I'm not near the internet right now, so I can't use the google to look it up, but I've heard that the word "Apology" comes from Greek, and means "to make a defense" or something similar. There's an entire field of Christianity dedicated to defending the faith, it's called Apologetics. Frankly, more Christians ought to be skilled apologetics, we tend to get trounced in debates, or we just avoid them entirely.
But one can make a defense of a lot of things, and the skill of logically and rationally defending one's activities should be exercised. So, purely as an exercise, I'm going to make a defense for my primary means of relaxing, that is to say sitting on my couch next to my dog and playing video games. Here goes:
In the world of things one can do to relax, it seems to me that they fall into two general, if broad, categories: Passive and Active. One can sit (passively) by a stream and listen (passively) to the water, or one can fish (active) for whatever kind of fish are in it. One can sit (passively) on a couch, watching (passively) television, or one can play (actively) a video game of some sort.
In the world of things one can do to relax, it seems to me that they fall into two general, if broad, categories: Passive and Active. One can sit (passively) by a stream and listen (passively) to the water, or one can fish (active) for whatever kind of fish are in it. One can sit (passively) on a couch, watching (passively) television, or one can play (actively) a video game of some sort.
This is not to say that video games are "active" in the sense that going running is "active", one could hardly say that video games lead to good heart health and low cholesterol, but they do require active thought and input from a person. This is in contrast to simply watching television, which does not require thought or input. True, one can watch television shows that provoke thought, but that is not a requirement of television.
Inside the realm of video games, there are of course many genres of video games. Some are devoted to guiding the player through a story, some center around puzzles, others center around gunfights, wars, car races, etc, etc, etc. It's a multi-billion dollar industry, so if you've ever done something, there's probably a video game that centers around it. Farmville is testament to the fact that even hard and boring work can be jazzed up enough to be a popular game.
However, video games can be grouped into two main categories, although I admit these are somewhat arbitrary: Games that primarily require fast reflexes, such as racing or shooting games, and games that primarily require problem-solving and strategic skills, such as strategy and puzzle games. That's not to say that the two cannot overlap, but that the mechanics of the games favor one skill over the other.
Now, any repetitive activity that requires a skill will train that skill, that's basic neurology. If you play poker regularly, you'll get better at it. Same with fishing, throwing a ball, or anything else. If you spend hours every day solving a Rubik's Cube, you'll develop strategies to do so faster, with more efficiency and fewer mistakes. If you spend hours every day shooting endless waves of digital zombies with digital machine guns, you will develop a much better
Take a game like Total Annihilation. A player needs to manage his resources to build up both an army and an economy to fund the construction of that army. He also needs to evaluate his enemy or enemies, then build specific units to counter his enemy's units to prevent his own destruction. He then needs to develop a strategy for defeating his enemy, and manage the several hundred units that will be involved in the various skirmishes. All in real-time, while the enemy is constantly doing the same thing.
The OODA loop, a basic part of modern strategic thought, works like this: A person Observes a situation, Orients himself to that situation, Decides on a response to that situation, then Acts to implement his response. At that point the person Observes how the situation has changed, and the loop repeats itself.
That thought process, and the ability to run through it quickly, is a key skill to a modern gamer. Even if gaming doesn't do anything at all for a gamer's body, a gamer's mind has been trained to work quickly and accurately. Contrast that to the mind of someone who watches television instead, someone who does nothing more than passively sit there while the box does all the work, and one can quickly see why gaming is in fact a positive alternative to watching television.
And people wonder why I dislike television.
And people wonder why I dislike television.
