Foxes & Hedgehogs

"The fox knows many things, but the hedgehog knows one big thing"

Archilochus (7th-century b.c.e.)

I was sitting in my living room one afternoon about a month ago when my housemate commented in his own witty yet mockingly (Italian) manner said to me 'mat, you should blog about this!'. I took a glance and smiled at the gesture and thought nothing of it, as it was something not unusual after all our friendships, like any good friendships are a blend of truth and mockery. I had not given his gesture a second thought until this evening. The thought of... hedgehogs, yes hedgehogs... once again came my mind and true to the suggestion made by my housemate over a month ago. So here I am calling his very bluff with a blog loosely based the subject in question. It is indeed about hedgehogs, and once again a metaphor as an interesting idea human behaviour. I wont say explanation, I don't believe you can really ever fully explain behaviour. I don't pretend to pursue such things. Rather its a nice journey of though provocation to make you consider you and possible people around you in a different way

I have been reading about a concept/theory entitled 'A Hedgehog Theory of Behaviour', not to be confused with the original suggested subject of the 'Hedgehogs Dilemma', a concept which I found to be highly interesting and thought provoking. Clearly my housemates know me well in many respects. The theories analogy supposedly stems from the Greek poet Archilochus who's fragment prose suggest that:

The fox knows many things, but the hedgehog knows one big thing.

Archilochus (7th-century b.c.e.)

We as people are characterized by one or the other. Take for example a fox. A fox moves and flutters about its work, scurrying around, hunting and gathering diligently. We all know these types of people, they are usually intelligent, highly strung, work religiously, trait anxiety, always highly wound, worrying about the next thing and the next thing and the next thing. These types of people make things happen and because of all these they often go far in life because they work repetitively hard over and over again.

On the other hand Hedgehogs are essentially one trick ponies. They have one move, the curl, but it is highly effective. They have a more more simplified existence in relative comparison to the fox.

These two personifications are also characterised by different ways of thinking. The fox pertains a sense of reality and existence which it accepts and engulfs into its thinking processes. The world to a fox is a series of complexities built up from a number of schema all interwoven, interconnected. It is the pursuit of the fox to identify all the intricacies ribboned into the fabric of life. These type of thinkers are bar raisers, they knowledge on, inch by inch, step by step and graft information out of every nook and cranny of the methods at their disposal. The hedgehog on the other hand thinks far more simply and as such is able to develop a simplistic version of the world which not only that satisfiable but its simplicity is one of significant grandeur eloquence and beauty. They are the big thinkers of this world, those who's tricks change the world and redefine the bar. The obvious include Einstein, Newton, Crick and Watson and so on. There is a nice truth in these metaphoric distinctions. I know many-a-people who would be classified neatly. I for one certainly classify myself as the former, I am a scatty, spontaneous thinker (if you haven't already figured).

The interest and significance of this distinction manifests itself in a whole host of ways. Consider this, the development of the world wide web and our online generation to date. I've heard it been described as the 'LOL generation'. The web has developed and evolved our way of thinking and processing information. Whereas once information was channeled through clearly defined means such a a newspaper broadsheet, a radio station or later the television. Now the web opens an array of means through a myriad of schema and possible sources. Anyone, anywhere can add their own bit of knowledge or data to the great server of life. This blog being a stellar illustration of such. Such shifts in communication has arguably led from an otherwise 'hedgehog' society to a 'fox like' endeavour. We scurry and skim through a vast array of information taking in a montage and snippets of information. We have shortened attention spans, lower levels of concentration on a single source. In fact I recall a very interesting documentary I watched on I-Player if any of you wonder why you are compelled to 3 hours of facebook per day. This documentary will give you some idea as to why. Its entitled 'the virtual revolution'. The interesting point threaded throughout this idea is whether or not such a change in type of thinking is a good thing. In a world were we no longer write with a pen but rather with a click of the mouse many argue that what you cause is poor hand writing, illiteracy, reliance on the all so easy 'spell checker' and consequently poor spelling and grammar usage. Whilst I agree to some extent to some these claims, one most consider the flip side of the coin. What we now have is a generation of individuals able to produce a level of professionalism through office software that is unprecedented. You have a computer 'literate' generation who can makes things happen not over hours but in an instant. Biro's have been replaced with cursors, white boards are replaced with facebook wall posts. We have a generation who can communicate globally, instantaneously. The change to a fox like manner, although seemingly a fear for most actually constitutes a mere evolution of thinking. To come back to the preference/complexity diagram, you have a generation who is attempting to minimize the level of complexity by naturally filtering irrelevant information in an attempt to simply the vast amount of information available. Arguably this process is necessary to produce something close to this idea of 'optimal complexity'. In other words this apparent 'disinterest' in information rather paradoxically produces are optimal level of preference to a given field or subject matter. Whether or not you think this Marxist macro-theory of subversive revolution is true, I leave entirely open to debate. I think you cannot ignore the trends and data that is blindly obvious, and I accept that indeed the world is changing. At current I see these changes as entirely neutral in consequence. They are neither good or bad, rather..just different. Any judgements on their morality I feel would be entirely speculative. On the one hand to say that they are a bad thing is entirely cynical and to say they are positive represents conformity to a naive standpoint.

Moreover consider the implications in a more specific learning situation. Take studying a topic area for your next series of exams coming up in June. The lecturer you are first presented with are the basic skeleton of ideas being thrown at you by your lecture. You passively sit and take in knowledge as only the hedgehog knows best in its most simplistic form. The feeling of the unknown and incomprehension means your preference for a particular given situation is limited. We all get bored in lectures, even if you walk out of it thinking 'that was a really good lecture'. Perhaps the reason that is true is that, as you leave the lecture hall, you express a preference and complexity level closer to the optimum. Once you have that knowledge initially passed on, you then go through (or not, which is the case for me) the readings of that lecture and the topic area. You again develop understanding of the area, you build on the knowledge you first were lecturer on. The information you learn is more sophisticated and detailed than your last encounter. After such you ignore and forget about that particular subject area and move on to the next, via the bar for a few beverages of course. You then start to repetitively drive the knowledge home through revision, of which you preference starts to decline, you know feel you are in over kill and going down the some journey again and again. You are sick of the material presented in front of you, but you have now choice for the exam. Your preference declines and as you read and develop your knowledge around the idea you again increase the complexity. It is then the cold realisation hits you that your once hedgehog like approach has been magically transformed to a fox like 'flurry of information'. This point is illustrated below:


(http://www.psywww.com/intropsych/ch09_motivation/complexity_and_preference_a_hedgehog_theory.html)

This hedgehog-fox analogy fits for an extensive array of examples. I have only scratched the surface of plausible applications with illustrations from both studying a module to the change in Internet usage. The list is my no means infinite, and I am sure you can think of an array of other possible avenues for exploration with a plethora of ways. I think its a highly thought provoking concept, which is relatively straight forward to understand.

I ask you again, after all this, which animal are you? A hedgehog or a fox? What are the implications being on or the other in how you think and act?

Just a thought...

x9