We live, we are told, in distracted times. The internet has destroyed our ability to concentrate, condemning us to a future of agitated doomscrolling. Our alienated children stare at their screens, poking at buttons like lab rats, barely able to comprehend the polychrome sewage flashing before their red-rimmed eyes. Our attention, once a tool of exquisite interiority, has been shattered by the excessive stimulation of the modern world, leaving us prey to manias and phantoms. We’re like disaster victims, burned out and disoriented. “We are on the verge of losing our capacity as a society for deep, sustained focus,”…