I was sitting eating my breakfast this morning, letting the Today programme wash over me, in that wondrous period when everyone else has left the house and peace is transforming it from a family home to a writer’s workplace. Outside the window I could see a robin bobbing about. And this led to a spot of thinking.

You see, if you ask me about birds, I will tell you I haven’t a clue. I can be walking along with my friend who quotes the stoats and weasels rhyme and he’ll say ‘Listen to that. Isn’t the song of the windcheater (or whatever it is) so evocative?’ And I’ll say, ‘Oh, look, there’s a brown bird.’

Before being inspired by that robin, I would have said I could identify black birds, and brown birds, and that was about it. But actually I know quite a few. (This isn’t idle showing off; there is a point.) As well as robins, I can identify a sparrow, thrush, blackbird, pigeon, various owls, kestrel, bullfinch, bluetit, kingfisher and so on. When it comes to corvidae, I’m a bit of a whiz. I can differentiate ravens, magpies and jays (though I probably call rooks crows). I can do ducks, geese, swans, moorhens and coots. Wow.

But I’ve never read a book about a bird, or knowingly watched a TV programme about them for more than the 3 seconds it takes to change to another channel.

It really is quite amazing how much we pick up by osmosis. Before thinking about it, I would have said I didn’t know a word of Welsh. But actually I know (well, assume) that araf means slow, goch/coch is red, ysgol is school and dim parcio is no parking. (You may guess I am educated by the University of Street Signs.) Llyn, I think, is lake, dhu (approx spelling) black and so on. I could continue, but it’s unnecessary.

So where does reality TV come into this? One of the genuine benifits of TV is that it’s a great way to absorb random information by this kind of mental osmosis. One of my daughters loves documentaries of a Channel 4 nature (i.e. not too heavy, probably with a weird title) and that’s really not a bad thing. But more and more of the non-fiction programming seems to be taken up with reality shows (which she also loves). And those can be almost osmosis free.

It’s not true of all reality shows, I admit. The recent one on new recruits to the RSPCA did have some real osmotic benefits, and The Apprentice certainly has some lessons, if only that being a multi-millionaire does not automatically give you taste. But anything that consists of any combination of:

• people locked up together in a house
• an almost total concentration on mindless chatter
• an obsession with money or celebrity

… and you can throw out any hope of absorbing something new and wonderful.

I must drag my daughter out into the countryside and point out some brown birds to her before reality shows transform her brain to mush.