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The Landscape is the place where real things happen. It's the fundamental social reality that we all live in. Sport belongs very much to this Landscape - the challenge and response occurs in real time. Somebody once observed that Hamlet wouldn't make a good sportsman because he's too much of a muller over of things. You have to be a bit more on the ball in sport. Your tactical and strategic abilities are directed towards a real immediate outcome. You also play with others according to rules agreed upon.

The kind of thing that children get up to when they get together for an impromtu game, illustrates what I mean. Rules are devised to make sure that no one gets an unfair advantage, that local conditions are taken into account, that special needs are catered for, and so on, but that, in the end, the 'best' can still shine. This is all Landscape behaviour.

AW: Yet plenty of people claim to have no interest in football or indeed any sport.

It's rare to find someone who genuinely has no interest in sporting heroes, although it's pretty much the attitude followed by those who consider themselves intellectuals. By sport I include games. Someone who detests football and claims to have no interest in popular diversions like it may nevertheless play Bridge with gusto, or Chess, and may admire individual players of those things. A good part of Landscape behaviour centers on the rules and order of 'play'; another part centres on the individuals who perform. There are those who may not consider golf a sport in the same category as football - if anything, however, a golf-club is more determinedly Landscape place than almost any other sporting set-up: individuals are graded moment by moment, rules covering every situation on and off the course. Of course, while sport may encompass a larger portion of what I call the Landscape than other activities, most activities that are renowned for their 'fans' mirror portions of the Landscape.

AW: Rock Music?

Certainly public performances of all kinds lie on the same continuum.

AW: So a fan of Jimi Hendricks is somehow making himself or herself more attractive and more likely to score?

Now you are confusing sex with marriage. Certainly a fan of someone or something is a more attractive person than one who has no enthusiasms at all. If you are a fan you are more likely to find another fan and another fan is more likely to be like you, and someone like you - in TO8 terms - makes the best mate. A person picks a hero who seems to embody things about themselves they like. The hero broadcasts a larger than life reflection of the fan and so helps the fan get recognised by potential mates who might miss his signals otherwise. The typical picture we have of fans as solitary socially awkward nerds is going to be very wrong in reality - if I am right. Fans are not simple imitators of their heroes, they are diviners of meaning, and often they find themselves in the role of apologist for when the hero's behaviour turns out to be not what was expected. Fans have a complex interaction with their hero in which they practise intellectual arguments and moral postures as well as find freedoms or excuses to express their emotions. Fans have discovered a means of amplifying their personalities and broadening the territory over which they can range for a mate. I would expect committed fans of almost any activity to marry - or at least settle - quite quickly.

AW: They should be happier too, if I understand the TO8 correctly.

Yes they should be. At least, happier in their relationships. It's a testable prediction.

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