(jīng)歷過早期的理想主義和騷動亂象后剩下的嬉皮士團體之一。

新聞記者約翰·馬爾可夫是“WELL”早期的貢獻者，他在2005年出版的《睡鼠說了什么》一書中廣泛闡釋了逆主流文化是如何塑造個人電腦發(fā)展的歷史背景?；ヂ?lián)網(wǎng)需要借用一個故事以此向那些對什么是“傳輸控制協(xié)議/網(wǎng)際協(xié)議”毫無興趣的人展現(xiàn)自身，而逆主流文化的幸存者為此提供了素材：開啟、收看、退出。在這個新版的寓言中，信息取代了LSD致幻劑，對這種神奇物質的消費足以改變世界。

不幸的是，信息并沒有滋養(yǎng)我們。更糟的是，其最終顯現(xiàn)自身無趣的一面。但是，無論怎么無趣，知識能產(chǎn)生意義。所以，如果“悶乏無聊”有藥可解，那就非意義莫屬，而不是信息本身。

在我們獲取意義的過程中，信息或許是最原始的材料。但是從信息到意義的過程中包含的不僅僅是簡單地將噪音從信號中過濾掉。而悶乏無聊也并不是人類固有的生活狀態(tài)，而是有著久遠的歷史，約始于18世紀，然后貫穿整個西方世界，從18世紀到21世紀以來，一直不斷地在演變。

互聯(lián)網(wǎng)誕生時似乎就許諾了解放無聊的工業(yè)社會，信息如七彩迷幻噴漆噴射到我們生活的每個單調乏味角落。事實上，信息的最佳狀態(tài)是另一種存在：在尋覓意義關聯(lián)時的一個非凡助手。但是如果無趣的深層根源在于缺乏意義，而不是缺少刺激，如果信息產(chǎn)生意義是一個微妙的、多層次的過程，那么我們現(xiàn)在所習慣的信息持續(xù)流動則無法兌現(xiàn)這樣的承諾。其充其量也就是用可能是無窮無盡的遞延點擊來分散我們的注意力。然而，我們遲早會被沖到互聯(lián)網(wǎng)下游的偏遠角落，疑惑時間都到哪兒去了。被這些網(wǎng)絡水流所承載的體驗與走向獲取意義那種需要耐心而不可預測的過程相比，兩者大相徑庭。

后者在其他方面之外還要求具備反思的空間——讓我們所吸收的東西有足夠的空間沉淀，看看最后會涌現(xiàn)什么模式。尋找那些生活中我們不需要插電的角落吧，還有那些我們可以對收件箱中緊急事態(tài)視若無睹的日子，那些我們可以不緊不慢進行的活動。關閉那無界終端，并不是永遠關機，也不是因為這有什么壞處，而是出于知道我們自身的有限性：我們所能承受的信息只有這么多，如果我們“溺水”了，我們便不能在河流中“垂釣”。任何一個20世紀60年代逆主流文化的幸存者都可以告訴我們，對神奇物質要心存敬畏——還要仔細掂量好劑量。