Down With the Sickness

Okay, this makes no sense.

I'm listening to a podcast right now, and one of the guys on it is talking about how his voice sounds funny because he's coming out of the tail end of a cold. And I am seriously having my "I had better be careful around this guy lest I catch his cold too" reaction, just to the sound of his voice! I caught myself trying to check my proximity to him, when I realized that oh right, he is in Chicago.

Of course, this reaction is totally crazy. There is no conceivable way that this fellow could transmit his illness to me. I have never even seen him in person! What's more, I am listening to this podcast pre-recorded, not live; by now he's probably over his cold. I am separated from his disease not only by space but time.

So why on earth am I having this weird, illogical reaction? I think it's that typically, when we hear someone talking, they're there. Sound recording doesn't occur naturally, and there's a limit to how far you can transmit your voice without mechanical amplification. Most of the time, when you hear a guy talking in a slightly-congested voice about how he's been sick, he is normally within potential contagion distance, so it makes sense that you'd have this built-in aversion. The instinct must be biologically hard-wired into us or something.

But, as usual, technology weirds things up. Don't get me wrong, I'm a fan of technology--heck, my job would not exist at all without technology--but as long as human beings are changing the terms on which we interface with nature, there are going to be strange moments like this in our lives. It's been awhile since I posted anything up, so maybe I can find some time this weekend to write something else.