Wednesday, June 15, 2005
Attention Span
On the way home from work today I passed a little girl sitting outside her mother's store, watching Fresh Prince of Bel Air while simultaneously playing her GameBoy Advanced. Her eyes were darting wildly back and forth between the two. I was slightly horrified. No, wait. I was completely horrified. (Ok, I *WAS* completely horrified before I realized that I'm typing this as I watch the Simpsons. But at least I'm doing it during the commercials.) What kind of brains are our children going to have if they fire a laser at a space alien, and get so bored during the next three tenths of a second before the next space alien appears that they need to watch TV while they wait? Multitasking is a necessary evil at times in todays world, but not a skill to be cultivated. Learn patience, do one thing at a time.
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2 comments:
GAMEBOY RULES! That lil' girl will grow up to be one of those crazy multi-taskers. Don't hate!
Lordy, lordy -- what about the 10-second TV commercials? Talk about attention deficit! It seems that advertisers encourage this condition by bombarding us with short snippets of images (and very little information). And the awful juxtaposition of some commercials at local stations!! [end rant on commercials]
Even computers can really only do one thing at any given moment: it's just that they work so fast that it gives the impression of doing several things simultaneously. And people try to emulate THAT? I fear the next generation of leaders will bring our civilization (such as it is) to near extinction if they cannot focus on one thing long enough to tackle it. Not saying they should ignore other things...just that concentration on one thing is frequently necessary.
PS: really enjoy your posts; some good food for thought, as well as confirmation that I'm not the only one who thinks some of these same thoughts--just don't have the time, or perhaps the inclination, to set up, write and maintain a blog of my own. Thanks.
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