Mobile phones

[waremark]

Watched the video. Gosh I would have found that distracting, unlike a brief voice call to.my wife.

[akirk]

How can you consciously "return to the decision making process" if your conscious is consumed by the phone call?

I guess it varies for everyone but ability to multi-task or share use of the conscious is something not really discussed on this thread, but presumably is of relevance, and would influence ability to make that choice...

Alasdair

[Horse]

Yes, the same sort of multi - tasking by participants which keeps close-up 'magicians' in business

[Matt1962]

Yes, the same sort of multi - tasking by participants which keeps close-up 'magicians' in business

If you are unable to multi-task then you are unable to drive a car. Any car driver trying (for example) to fly a helicopter or even plough a field, could decide after a few minutes that they were not capable of such complex multi-tasking, but after several hours they might surprise themselves.

[Strangely Brown]

You know multi-tasking is a myth right?

Just one of many links:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=95256794

[Horse]

Yes, the same sort of multi - tasking by participants which keeps close-up 'magicians' in business

If you are unable to multi-task then you are unable to drive a car. Any car driver trying (for example) to fly a helicopter . . . after several hours they might surprise themselves.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-hampshire-38238883

[akirk]

If you are unable to multi-task then you are unable to drive a car. Any car driver trying (for example) to fly a helicopter or even plough a field, could decide after a few minutes that they were not capable of such complex multi-tasking, but after several hours they might surprise themselves.

Not totally sure - the layman's perspective of multi-tasking in the context of driving should perhaps be seen as where your concentration / focus goes (i.e. the conscious activity of the brain v. the sub-conscious) - surely one of the hallmarks of being able to drive is that the mechanical management of the car (the actual driving) should all be in the sub-conscious - which can handle many things together... leaving the driver to choose where the conscious is focused...

the issue of the phone is that it splits the conscious away from the driving element...

Alasdair

[Matt1962]

If you are unable to multi-task then you are unable to drive a car. Any car driver trying (for example) to fly a helicopter or even plough a field, could decide after a few minutes that they were not capable of such complex multi-tasking, but after several hours they might surprise themselves.

Not totally sure - the layman's perspective of multi-tasking in the context of driving should perhaps be seen as where your concentration / focus goes (i.e. the conscious activity of the brain v. the sub-conscious) - surely one of the hallmarks of being able to drive is that the mechanical management of the car (the actual driving) should all be in the sub-conscious - which can handle many things together... leaving the driver to choose where the conscious is focused...

the issue of the phone is that it splits the conscious away from the driving element...

Alasdair

Combining this train of thought with Strangely Brown's interesting link above can lead you in some unsettling directions.....Quite a lot of what we regard as 'Advanced Driving' involves reclaiming some of the things that 'non Advanced' drivers are happy to remain in the sub-conscious (signaling, BGOL etc.) .
Maybe the reality is that good planning (and experience) allows for rapid mental cycling of tasks, so results in something that functionally is equivalent to multi-tasking?

[akirk]

I think you are right - AD brings things out of the sub-conscious to do them better - a really good AD will then bank them again as sub-conscious but at a higher level... but it is why driving on focus and in AD mode is so much more tiring than driving 'normally'...

this is I think no different to any skill - e.g. sports where a good coach / instructor takes skills out of the sub-conscious - redevelops / improves them and then pushes them back into the sub-conscious...

Alasdair

[Strangely Brown]

Maybe the reality is that good planning (and experience) allows for rapid mental cycling of tasks, so results in something that functionally is equivalent to multi-tasking?

The reality is that you cannot concentrate on two things at once and if the phone conversation causes you to use your visual cortex to understand a question or formulate a response - something over which you have no control - then using it for something required by the driving task is simply not possible. You *will* miss things, no matter how much you *think* you can "multi-task".

As has been said, and shown, time and again in this thread: it is not the phone that is the problem. It is the call. As Prof. Miller said in the article:

"People can't multitask very well, and when people say they can, they're deluding themselves," said neuroscientist Earl Miller. And, he said, "The brain is very good at deluding itself."