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Research Suggests Brain Has a 2-Task Limit for Multitasking
suraj.sun writes with a story from LiveScience about just how much attention you can devote to each of the tasks on hand that scream for it: "The brain is set up to manage two tasks, but not more, a new study suggests. That's because, when faced with two tasks, a part of the brain known as the medial prefrontal cortex (MFC) divides so that half of the region focuses on one task and the other half on the other task. This division of labor allows a person to keep track of two tasks pretty readily, but if you throw in a third, things get a bit muddled. 'What really the results show is that we can readily divide tasking. We can cook, and at the same time talk on the phone, and switch back and forth between these two activities,' said study researcher Etienne Koechlin of the Université Pierre et Marie Curie in Paris, France. 'However, we cannot multitask with more than two tasks.'"
One could do a lot of things at once, but maybe is up to a few to actually solve new problems instead of being just receptor (reading, watching tv, hearing music, probably recognizing patterns in that input) or do a somewhat automated thing (walking, eating, even writting what you are thinking).
Talking with a cellphone while driving could fall into this category, you have one task thinking in what you are talking, and if you try to solve something else you could be out of tasks to solve the problem on how to avoid the next obstacle.