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The Presence of One’s Own Smartphone Reduces Available Cognitive Capacity

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Re: The Presence of One’s Own Smartphone Reduces Available Cognitive Capacity

#381

Post by TranquilMarmot »

jxramos wrote: post #380
TranquilMarmot wrote: post #365

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you ever tried a boogie board? https://www.myboogieboard.com/ Writing on it is very natural/paper feeling, there's no erasing or anything. With the more expensive models, it can sync the notes to a computer/cloud service.

wow, it's pretty affordable. How do you write multiple pages on it?

The way the screen works, it can only erase the whole screen in one go. I think with the cloud-connected ones, you can save the page off before erasing it and then view them later.

Re: The Presence of One’s Own Smartphone Reduces Available Cognitive Capacity

#382

Post by QuarterReptile »

nwatson wrote: post #3

Bards pre-literate-times in Greece purportedly could recite Homer's Odyssey themselves after one hearing. Writing destroyed that all. (Maybe I don't have a citation right off, but I've read that on the web or heard it in some college class years ago ... in any case, ability to retain heard information has likely declined since then). But ... few people complain about how books corrupt our memory. So we're the first g…

People (mostly) don't complain about books because we fail to recognize the trade off, or else we accept it, but there are certainly useful places for memorization of large amounts of information. Not only is it more easily summoned when you need it, but it's more fully internalized. By comparison, I know almost nothing about the books on my bookshelf, despite having spent significant amounts of time reading each of them.

Re: The Presence of One’s Own Smartphone Reduces Available Cognitive Capacity

#383

Post by jxramos »

jxramos wrote: post #114
throwawaycopy wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Try keeping a sketch pad for quick illustrations or perhaps a notebook for poems. The world is filled with inspiration! Not only will you be more present, but you'll be turning your seemingly humdrum life into a work of art!

I love that interpretation of jotting down information as creating a mindfulness work of art. What a thought! I used to do the cliche "note to self" with a voice recorder, that I've recently been desiring again. My cell phone is too slow to respond to my inspirations having to log in past the keycode, launch the app, dump mental information. Stepping through those hoops seems to decay my inspiration. You make me thin…

I just installed Microsoft OneNote to my Android phone and it added a quick launch app to my lockscreen much like how the camera can be launched while the phone is locked. I'll see how much mileage I get with this solution.

Re: The Presence of One’s Own Smartphone Reduces Available Cognitive Capacity

#384

Post by Bakary »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #244
Bakary wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only a small fraction of that information is actually useful in improving our lives or giving meaning to them.

I think you'd be surprised. It's kind of like your house. The only necessary things there are the bed and the ceiling. And yet life would be much more miserable without all the random stuff you probably store in various cupboards.

These days I think of it in terms of cost to benefit ratios. I've for instance spent countless hours on Reddit, and while I got some benefit from it it is clear that the overall cost was negative even if it is impossible to know the exact figures.

It's still unclear to me which parts of the Internet provide a good ratio.

Re: The Presence of One’s Own Smartphone Reduces Available Cognitive Capacity

#385

Post by ramblerman »

knodi123 wrote: post #327
lazyasciiart wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No. It would take one person who had memorized the story, over however much repetition, to tell the story and then listen to the other person repeat it back. It's more like, if your nephew came to your house and saw Star Wars and then told you the story, and you, having seen the movie multiple times, said "well, that's actually not a perfect retelling".

> It would take one person who had memorized the story, over however much repetition From whom did this person hear it repeated over and over, perfectly, without variation? And who did THAT person find, capable of reciting a quarter million words in a specific order, multiple times without mistake? And so on. At some point in the chain, you either have a person with an unverifiable claim of single-hearing perfect sup…

I don't know which story you guys are telling at this point, but I think you both have lost the plot.

Re: The Presence of One’s Own Smartphone Reduces Available Cognitive Capacity

#386

Post by majewsky »

Bakary wrote: post #384
TeMPOraL wrote: post #244

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you'd be surprised. It's kind of like your house. The only necessary things there are the bed and the ceiling. And yet life would be much more miserable without all the random stuff you probably store in various cupboards.

These days I think of it in terms of cost to benefit ratios. I've for instance spent countless hours on Reddit, and while I got some benefit from it it is clear that the overall cost was negative even if it is impossible to know the exact figures. It's still unclear to me which parts of the Internet provide a good ratio.

I guess for most sites, the cost-benefit ratio is a function of the time spent, following a steep downward slope. When I spend 15 minutes on HN every workday, it provides me with interesting stories and insights. When I spend two hours, it ends up draining more energy than it replenishes.

Re: The Presence of One’s Own Smartphone Reduces Available Cognitive Capacity

#387

Post by majewsky »

pbhjpbhj wrote: post #280
copperx wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I really doubt it's feasible to memorize it in a single hearing without paraphrasing. The human brain couldn't have been different a few millennia ago, and we know that the greeks used the same memorization techniques we use today (e.g., the memory palace, chunking, ...).

We also see in history specific people tasked with recitation, and high status coming through that ability. Suggesting it's a rare and learned characteristic.

Nitpick: That only suggests that this ability is rare, not that it is learned. (Not saying it is purely talent; everything I know about the brain suggests otherwise. But not just the historical evidence.)

Re: The Presence of One’s Own Smartphone Reduces Available Cognitive Capacity

#388

Post by majewsky »

mi100hael wrote: post #34
sillysaurus3 wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I keep my phone on silent and turn off all vibrations. There's no way to notify me of anything until I look at it, but that's a feature.

I think there's a subtle difference between "monitoring for notifications" and actual notifications. Your phone might be on do-not-disturb mode, but that doesn't mean your brain isn't distracted wondering whether someone replied to your last message or returned your call from yesterday. Taking it out of your pocket and leaving it in another room or your car or wherever lessens the compulsion to frequently pull it out…

I noticed something similar during meditation: I had set up the stopwatch on my phone so that I did not have to wonder how many time had passed. It would just ring when 30 minutes had passed. However, when the phone was just lying next to me, I would compulsively check the time on the phone every few minutes. Only when I moved the phone to the other side of the room did I stop caring about the time passed (at least for the most part).

Re: The Presence of One’s Own Smartphone Reduces Available Cognitive Capacity

#389

Post by trustyhank »

jff wrote: post #7
nwatson wrote: post #3

Bards pre-literate-times in Greece purportedly could recite Homer's Odyssey themselves after one hearing. Writing destroyed that all. (Maybe I don't have a citation right off, but I've read that on the web or heard it in some college class years ago ... in any case, ability to retain heard information has likely declined since then). But ... few people complain about how books corrupt our memory. So we're the first g…

You seem to be defending against a claim the study does not make. They're not saying "smartphones make us stupid because Google's in your pocket!" Rather, the study is saying that by having your phone on the desk or even in your pocket, you will exhibit decreased mental capacity because your brain is using some cognitive resources to monitor for notifications etc. This may be over-simplified but appears to be backed…

This is why smart watches are actually pretty great.

Re: The Presence of One’s Own Smartphone Reduces Available Cognitive Capacity

#390

Post by stepanhruda »

notadoc wrote: post #85
lathiat wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Buy AirPods. Honestly.

I considered it but I'm not a big fan of headphones, I usually listen to music at home or in a car. One of the most annoying situations was when I had a great podcast I wanted to share with someone on a long drive, pulled out the iPhone 7 to plug into their car stereo and.... new-ish car.... but AUX only.... no dongle..... never mind! I believe Apple removed the headphone jack 5 or 10 years too early. Bluetooth is no…

Wait what? You forget the dongle but don't use headphones? How many different cars do you drive/how many aux cables do you use? Just keep the dongle on the cable.

Personally I bought Bluetooth headphones and that's it, imo people are being too dramatic about it.

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