A Response The Picture Problem, Brooke Foti

Malcolm Gladwell discusses the limits of humans attempting to interpret certain applications of photographic imagery in his article "The Picture Problem." In his tagline, he quips, “Mammography, air power, and the limits of looking,” and while Gladwell certainly writes about mammography and air power, what he is really showing us is that even the most seemingly reliable technology is constantly in question, and rightfully so. But to me, it seems that the most questioning is being done by those who have the least vested interest. So, who is doing the questioning, and what is it that drives them to do so?

There are a few quotes in this article that are particularly pertinent to the problem of interpreting photography. Charles Rosen and Henri Zerner said, “that photography not only does not, but cannot lie, is a matter of belief, an article of faith. We tend to trust the camera more than our own eyes.” Gladwell himself writes that, “there are few cultural reflexes more deeply ingrained than the idea that a picture has the weight of truth.” This problem of trying to decode a photograph is not a new problem, but one that has existed since the invention of photography. If the photograph existed, then whatever was depicted in it was the absolute truth; this seemed the reality for years. When surrealist photographers emerged, viewers of their work now had to try to wrap their heads around what they were seeing and eventually start to realize that photography can, in fact, lie.

The fact of the matter is that photography is an ever-evolving technology in every facet of its many applications. A radiologist can look at a scan and think they see something, and often make important decisions without a second opinion, even though they are fully aware that their imagery is not infallible. According to Gladwell, there were several instances in recent history where war bombers had to make quick decisions on where to drop a bomb based on little or poor information from an image, but were able to make those choices, albeit they had their failures. It is true that just the average person expects to flip through a set of pictures and see images of the world as it exists in reality...but in the age of Photoshop and the Internet, more and more people are actually questioning what they see in a photograph instead of just accepting it as truth. 

Unfortunately, it seems as though the images that garner the most speculation are the ones that matter the least. Pictures of the Kardashians and the Jenners pollute the news, with people scrutinizing every detail of every image ever posted to social media. People actually took the time to write full articles about every detail of the evolution of Kylie Jenner’s lips, questioning whether or not the discrepancies between photographs indicated that the teen got lip injections or if she was just using some sort of sorcerous makeup technique. And of course, the Internet was rumored to be imploding when images of Kim Kardashian were released, and everyone just had to know if the images were real or if they were digitally enhanced.

But why are these questions so important to people? Why is it that masses of people will go to great lengths to examine every detail of a celebrity’s latest Instagram post, but will probably not do the same for something that actually requires a great deal of scrutiny? And most importantly, what makes people believe one photograph over another? Why is it that a Gulf War bomber is willing to drop a bomb somewhere or a surgeon is inclined to remove a woman’s breast based on one photograph, and yet half of the Internet population cannot sleep until they know the answer to something that is hardly worth a second thought?

The answer that I’m offering to these questions is that photography is a contextual technology. Therefore, the context of the image, and also of the viewer, will dictate the response. The war bomber is in a high-stress environment with limited information, and must make a rapid decision that can affect many people; he simply did not have the time to speculate. Sometimes, when you are scouring a screen or an image for something specific, you might jump quickly to assume that you’ve found it, even if you actually haven’t. This very well could’ve been the case with the Gulf War bombers and Colin Powell’s experts. 

The radiologist is also in a position of offering a life-or-death decision based on what they think they are reading in a scan. Gladwell articulates that the decision is based on the ‘temperament’ on the individual radiologist, and that the results on one scan can vary greatly from one radiologist to another based on their instinctual inclinations. One radiologist may see nothing and decide that the patient is normal, and the next may see what they believe to be a cancerous mass and decide to act aggressively. These decisions are incredibly important, and the radiologist must rely on their instincts and education to point them in the right direction. In the context of the radiologist, however, a mammogram is actually just one tool that they have to locate and diagnose cancer, so it would be understandable that they would act cautiously when they suspect an abnormality.

As for the Internet, I don’t know that I’ll ever be sure of why some people need to endlessly pick apart every detail of an image that really doesn’t matter. As the technology evolves, so do the people that use it. From a mammogram to a bomber’s viewfinder to an Instagram post – there could be something there in the picture, or there could be nothing. Maybe it’s not important, but maybe it is. As long as photographs are around, there will be opportunities for people to explore them, and in the end it will always be up to them to decide.