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jimmydean

jimmydean

The Official Meat of Ridemonkey
Sep 10, 2001
43,072
15,162
Portland, OR
Westy said:
If you are going to buy a cheezy replicar at least copy the "good one"

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:drool: I've been saying that for years. There is a guy in the parking lot with a nice Cobra replica, but the whole lack of roof seems impractical in Portland. There is a nice 911 turbo something as well, everything else around here is underwhelming.
 
syadasti

syadasti

i heart mac
Apr 15, 2002
12,690
290
VT
Kevin said:
Anyone else agree wifi and mobile internet are some of the worst things that could have ever happend to people?

Over it...
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Just like back in the day it was fashionable to say that about the printing press, then records, radio, TV, etc...
 
dan-o

dan-o

Turbo Monkey
Jun 30, 2004
6,499
2,805
syadasti said:
Just like back in the day it was fashionable to say that about the printing press, then records, radio, TV, etc...
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I don't know, I never see two people sharing dinner operating a printing press and ignoring each other.

The technology is benign and very useful but the implementation (esp social network obsession and the resulting erosion of real interaction/communication skills) is ruining society.
 
syadasti

syadasti

i heart mac
Apr 15, 2002
12,690
290
VT
dan-o said:
I don't know, I never see two people sharing dinner operating a printing press and ignoring each other.

The technology is benign and very useful but the implementation (esp social network obsession and the resulting erosion of real interaction/communication skills) is ruining society.
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Random photo:



Chicken little syndrome - the dire warnings are nonsense everytime.

The problems are a result of people with poor self control/focus who are distracted by a variety of technologies/food/drugs/etc. It's not just the latest communication technology that distracts people, so singling out the latest doesn't make sense. Every generation does this with new technology/distraction/vice but society changes and advances - they were wrong then and they are wrong now.

In psychology we refer to the ability to understand when you need to focus and when it is not necessary to do so as “metacognition” or knowing how your brain functions. In one recent study we found a perfect demonstration of metacognition, albeit totally by accident. In this study we showed a video in several psychology courses, which was followed by a graded test. Student were told that we may be texting them during the videotape and to answer our text messages. In fact, one-third did not get a text message from us, one-third got four texts during the 30-minute video and the other third got eight texts, enough, we guessed, to make them not be able to concentrate on the video. Oh yes, one other wrinkle was that we timed the text messages to occur when important material was being shown on the videotape that was going to be tested later. We were right that the group who got eight texts did worse but the group with four texts did not. HOWEVER, here a mistake in our instructions told us more about what was going on inside the students’ heads when the text arrived. Those students who answered our texts immediately did worse than those who opted to wait a minute or two or even three or four to respond. Those students were using their metacognitive skills to decide when was a good time to be distracted.

How do we teach focus in a world that is constantly drawing our focus elsewhere? One idea is to use “technology breaks” where you check your phone, the web, whatever, for a minute or two and then turn the phone to silent, the computer screen off and “focus” on work or conversation or any nontechnological activity for, say 15 minutes, and then take a 1-2 minute tech break followed by more focus times and more tech breaks. The trick is to gradually lengthen the focus time to teach yourself (and your kids) how to focus for longer periods of time without being distracted. I have teachers using this in classrooms, parents using it during dinner and bosses using tech breaks during meetings with great success. So far, though, the best we can get is about 30 minutes of focus. Thanks to Steve Jobs (and others) for making such alluring, distracting technologies.
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More from experts rather than people making up BS about technology xyz: E-Mail Is Not the Problem: It’s Our Need to Task Switch
Learning how to focus is not rocket science. It's brain science.
Published on April 21, 2013 by Larry Rosen, Ph.D. in Rewired: The Psychology of Technology
 
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