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Digital Devices Deprive Brain of Needed Downtime
siliconbits writes with an excerpt from NY Times: "Technology makes the tiniest windows of time entertaining, and potentially productive. But scientists point to an unanticipated side effect: when people keep their brains busy with digital input, they are forfeiting downtime that could allow them to better learn and remember information, or come up with new ideas."
Why do you think I run Windows? ::rimshot::
Living With a Nerd
I lay down on the couch several times a day for 10 to 30 minutes and close my eyes, it does not matter if I fall asleep or not, just the act of closing my eyes and letting my mind rest does wonders for recharging my energy levels and clearing my mind of noise & clutter.
Politics is Treachery, Religion is Brainwashing
NPR had a long thing on this the other day. Supposedly it kills our attention span. Or something, tl;dl.
THL phish sticks
Did Slashdot just advise us to cut back on Slashdot?
I really value my exercise time for this 'down time.' I can't stand running with headphones because I can't get lost in the moment. Going out for a nice long run (or a walk) on Sunday morning when you have a problem to mull over is just about the greatest way to find some insight and a new angle on it. I've composed term papers and had some wonderful insights into my life and relationships while on runs.
As I get older, I also find that I need to turn off more and more distractions if I really want to get anything serious done. I close the web browser, turn off the IM and silence the phone (I'd turn it off, but it takes so freaking long to reboot, it's obnoxious). I remember a time in my youth that I'd have 12 things going on at once, watching TV, playing video games and maybe even music running somewhere. I think I was being productive, but looking back, I question that. Perhaps my abilities to 'multi-task' have diminished as I've aged, but I think that I've just become more adept at recognizing shoddy work. What about you all? Have you fond that as you get older, you need more quite time to think than you did when you were younger? Do little distractions like email and IMs really cut into your productivity?
This one's tricky. You have to use imaginary numbers, like eleventeen... --Hobbes
*People ask how can you manage that - I tell them it's a little secret called forethought or planning.
I usually tell them it's a little secret called "no friends".
Jesus had a UNIX beard.
"I thought cell phones were only useful for buying drugs."
There's an app for that.
Tic-Tac-Toe, Global Thermonuclear War, and relationships all have the same winning move.
I read the article on the New York Times yesterday, but I've been thinking about this a lot lately in general, and I've come across some pretty interesting stuff. For instance, its pretty obvious that computers give off a lot of blue light. Apparently someone decided that blue LEDs meant high tech and so devices get fitted with them all over the place. Blue light in particular is linked to suppression of melatonin(source: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11487664). Particularly low levels of melatonin have been observed in patients with various degrees of ASD, including slashdot's favourite asperger's (source: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17505466).
So, my contention is that the "rise in autism" that seems to be so prevalent these days is probably a result of children basically being deprived of proper darkness, being surrounded by light from computers, tv, video games, etc. I've started taking melatonin supplements as since I got back into IT work about two years ago and spending much more time on computers, I've been sleeping a lot less and feeling generally less sociable. My memory has gotten shot, etc. Could just be that I'm getting older, but I'm only 26... I'm not that old. When I get a break away from computers, take some time out to sleep, and get outside in the woods then I can generally shake the effects off in a day or so, but when I was a kid the world wasn't nearly as surrounded by computer technology in all its myriad of forms as it is today, where kids are basically handed a DS right out of the womb. I didn't see a gameboy until I was about 7 or 8, and it had a monochrome screen with no backlight.
And no, I don't mean a break from work. I mean a break from computers. It's not just being at work -- when I'm at work, its light outside anyway. I mean no laptop, no fancy phone, no nothing. Go away for a few days and leave that stuff behind, because if I'm just at home on the weekend and spend a lot of time plugged up, then I don't feel any better for not having been at work.
The way kids are today, with all their gadgets and gizmos can't possibly be any better for their brains than it is for their bodies, not playing outside nearly as much as they used to.
Stories like this match up pretty well with my own anecdotal evidence, not that it means much, but when I find NIH studies that seem to point to much more extreme versions of what I've seen, even in myself. Like I said, the effects on an adult are likely to be temporary, but our brains had time to mature before being mushed up.
It is not like before "digital devices" people would sit around doing nothing for "downtime".. Before pocket toys that look for our attention people had a list of tasks they had to do. Instead of wasting time sitting there playing plants-vs-zombies they read a book or talked.
My downtime is usually under a car or elbow deep in a motorcycle doing high level brain activity compared to what any digital device causes.
This is all bull-cockey. If anything the digital devices are making people stupid because they dont have to actually work for or retain any knowlege.. they certianly are not causing us to lose downtime, as humans by nature dont do brain downtime. Hell when we sleep we dont even have brain downtime.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
You know, cell phones have a very useful functionality: You can switch them off. The advantage of a switched-off cell phone vs. no cell phone is that you can quickly get a working cell phone in case you need one: Just switch it on. Moreover, you get great times between battery recharges this way.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
Meditation should cause you to become aware of your environment and not let the mind dwell on other issues. It's about focusing on "being here now." What you're doing is spacing out. They're not the same thing.
Dedicated Cthulhu Cultist since 4523 BC.
I heard an interview with the guy who wrote that book on NPR yesterday. Practically every sentence he spoke contained a "Maybe" or a "We don't know for sure" or an "It's possible that..."
His entire interview was preceded by him saying this is all theories and may not be correct at all and that there's actually no scientific proof of any of this.
So, grain of salt.
In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is kinky.
I think a study should be done that correlates smartphone ownership with time spent per bathroom break. I think you all know why.
Life is rarely fair. Cherish the moments when there is a right answer.
I use a slightly different mechanism: I turn the ringer to silent, and don't empty my voice mail. If I see you've called *and* I actually want to talk to you, I'll call you back.
The problem is, I loathe telephones. Typically, when the phone rings, it's because someone expects me to drop whatever I'm doing RIGHT NOW and attend to whatever it is they need. Worse, when I'm talking to people on the telephone, they tend to feel slighted if I don't give them my full and undivided attention. So if I'm at work trying to, you know, work, and my phone rings, the expectation is that I will immediately cease work to chat/be a chimney while they vent/solve the world's problems/whatever. Maybe I'm just a curmudgeon, but I find that rather irritating.
I much prefer text messages or e-mail, since I can look at it and get back to you when I actually have the CPU cycles to devote to whatever it is you need.
MCSE? No, sir...I don't do Windows. Yes, I am an idealist. What's your point?
Time to change your sig again ;)
Is 1563649 a prime number?
#include <time.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
#include <stdio.h>
#define kase(tipo,stmt) case(tipo):{stmt;break;}
char *a[10] = {
"in particular",
"on the other hand",
"however",
"similarly",
"in this regard",
"as a resultant implication",
"based on integral subsystem considerations",
"for example",
"thus",
"in respect to specific goals"},
*b[10] = {
"a large portion of the interface coordinated communication",
"a constant flow of effective information",
"the characterization of specific criteria",
"initiation of critical subsystem development",
"the fully integrated test program",
"the product configuration baseline",
"any associated supporting element",
"the incorporation of additional mission constraints",
"the independent functional principle",
"a primary interrelationship between system and/or subsystem technologies"},
*c[10] = {
"must utilize and be functionally interwoven with",
"maximizes the probability of project success and minimizes the cost and time required for",
"adds explicit performance limits to",
"necessitates that urgent consideration be applied to",
"requires considerable systems analysis and trade off studies to arrive at",
"is further compounded when taking into account",
"presents extremely interesting challenges to",
"recognizes the importance of other systems and the necessity for",
"effects a significant implementation of",
"adds overriding performance constraints to"},
*d[10] = { /* orders: abcd, dacb, bacd, adcb */
"the sophisticated hardware",
"the anticipated next generation equipment",
"the subsystem compatibility testing",
"the structural design based on system engineering concepts",
"the preliminary qualification limits",
"the evolution of specification over a given time period",
"the philosophy of commonality and standardization",
"the top-down development method",
"any discrete configuration mode",
"the total system rationale"};
main()
{
int n, order, w, x, y, z;
srand(time(NULL));
for (n = 0; n < 1000; n++)
{
if (!(n % 10)) printf("\n");
w = rand() % 10;
x = rand() % 10;
y = rand() % 10;
z = rand() % 10;
order = rand() % 4;
switch (order)
{
case 0:
printf(" %c%s, %s %s %s.", a[w][0] & 0xDF, a[w] + 1, b[x], c[y], d[z]);
break;
case 1:
printf(" %c%s, %s, %s %s.", d[w][0] & 0xDF, d[w] + 1, a[x], c[y], b[z]);
break;
case 2:
printf(" %c%s, %s, %s %s.", b[w][0] & 0xDF, b[w] + 1, a[x], c[y], d[z]);