The Invisible Gorilla
A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, when he was attacked by robbers. They stripped him of his clothes, beat him and went away, leaving him half dead. A priest happened to be going down the same road, and when he saw the man, he passed by on the other side. So too, a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. But a Samaritan, as he traveled, came where the man was; and when he saw him, he took pity on him.
Luke 10:30-33
More than a decade ago Christopher Chabris and Daniel Simons conducted an experiment at Harvard University that became famous in psychology circles. Their book The Invisible Gorilla popularized it. And you may be one of the millions of viewers who made their Selective Attention Test one of YouTube’s most-watched videos.
The two researchers filmed students passing basketballs while moving in a circular fashion. Viewers are given specific instructions: “Count the number of passes by players wearing white shirts.”
In the middle of the short film, a person dressed in a gorilla suit walks into the frame, beats their chest, and walks out of the frame. The sequence takes nine seconds in the minute-long video.
Of course, the researchers were not interested in assessing pass-counting ability. They wanted to see if the viewers would notice something they weren’t looking for, something as obvious as a gorilla. Amazingly, half of the test group did not.
How is that even possible? How do you miss the gorilla in the room?
The short answer is inattentional blindness.
Inattentional blindness is the failure to notice something in your field of vision because you are focused on something else, in this case, people in white shirts passing basketballs.
A Biblical Case Study
In the Parable of the Good Samaritan, Jesus offers an even better case study. The priest and the Levite in His story were so focused on their agenda and their purity that they could not see the need right in front of their eyes.
Inattentional blindness can be as intentional as turning a blind eye to something you don’t want to see, as the priest did. After all, he was a busy man and had a schedule to keep.
It can also be as unintentional as prioritizing holiness over engagement. After all, for the Levite, he had to maintain his distance from anything that might make him “unclean.”
It’s interesting that Jesus used these two religious examples as those who failed to see the gorilla in the room. Though they would be considered to be among the most holy, in this case, they were the most blind.
In contrast, the Samaritan (one considered to be low on the religious totem pole) saw the gorilla in the room. It wasn’t that he couldn’t have been distracted. After all, he was obviously on a journey and had a schedule to keep. And to stop to tend to the wounded traveler would entail not only time but money, and no small amount of danger (the thieves still could have been around).
Yet he wasn’t victimized by inattentional blindness. Rather, he was sensitive to needs he came across during his day. And having seen them, he addressed them.
As you move through your day – staying on schedule and monitoring your safety – make sure you are alert to the gorilla in the room that you may encounter. That person in need. That individual in crisis. It may well be the most important thing you do all day.
As you move through your day, make sure you are alert to that person in need...that individual in crisis. It may well be the most important thing you do all day.
PRAYER
Lord, I recognize that all too often I suffer from inattentional blindness. I turn a blind eye to that which I don’t want to see excusing it because of my prioritization of my busyness or my reluctance to engage the messiness. Help me to see things clearly and to follow the example of the Good Samaritan.
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