by Jon Lackman | 12 April 2010 | Conferences
In the blog Experimental Philosophy, Eric Schwitzgebel writes about recent studies he’s done of conference audiences. He concludes that “most audience members, listening to most academic talks, spend most of their time with some distraction or other at the forefront of their stream of experience. They may not remember this fact because when they think back on their experience of a talk, what is salient to them are those rare occasions when they did make a novel connection or think up an interesting objection.” Most of the time, audience members are more likely to be thinking about their cell phone, an itch, their feelings of confusion, the “skanky taste” of the coffee, or their need to go to the bathroom.
