Flight Vs. Invisibility

This post is almost completely lifted from an NPR broadcast of "This American Life".

This particular broadcast had a narration by author John Hodgeman. He says that he has been fascinated by the question "Flight vs. Invisibility" and has been going around asking people which of these superpowers they would choose, if they had the choice. Whichever they chose, they would be the only one to have that power on Earth.

The author says that he was struck by the speed with which people usually made the decision - Almost as if they had been thinking about this for some time ...

In addition, none of the people seemed to want to use their superpowers to help the world - Instead, their plans bordered on the mundane; People who chose flight would stop taking the bus and those that chose invisibility would get into movies for free.

Although this question seems trivial, it really is a tool to probe into your inner consciousness and understand yourself.

The five stages in decision-making that the author observed were as follows:

• Gut Reaction - Everyone instantly chose a power of the top of their head without much thought. In most cases, the super-power chosen was invisibility
• Practical Consideration - They would then try to justify the choice that they made, talking about the things they would do - Free movies, watching women taking showers, getting on planes without paying ...
• Philosophical Reconsideration - They would then start having doubts about their choice and start thinking about the bad things associated with their choice
• Self Recrimination - They would express concern that invisibility would lead them down a dark path of perversion
• Acceptance - "I would definitely have to choose flight !"

Various interpretations ....

• Flight is the hero, invisibility is the villain
• People who choose flight have nothing to hide, others want to hide themselves
• People with guile choose invisibility, those without choose flight - And the reason for our internal conflict is that people do have guile, but want to appear guileless

One lady on the show went so far as to say that every person in their heart of hearts would choose invisibility, but would often say that they chose flight as that is the more socially acceptable choice and because they want to sound mythic and heroic ....

The author then sums up by saying "At the heart of the decision lies the question I really don't want to consider - Who do you want to be - The person you hope to be or the person you fear you really are ? Don't rush into it, think it over ...."