When fast and slow time meet, fast time wins. This is why one never gets the important things done because there is always something else one has to do first. Naturally, we will always tend to do the most urgent task first. In this way, the slow and long-term activities lose out. In an age when the distinctions between work and leisure are being erased, and efficiency seems to be the only value in economics, politics and research, this is really bad news for things like thorough, far-sighted work, play and long-term love relationships

Eriksen, The Tyranny of the Moment, 2001

Taken from No Time to Think

I stumbled across this article from the economist, which briefly outlines some of the mechanisms which collective animals like bees and cockroaches make decisions. An excerpt:

Another form of groupthink occurs when people are either isolated from crucial sources of information or dominated by other members of the group, some of whom may have malevolent intent. This too has now been demonstrated in animals. José Halloy of the Free University of Brussels used robotic cockroaches to subvert the behaviour of living cockroaches and control their decision-making process. In his experiment, reported in an earlier issue of Science, the artificial bugs were introduced to the real ones and soon became sufficiently socially integrated that they were perceived as equals. By manipulating the robots, which were in the minority, he was able to persuade the cockroaches to choose an inappropriate shelter—even one which they had rejected before being infiltrated by machines.

I think we can easily find parallels to this in our own society. Deliberate disinformation campaigns by the cigarette industry and the fossil fuel industry regarding the safety of smoking and global warming, respectively, delayed the progression of the debate on these issues by years, maybe decades.

Via Policy Economist.

Wired has a report on the recent collapse of the SUV and truck market in the U.S., which have taken a rather sharp nosedive these past few months. Some analysts seem to believe it’s a change that’s here to stay. Jesse Toprak on CNNMoney is quoted in the article as saying “Even if gas prices go down for a month or two, consumers are not going to rush back out and buy SUVs. This appears to be a permanent shift”. While I don’t think oil prices are going to go down any time soon, I’m not so sure that people wouldn’t rush back to SUV’s and trucks if they did. In any case, a few months of sales don’t mean a whole lot. North Americans love big things, and I’m not so sure the mental shift can happen that fast.

I would be happy to see North Americans adopt a more European outlook on cars (and houses, and food for that matter) in going for quality over quantity. Pictured here is the Mercedes A-Class (( Photo credit to Flickr user Dirk1812, used under a Creative Commons License )) , a luxury subcompact sold in the European market. They were super-popular in Germany, but go directly against the North American penchant for size over everything else, which, as mentioned, seems just as prevalent in our homes and on our plates.

I would be pleased to see an overnight shift to compacts, hybrids, and bicycles. This is, however, more likely going to be a slow move to small trucks, so-called “crossovers” like the amusingly aptly name Buick Enclave, and mid-size cars.

This blog is ostensibly about long term thinking, and the Five Whys philosophy is central enough that I named the blog after it (( for the record, I had encountered the idea of Five Whys far before I had encountered Spolsky’s article. )) . The essence of the philosophy says that you should try to get to the root of your problem by asking why five times, in order to find the root of the problem.

Many people responding to Spolsky’s article seem to have been overly caught up in is the actual number of whys in the saying. Five might work in a some cases, but not all. The specifics here are less important than the concept – which is to drill down as much as possible to find the root cause. It could take a single step, it could take five, or it could take fifty. The point should be that you should really keep asking why until you can’t anymore.

While Five Whys is a snappy and easy encapsulation of the idea, the real root of it is to keep asking questions all the time. In a sense, I think it is more productive in the long run to put more of our effort in making sure we’re asking the right questions rather than trying to find the answers to the questions we already have. If we’re patient enough, pretty much any question we have will eventually be answered.

As Richard Saul Wurman, founder of the TED conference and coiner of the term Information Architect, put it:

When the emphasis is placed on finding answers, we stop thinking about the innocent questions and start pretending we know the answers.

A good book or blog post will give answers to questions that you already had, but a truly great one will leave you questioning everything.

Ignoring Ikea’s ridiculous Stichting Ingka, which purports to be a charitable foundation focused on improving interior and architectural design (but is really most likely a $36 Billion tax avoidance scheme), Conn cites the overwhelming emphasis among foundations in areas where short term results are more easily quantifiable, like distributing malaria nets or sponsoring artists. While the arts and current health are extremely important, he argues that they receive far too much of the pie, and we would be better off if foundations spent more than the 5% they do on the environment, or the 2.9% they spend on science and technology research.

In the early 1970’s, two John Darley and Daniel Batson published a paper called From Jerusalem to Jericho: A study of situational and dispositional variables in helping behavior (( You can read about the study here )), a paper which may offer some insight into how our decision making is affected by time, or at least perceived time.

They took a group of students, and assigned half them to give a talk on the parable of the Good Samaritan, while the others were asked to talk about another, less morally-driven subject.

When they arrived to give their speech, the subjects were told that the location had changed at the last minute, and that they had to make their way to a different building on campus. At this point, some were told they had to hurry extremely quickly to make the speech, while others were told they could take their time.

On the way to the other building, the study had placed an actor who was slumped over, eyes closed, appearing to be in great pain. The idea was to see what was the more important factor in whether the subject would stop to help – the topic of their speech, or the time constraint they were under. The study found that by far the most important factor was in fact the time pressure. Most of the people with time to spare stopped to help, most of the people in a hurry did not.

The result could be argued that even perceived lack of time leads people to be, at best, less thoughtful, and at worst, less caring. It is a commonly held notion that the modern world’s fast pace, long work hours, dual-income households, short vacation times, and long commutes are leaving most people with less and less free time.

What impact, if any, could this lack of free time be having on our morals? While it is extremely difficult to draw direct links between this study and behaviors in everyday life, the study serves as an important reminder of why it’s important to slow down and take your time.