On the gravity of doorways (a fluff piece)

As indicated by the title, this is a fluffy piece of ranting, and you should not read it if you have any remotely productive activity you could be using this time for.

I warned you.

Last night at church, I had to pass through 3 doorways to exit the building. At each doorway, I was impeded by people having a conversation while standing in the doorway. After letting me by, they continued their conversation in the doorway. I assume that they were interrupted roughly one time per person in attendance. Between the doorways, there were very wide hallways, yet none of this space was deemed suitable for the doorway conversation.

What's the deal? Elementary physics would lead us to believe that hallways would be the least likely place for people to congregate if it is only the force of gravity that draws them to the spot. The gravitational force exerted by the walls in the hallway are several orders of magnitude greater than that of the gaseous air which fills the space within the doorframe.

Obviously it is a sociological phenomenon. I'm sure that someone schooled in this field could give you a very detailed analysis filled with jargon and impressive sounding references. I'm going to just refer to the sociological forces at work by one word: selfishness. (I did toy with using "thoughtlessness," "rudeness," and "annoyingness," but I settled on "selfishness.")

Why do people talk in doorways? There are a few different cases I'd like to point out, but they all have similar root causes (in my opinion, that is).

CASE 1: One going in, the other coming out.
CASE 2: Both leaving, but to divergent destinations.
CASE 3: One staying in the room and the other leaving.
CASE 4: One staying in the room and the other just passing by.

In all of these cases, exiting the doorway would move one of the participants farther away from their final destination, and would actually constitute negative progress. Keep in mind that this is primarily a spatial and not a temporal set back. The very act of having the conversation is increasing the time that it would take to get to wherever they're going. What it's not increasing is the distance they have to travel to get there. Moving out of the doorway, however, would increase the distance one of the participants would have to travel, even if it's only by a few feet. In almost every case, this would only apply to one of the participants, since the path they take together to leave the doorway will most likely be along a trajectory that one or the other of them would have taken after the conversation, anyway.

Apparently, we can move about within a room or space without feeling like we're getting farther away from our goal. Actually exiting to a space further away from our destination, however, is too inconvenient. The doorway allows the conversation to occurr without either participant having to decide that talking to this person is actually more important than making progress toward their destination.

That's the first reason I call it "selfishness." We are willing to talk to someone as long as it doesn't mean that we are going to have to lose a meter or so of the progress we've already made.

The second reason I call it "selfishness" is that the fact that the entrance or exit of any other person not directly involved in the conversation is apparently not taken into consideration when deciding where to have this conversation.

All of this happens at a subconcious level. We find ourselves stopped in a doorway without being aware of any process of thinking that led to that decision. It doesn't seem like a big deal, but it's the kind of thing I think about when I see episodes of Star Trek and we find out that in the future there is no war on earth and everyone lives at peace with one another. "How are we gonna get there if we can't even move out of the doorway for people?" I think to myself as I chuckle at the naivete of the writers who have bought the idea that it is in our nature to be thoughtful of others.

This same sort of subconscious selfishness can be seen all over the place. At my school, it's impossible to get up or down the stairs since dozens of students are sitting on them to eat their lunches. I often remark to them that someone ought to build some stairs so that people stop walking up and down their cafeteria benches. They usually don't get it... but to be fair, they're usually not paying attention, either.

Another place you'll see this is at the store, whether it's Safeway, Costco, or Home Depot. Usually there is space for two carts to pass each other in an aisle. Occassionaly, however, there is only space for one cart because of some freestanding display or someone else's cart parked while they peruse the wares. Have you ever noticed that if the rest of the aisle is completely empty, people are drawn to park their carts right next to the other obstruction, rendering the entire aisle impassable? Does that bug you? It bugs me, too.

I do have hope for the future, however, because I've never seen anyone stand in the doorway on Star Trek.

- "The good of the many outweighs the good of the few... or the one."