Coordinates of reference

The last chapter of Oliver Sacks’ The River of Consciousness, published in 2017 (posthumously), is “Scotoma: Forgetting and Neglect in Science.” Merriam-Webster’s definition of scotoma is a spot in the visual field in which vision is absent or deficient. In Sacks’ chapter, scotoma involves, first of all, prematurity, i.e., an observation, insight, or discovery ahead of its time and, thus, “could not be integrated into contemporary conceptions.” But, it also involves “a loss of knowledge, a forgetting of insights that once seemed clearly established, and sometimes a regression to less perceptive explanations.” There is a lack of language to describe what is premature. What is premature does not fit into the contemporary coordinates of reference. Scotoma is common in all fields of science. Sacks gave numerous examples, including Mendel (plant genetics), McClintock (molecular biology), and Wegener (geology). Related to scotoma is the “sudden explosion of [scientific] activity, when enormous advances are made in a very short time,” somewhat like, as Sacks noted, “punctuated equilibrium” in natural evolution. As applied to running, see examples of (sort of) “punctuated equilibria.”

Another what seems to be a change in the coordinates of reference related to guns in the U.S. is signified by the recent March for Our Lives in Washington, DC and across the country. The change is illustrated by the graphic in this tweet from Shannon Watts, founder of Moms Demand Action. The top infinite loop is like the premise of Groundhog Day or, earlier, of couple stories in The Twilight Zone. The bottom escape from the loop is effected by the change in the coordinates of reference. This change has been led and sustained by the students from Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, FL who had survived the shooting there on Valentine's Day. Students have historically been agents of fundamental changes. Likewise, the students from Parkland have changed the metanarrative of guns in the U.S. 

That day in March, I went down to DC a few hours before the start of the scheduled events. Sitting there in the Starbucks near 7th and D St., NW, watching people (many young, but also of all ages) stream by, I had a palpable sense that this time is different, the coordinates of reference have changed. There's movement. There's hope. There's energy--and it's not from the caffeine.

Near the Starbucks and looking down 7th St. towards Pennsylvania Ave., NW

On Pennsylvania Ave., National Gallery of Art in the background

Wendell Berry, in his 1971 “The Unforeseen Wilderness: An Essay on Kentucky’s Red River Gorge,” wrote, “… a man who knows that the world is not given by his fathers, but borrowed from his children.” There have been many later variants of the quote, but all reference three generations, focused on the middle one. I prefer this one, “The young does not so much inherit from the old as the old borrows from the young,” which only references two generations, focused on the younger one. And, now, the young, regarding guns and many other problems of which they will bear the brunt, is calling in the stewardship loan. Whichever variant, this quote, in itself, is a change in the coordinates of reference.

Also in March (4^th) was the death of Roger Bannister. On May 6, 1954, Bannister ran the first ever sub-4-minute mile (3:59:4). For decades, this goal had been thought to be unattainable. There is an entire literature on Bannister’s achievement and its meaning, including, not surprisingly, the mental vs. physical aspects. His recent death has led to an updating of this literature. See, e.g., New York Times’ obituary. In The Power of Impossible Thinking, Wharton School’s Yoram Wind and Colin Crook has an entire chapter on Bannister as a case study, emphasizing the importance of the “mental model” with which one views the world. "What you see is what you think."

To which, Tim Noakes or Bruce Lee might add, “What you think is what you do.” Lee, in one of his letters (in Letters of the Dragon), included the poem, "Thinking," by Walter D. Wintle, which begins with “If you think you are beaten, you are;” and ends with “But sooner or later the man who wins is the one who thinks he can!”

What's really interesting is that, once Bannister ran a sub-4, many others soon followed, a few of which with new world records—within 46 days, in the case of John Landy of Australia. (The current WR 3:43:13 was set by Morocco's Hicham El Guerrouj in 1999.) Now, it could have been just timing; i.e., had Bannister not run that day, perhaps Landy would have been the first to run a sub-4. But, Bannister did run, and he did seem to have broken the mental barrier more than the physical. Bannister himself said, “It is the brain not the heart or lungs, that is the critical organ, it’s the brain.” What had changed? Not the distance, and not the running conditions or runners (at least during that same general period). What had changed was the context, the framing, the mental image: the coordinates of reference. The supposed physiological limit became a goal that someone else had already achieved. There are other factors, of course; see, e.g., these two articles by Ross Tucker (1, 2). And, running a sub-4 is still hard!

On a more quotidian level of running, there are examples of the effects of changing coordinates of reference, both internal and external (to the runner). An internal example is the use of mantras to calm the turmoil of the mind during a race. A familiar external example is the Rashomonic encounters with exiting cars from driveways or side streets. To the runner, it's "Be careful, don't get run over by the car." To the driver, it's "Be careful, don't collide with the oncoming cars." Nowhere is the runner in the driver's coordinates of reference--scotoma!

So, does Eliud Kipchoge’s 2:00.25 record, achieved in Nike's Breaking2 Project, though unofficial, make it easier for Kipchoge or others to better Dennis Kimetto’s official WR of 2:02.57? Have the coordinates of reference related to a sub-2-hour marathon changed sufficiently?

And, for mere mortals like myself, how to change the coordinates of reference to run a 3:30 or even a sub-3?😊