Many years ago, when telephones were black, hardwired and still part of a government-sanctioned monopoly, I managed to get a semi-legal, plug-in model. But it was hardly worth the effort since I never plugged it in. One guy got so frustrated at never being able to get through he gave me an electronic leash...otherwise known as a pager. I put it in the same drawer where I kept the phone. Now I have a new plug-in phone that I keep plugged-in...to the answer machine that I keep in the drawer. I guess I'm something of an anachronism but, quite frankly, I don't want to be interrupted when my mind is busy wandering around aimlessly. Daydreaming, navel gazing, wool gathering, meditating, vicarious trial and error - whatever you want to call it.
Anyway, also many years ago, I once stopped in at my wife's university where she was a highly regarded computer science professor. I watched as, surrounded by ogling students, she entered a long string of commands into a keyboard and hit a big red button. Nothing happened. She repeated this process three more times until, at last, a machine the size of Kilauea began to rumble. So I asked why it took four tries and discovered she didn't know. Even worse, she didn't care. It works - right? Her acolytes all agreed. Where had we gone wrong? Generations ago, the average man felt a need to know roughly how things worked and so was pretty much able to suss out why they didn't when they didn't...but no more. Welcome to the Computer Age.
Moving to my point: Is it possible that our neural networks are being physically altered by the combined effects of distraction overload, continuous partial attention and the omnipresence of unfathomable black box technology? To me it seems that this is indeed the case...that our brains are beginning to accept as normal our almost total ignorance of the information systems that surround us. It started with VCR's. Everybody just sort of accepted the fact that they were impossible to program.
Now the whole world has become a VCR. There's no standardization and you can go from one geek to another and still not get a simple answer to a simple question involving a computer problem. Buy a new device and plug it in? Lot's o' luck. And you just know that hitting the HELP option is worse than useless on a system where you have to press START to shut down. Even going through an hour of "let's try this/let's try that" with an expert in India (who, for some reason, wants you to think his name is Joe) isn't much better. And this is truly scary stuff because when you add distraction to confusion at every level of human endeavor - from financial meltdowns to nuclear exchanges - what can you expect besides data deficient decisions?
Some states now ban cell phone use while driving and a Blackberry was recently blamed for a train wreck that caused multiple fatalities. Then there's the plane crash that's been attributed to pilots (interrupted during their preflight) forgetting where they were on the list. Did you check for two wings? Errr...Roger.
Look At It This Way
Depending upon which one of the two latest studies you believe, the average worker is now interrupted every three minutes or every eleven minutes. Somebody should interrupt the people who did those studies and ask which is it? In either case, considering how long it takes to refocus and how much information can be lost in the interim, imagine the difficulty involved in wrapping your brain around how your iPod can be connected to your iPhone while your iTunes are still playing.
Because new technologies deliver information in new ways, adjusting to the latest medium involves subtle changes in brain function. Perhaps our slowly evolving and already jerry rigged brains have reached their limit. Today, flooded with overlapping signals generated by unfathomable machines, we appear to be devolving into a culture that decides between big issues like science versus religion less with our mind and more with our gut. Just pick a bumper sticker that feels right - the Fish-with-Feet or the Cross-with-Clouds. And No...they are not compatible.
