BRADFORDBENN
Slowpoke & Proud of It!
username said:
That is humor, right?
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That is humor, right?
U
USERNAME
Guest
pete - i've got a friend and he thinks he'd be fine listening to books too.
i think all of our brains are different, with different capacity and bandwith for various things. the visual and auditory portions of the brain can be processed independently of each other, and i think for some it is totally within the realm of possibility that they can listen to books and safely operate machinery. i'm not convinced that *i* can do both simultaneously, so i sought to find out if i was in the minority or majority.
if you can do it, good!
i think all of our brains are different, with different capacity and bandwith for various things. the visual and auditory portions of the brain can be processed independently of each other, and i think for some it is totally within the realm of possibility that they can listen to books and safely operate machinery. i'm not convinced that *i* can do both simultaneously, so i sought to find out if i was in the minority or majority.
if you can do it, good!
philabeemer
New member
Holy Cow!
Who'd have thunk this question would get such intense feedback. Anyway, spurred me on to give mine. I commute 70 miles roundtrip to work. Almost all of it on I95 between Philly and Wilmington. Everyone moves fast, people drive badly, traffic is heavy. Not a good combination for audiobooks and driving you would think. However, I have an MP3 player and a subscription from audible.com that allows me to download five complete books a month. For 24 months (not entirely true since I missed 11 days due to snow), I have been doing this commute daily and listening to audiobooks the whole time.
I have had a couple of close calls with folks cutting me off, or veering while rubbernecking an accident, and I have never felt that my evasive maneuvers or reaction time were in any way compromised by the fact that during the whole process I had an audiobook playing.
There may be people out there who cannot process more than one input at a time, and I would suggest that those people should not be allowed to drive. Period. If anything, I have found that trying to solely concentrate on driving is actually counter-productive as it fatigues me a lot more than listening to books on tape.
Driving does require attention, but for the most part even my extremely defensive driving, with constant scanning, anticipating and reacting, is in no way compromised by audiobooks.
Cheers,
Philabeemer
Note: I am not affiliated with audible.com except as an extremely happy customer.
Who'd have thunk this question would get such intense feedback. Anyway, spurred me on to give mine. I commute 70 miles roundtrip to work. Almost all of it on I95 between Philly and Wilmington. Everyone moves fast, people drive badly, traffic is heavy. Not a good combination for audiobooks and driving you would think. However, I have an MP3 player and a subscription from audible.com that allows me to download five complete books a month. For 24 months (not entirely true since I missed 11 days due to snow), I have been doing this commute daily and listening to audiobooks the whole time.
I have had a couple of close calls with folks cutting me off, or veering while rubbernecking an accident, and I have never felt that my evasive maneuvers or reaction time were in any way compromised by the fact that during the whole process I had an audiobook playing.
There may be people out there who cannot process more than one input at a time, and I would suggest that those people should not be allowed to drive. Period. If anything, I have found that trying to solely concentrate on driving is actually counter-productive as it fatigues me a lot more than listening to books on tape.
Driving does require attention, but for the most part even my extremely defensive driving, with constant scanning, anticipating and reacting, is in no way compromised by audiobooks.
Cheers,
Philabeemer
Note: I am not affiliated with audible.com except as an extremely happy customer.
U
USERNAME
Guest
thanks to all the good advice pro and con, i've decided to do a little testing on my own. after all, my brain is not your brain, so i might as well see what mine can handle. last night i purchased some etymotic er6i earbuds an iPod mini and the little remote control fob-thing. in addition, i went and snagged a copy of total recorder that allows me to record streaming audio to mp3 format and listen to it later. so right now, my PC at home is sucking down episodes of this american life and as soon as everything arrives, i'll go do three types of riding listening to both music and spoken word, and try to step outside myself and see how my attention is focused. i'll ride in town, commuting. i'll ride country roads. i'll go do an hour on the local interstate. then i'll post my thoughts in this thread. it'll be interesting.
thanks to everyone for taking the time to read and post.
thanks to everyone for taking the time to read and post.
U
USERNAME
Guest
running the risk of talking to myself, i'll provide an update.
this past weekend the ipod arrived. i loaded a number of songs and a few episodes of TAL. then i spent 30 minutes to an hour futzing around trying to figure out how i wanted to mount the ipod. there doesn't seem to be a simple solution with my current tankbag and jacket. this tells me that the ipod is an excelletn piece of equipment, becuase it is enabling, no, DEMANDING another gear purchase. so i'm going to shop for tank bags. anyway, i mounted it in my current bag, and fa-shizzled a little tab to clip the remote to, and i was ready to go.
the noise in the helmet was just too much. i had to turn everything way up to hear it on the highway. then when i'd stop, it would seem super loud. i need to re-evaluate the whole thing when the other earbuds arrive. if they cut down the noise enough, i should be all set.
as for content vs. road type, i got the results i expected. listening to something like this american life while riding on city streets, any road with hairy traffic, and on curvy technical roads was dangerous for me. i tried all three and decided i don't have the right kind of brain to listen to meaningful speaking and focus on the ride at the same time. i'm going to try again with the etymotics, because they will (should) allow me to listen at a lower volume level, and that may be less distracting, but i'm ok with it not working out.
music on the above roads was fine, albeit too loud. (i dont like things loud.)
TAL on a dull piece of highway was another story. that was no problem.
i havent found a way to measure it quantitatively, but for me, it's a function of number of stimuli. on the slab, it's few stimuli. in the city, with more cars coming at me from different directions, stoplights, etc, i need too much of my brain to let some be devoted to decoding and interpreting interesting radio. too many of the stimuli are critical and need to be focused upon, and that focus needs to rotate and shift around to different ones at different times.
i'll re-test with the etymotics sometime this week, and post again.
anyone with a slick tankbag/jacket/ipod mounting/cord routing scheme, please weigh in, i'm looking for ideas.
this past weekend the ipod arrived. i loaded a number of songs and a few episodes of TAL. then i spent 30 minutes to an hour futzing around trying to figure out how i wanted to mount the ipod. there doesn't seem to be a simple solution with my current tankbag and jacket. this tells me that the ipod is an excelletn piece of equipment, becuase it is enabling, no, DEMANDING another gear purchase. so i'm going to shop for tank bags. anyway, i mounted it in my current bag, and fa-shizzled a little tab to clip the remote to, and i was ready to go.
the noise in the helmet was just too much. i had to turn everything way up to hear it on the highway. then when i'd stop, it would seem super loud. i need to re-evaluate the whole thing when the other earbuds arrive. if they cut down the noise enough, i should be all set.
as for content vs. road type, i got the results i expected. listening to something like this american life while riding on city streets, any road with hairy traffic, and on curvy technical roads was dangerous for me. i tried all three and decided i don't have the right kind of brain to listen to meaningful speaking and focus on the ride at the same time. i'm going to try again with the etymotics, because they will (should) allow me to listen at a lower volume level, and that may be less distracting, but i'm ok with it not working out.
music on the above roads was fine, albeit too loud. (i dont like things loud.)
TAL on a dull piece of highway was another story. that was no problem.
i havent found a way to measure it quantitatively, but for me, it's a function of number of stimuli. on the slab, it's few stimuli. in the city, with more cars coming at me from different directions, stoplights, etc, i need too much of my brain to let some be devoted to decoding and interpreting interesting radio. too many of the stimuli are critical and need to be focused upon, and that focus needs to rotate and shift around to different ones at different times.
i'll re-test with the etymotics sometime this week, and post again.
anyone with a slick tankbag/jacket/ipod mounting/cord routing scheme, please weigh in, i'm looking for ideas.
BRADFORDBENN
Slowpoke & Proud of It!
I just tried an audio book on a plane flight, after reading this thread.
I slept through most of it. Then again, there were some mitigating circumstances. Was up at 4:30AM for flight, got five hours of sleep. Book was 7 Habits of Highly Effective People.
I slept through most of it. Then again, there were some mitigating circumstances. Was up at 4:30AM for flight, got five hours of sleep. Book was 7 Habits of Highly Effective People.
dancogan
New member
Some audio helps the driver
Sunday I mapped out a route on my Street Pilot, popped it into the RAM mount, attached a small earbud type device, and headed out. I found the audio instructions very, very helpful on the road. Particularly when headed down the slap at 75+mph (which I don't do very often), it was nice to get verbal clues of which exit to take, or which way I would turn at the next exit. It helped me keep my eyes on the road and the traffic ahead. Even though the Street Pilot gives large, very visible cues for each turn, the verbal cues were far nicer, and not distracting.
Sunday I mapped out a route on my Street Pilot, popped it into the RAM mount, attached a small earbud type device, and headed out. I found the audio instructions very, very helpful on the road. Particularly when headed down the slap at 75+mph (which I don't do very often), it was nice to get verbal clues of which exit to take, or which way I would turn at the next exit. It helped me keep my eyes on the road and the traffic ahead. Even though the Street Pilot gives large, very visible cues for each turn, the verbal cues were far nicer, and not distracting.
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USERNAME
Guest
BradfordBenn said:
brad - i think it is BEAUTIFUL that you slept through a book like that. totally hilarious. im guessing "sleeping through motivational books on tape" is not one of the habits?
fantastic.
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USERNAME
Guest
MIKETHEBIKE said:
U
USERNAME
Guest
ok, the etymotic earbuds came today.
WOOOOOOO! they *rule.* i havent been this happy with a product since i got my ipod on saturday.
if you listen to music while riding, and if you use earbuds, and if you don't have these, run, don't walk, to froogle.com and find yourself a pair. mine were $100 delivered, and they are worth every penny.
i slid them in, and whammo, they knocked down the ambient noise BETTER than the foam earplugs i normally wear while riding. i jumped on the bike, and rode around listening to TAL, and at a very low volume. the sound was wonderful, and i could hear every little nuance of ira glass's voice while bombing down the highway at 70. pretty sweet.
i also re-tested things, and with the ambient noise knocked down, and the headphones at a lower volume, listening to spoken word and riding in town, at night, and on really dark back roads, was not a chore. i was able to focus on the riding. i found that at a few times i tuned into the riding, and out of the listening, and i attribute that to the low volume at which i was able to listen.
and music was a slam dunk, sounded amazing (i heard parts of one of bob dylan's songs from the "live in 1966" album that i've never heard - shuffling around and voices of the crowd, and that was way cool.) and was a pleasure.
im happy, i'm ready to ride, and can now listen to someone besides me talk and sing. bliss.
WOOOOOOO! they *rule.* i havent been this happy with a product since i got my ipod on saturday.
if you listen to music while riding, and if you use earbuds, and if you don't have these, run, don't walk, to froogle.com and find yourself a pair. mine were $100 delivered, and they are worth every penny.
i slid them in, and whammo, they knocked down the ambient noise BETTER than the foam earplugs i normally wear while riding. i jumped on the bike, and rode around listening to TAL, and at a very low volume. the sound was wonderful, and i could hear every little nuance of ira glass's voice while bombing down the highway at 70. pretty sweet.
i also re-tested things, and with the ambient noise knocked down, and the headphones at a lower volume, listening to spoken word and riding in town, at night, and on really dark back roads, was not a chore. i was able to focus on the riding. i found that at a few times i tuned into the riding, and out of the listening, and i attribute that to the low volume at which i was able to listen.
and music was a slam dunk, sounded amazing (i heard parts of one of bob dylan's songs from the "live in 1966" album that i've never heard - shuffling around and voices of the crowd, and that was way cool.) and was a pleasure.
im happy, i'm ready to ride, and can now listen to someone besides me talk and sing. bliss.
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