You Are Here: Why We Can Find Our Way to the Moon, but Get Lost in the Mall
240
You Are Here: Why We Can Find Our Way to the Moon, but Get Lost in the Mall
240eBook
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Overview
An eye-opening exploration of the intriguing and often counter-intuitive science of human navigation and experience of place.
In the age of GPS and iPhones, human beings it would seem have mastered the art of direction, but does the need for these devices signal something else—that as a species we are actually hopelessly lost. In fact we've filled our world with signs and arrows. We still get lost in the mall, or a maze of cubicles. What does this say about us? Drawing on his exhaustive research, Professor Collin Ellard illuminates how humans are disconnected from our world and what this means, not just for how we get from A to B, but also for how we construct our cities, our workplaces, our homes, and even our lives.
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9780385530422 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group |
| Publication date: | 07/07/2009 |
| Sold by: | Random House |
| Format: | eBook |
| Pages: | 240 |
| File size: | 6 MB |
About the Author
Read an Excerpt
Chapter 1
Looking For Targets
Simple Tactics for Finding Our Way
That We Share With All Other Animals
Following the light of the sun, we left the Old World
We’ve all done it. At a meeting, a conference, a wedding, or a simple potluck gathering with friends, the food appears. Though manners may prompt us to restrain ourselves for a few minutes, our antennae wave, our restless feet shuffle, and we make a beeline for the tables. If a scientist were to hover above us and measure our movements, it would be easy to show the average guest-to-plate distance as a steadily decreasing mathematical function. This class of behavior, called taxis, is the simplest kind of spatial behavior that can be imagined. All that is required is a target (that magnificent roast of beef), a sensor or two (our well-tuned nostrils and eyes), and some kind of motive force (sore feet squeezed into formal shoes will do nicely).
Life does not always treat us so kindly, though. On our way to the table, Longtalker Larry makes a perfect intercept course. How to rearrange the missile trajectory so as to home in on the canapés while avoiding verbal entanglement with Larry? The buffet table has two rows of food. On the closest side is Aunt Betty’s famous potato salad, but it looks a little bland. The better bet is Sarah’s Spicy Potatoes, but they’re just out of reach. We’ll need to thread our way through a crowd, momentarily losing sight of the target completely, in order to plan the return foray to starch Valhalla on the distal side of the room. What’s the quickest way? Perhaps the party is in a building we’ve never seen before. The sweet aromas are everywhere, but compared to what vision gives us, they don’t make much of a spatial cue. Which way do we go first? How do we conduct an efficient search?
Compared with many of the stories of feats of navigation that I will relate to you, finding your way to and then around a table full of food is small potatoes (Sarah’s if you’re lucky). Nevertheless, all such behaviors, ranging from the trivially simple taxis to the complex wayfinding task, point to one basic truth of biology. Unlike the potted geranium sitting in my window, you and I, like all other animate beings, need to be able to move from one place to another to survive. In order to remain nourished, I must get up from my chair and go to the fridge to find food. In order to avoid a premature demise, I need to leap out of the way of the bus that hurtles down the road toward me. The whole raw biological point of my individual survival is to reproduce. But this, too, requires movement. In order to pass my genes on, I need to be able to get up and walk around until I find a mate. (This, you may argue, is something of an oversimplification.) To survive, we must come to terms with space and time. Whatever the physicists and philosophers might say about these things, movement is defined as a change in place over some duration of time. Given this, it is not at all surprising that nature has produced a wide array of mechanical devices that produce movement (legs, wings, fins, and so on). In addition, we have evolved an even more impressive arsenal of tools that allow us to know where to move—that is, to find our way through space to important goals such as sustenance, warmth, safety, and sex.
The simplest tricks of navigation are perhaps so obvious that we don’t even think of them as being tricks. You are walking down the aisle in a grocery store when, just ahead of you, you see the box of spaghetti you’ve been seeking. With little or no conscious effort, the box is soon in your hand and then in your shopping cart. What’s to explain? This seemingly trivial piece of behavior—moving to a clearly visible target—is something that we do hundreds of times a day. Such behaviors are required of all animals that move, yet they are accomplished in a wide variety of ways.
The most primitive kinds of animals, one-celled creatures such as bacteria, though their needs may be simple, must still possess a basic toolkit that allows them to find their way to conditions that sustain life: light, heat, and sustenance. Sometimes these unicellular denizens of our soil, water, and even our own bodies can employ a search strategy much like a child playing a game of blind man’s bluff. Their rates of movement rise and fall with the activity of sensors tuned to the concentrations of heat, light, or chemicals that surround them, and these changes in movement bring them inexorably into contact with their goal. Other than the movement of a plant bending toward the light, it is difficult to imagine a simpler mechanism by which a living thing can deal with the problems of space.
In other cases, such tiny creatures as these may possess specialized equipment to help them guide their movements. In 1996, a group of scientists, headed by Dr. David McKay of NASA’s Johnson Space Center, claimed they had discovered fossil evidence for the existence of life on Mars in a lump of meteoric rock that had been collected from the Antarctic. Analysis of the chemical composition of the rock left little doubt that it was of Martian origin, and the peculiar formations inside the rock looked suspiciously biological. Researchers thought they could see tiny cell bodies, reminiscent of our own earthly bacteria.
As some of McKay’s early evidence has been disputed by others, the initial excitement has died down, but he remains convinced that the particles of magnetite that were found in the sample once constituted a part of a Martian life form. Magnetite is found in various places on our planet, but one of the most interesting homes for this magnetic mineral is inside single-celled organisms that employ a unique style of navigation. So-called magnetotaxic animals use particles of magnetite as tiny compasses that orient their bodies with planetary geography. Though these magnetite bodies take advantage of the earth’s magnetic field in exactly the same way that makes the Boy Scout compass face north, in this case it is not to help them to read maps correctly but to do something much simpler: the magnetite pulls these tiny aquatic animals downward into the lakebeds lining their watery homes, where they find food, safety, and comfortable temperatures. The origin of the magnetite found in McKay’s samples is a matter that still swirls in controversy, but if he is correct, not only will his discovery constitute the first evidence of extraterrestrial life but his claim will be based on an elementary form of navigation.
Interviews
Did You Know?, by Colin Ellard
Author of YOU ARE HERE: Why We Can Find Our Way to the Moon but Get Lost in the Mall
According to a survey of 12,500 people in 13 countries conducted by Nokia, 93% of people reported becoming lost on a regular basis. 30% blamed their partners. Almost half of respondents admitted to giving wrong directions on purpose. 11% of Russians have asked for directions even when they weren't lost, just to flirt.
One out of ten people have missed a job interview, an important business meeting, or a flight because they lost their way.
In 2007, a Thai woman was reunited with her family after having been lost for 25 years after getting on the wrong bus for a shopping trip to Malaysia.
Men may not ask for directions because they have greater difficulty following them. Women navigate using routes and men navigate using compass orientation.
A poorly designed you-are-here map can actually make it more difficult for you to find your way than no map at all.
The top five cities in which residents report becoming lost are (in order) London, Paris, Bangkok, Hong Kong, and Beijing.
A desert ant can wander in a random path equal in human distances to the length of a marathon and then return in a straight line to within about 2 inches of its nest, even if it can't see the nest.
Food-storing birds can remember the hidden locations of about 80,000 food stashes in a single fall season.
The wood mouse actually makes its own direction signs by leaving twigs at important decision points on its travels.
Italian homing pigeons navigate using mental maps which include major highways and railroad tracks.
Top 10 Ways to Avoid Getting Lost, By Colin Ellard
1. Take the time to smell (and look at) the roses. The difference between expert way-finders and the rest of us probably has much to do with being able to pay attention to details. Take the time to soak in the sights, sounds, and smells so that they'll be familiar on the return. Try not to walk (or drive) on auto-pilot.
2. Remembrance of things passed. Insects use a strategy called the "look-back." It's exactly what it sounds like. From time to time, turn around and look behind you so that you'll be better able to recognize a scene on the way back.
3. Don't get lost in time. We are as bad at keeping track of when as we are at keeping track of where. When travelling through unfamiliar territory, check the time frequently so you'll know how long a trip has taken. Then you can estimate how long it will take to return.
4. Every route's a story. Ancient way-finders connected places with stories to help them remember routes. When walking, try to stitch the things you see into a tall tale that you'll remember later.
5. Embrace your inner geek. Remember that technology is your friend. If you're out in nature and you're carrying a compass, check it frequently before you get lost so that you'll have some idea of your route. If you're using a GPS, make sure you know how it works before you need it (and make sure the batteries work!).
6. Head for home. When visiting somewhere new, assign one major area or street as the home base and return to it frequently during your explorations. This will help you build a better mental map quickly.
7. Stop, drop, and wait. If you become seriously lost in wilderness, stop moving! Search and rescue teams always begin their "hasty search" from your last known location, and the less you move away from it, the faster you'll be found.
8. Picture yourself found. If you have a digital camera, take lots of pictures of your route. In a pinch, you will be able to refer to your pictures to remind you of sights along your route, but even without doing so, taking pictures forces you to pay attention to where you are.
9. Don't lose your cool. Remember that we all become lost from time to time. Getting angry with your partner or yourself will only distract you and make it more difficult to find your way.
10. Stay on track. Most people become lost in natural spaces because they leave a marked trail. Never overestimate your abilities to find your way back.
How To Use Psychology to Organize the Spaces Where We Work, Rest and Play
Home spaces
Create refuges using corners, alcoves, and varying ceiling heights. Our feelings of comfort in our homes are directly related to ancient biological needs to feel protected from predators
In natural settings, we're happiest when we can see grand vistas such as those given by ocean or hilltop views. The same kind of satisfaction can be obtained in interiors by careful arrangement of furniture to provide views of the most active parts of the house.
Studies show we are attracted to the subtle promise of a new sight lying just around a corner. As visitors enter a home, some of their sight lines should be slightly occluded, inviting them inward to explore. Even small changes like the clever placement of a chair, a decorative screen or a large plant can create alluring mystery in a home.
Centers in our home are those quiet places where we go to rest, daydream and to talk to one another. If seating is located too close to the pathways that are used to go from room to room then these spaces cannot function as centers. In the words of Gertrude Stein, "there's no There there." Changing the orientation of a chair or a sofa to make an oasis of quietness in a busy room, using lighting to bathe a seating area in an inviting glow, or clever use of area rugs can help to define centers.
Work spaces
Work spaces should be organized to balance the need for quiet and privacy with the importance of social interactions. Cubicle farms should be avoided in favour of semi-open designs with good sight lines to co-workers.
Unplanned interactions between co-workers with very different work-roles lead to creativity and ingenuity in an organization. Encourage such interactions by providing a major central corridor-a kind of "Main Street" shared by all workers.
We judge distances as much by how many turns we make as we do by how many steps we take. To encourage interactions, consider office layouts with simple, strong traffic lines rather than confusing maze-like arrangements which can make people feel further apart.
Be careful with completely open office plans that lack dedicated territories for individual workers. Though such plans can work well for companies in which employees spend much of their time in the field, they can also lead to confusion, distraction, and lowered productivity.
City spaces
The success of a city depends on getting people on the street, and this is done by understanding the psychology of the walker.
Making time pass quickly can make distances shrink, bring destinations closer together and encourage walking. To speed the passage of time, increase the interest of streetscapes by adding features and details.
When we wander a city, our feet are led by our eyes and our gaze can be captured by the most eye-catching lines in the view. Flowing horizontal lines encourage movement. Vaulting vertical lines, as seen in tall facades, slow us down and make us linger. Simple principles like these can be used to influence how we move, where we stop, and where crowds build.
Urban greenspace is not a frill but is essential to health. Groomed, geometric lawns and tidy rows of potted trees do not restore us as well as wilder spaces, but can be used to frame gathering places. Unruly wild places in the urban scene, even very small ones, can actually change our biology and should be placed centrally so that we are strongly encouraged to walk through them.
People will use automobiles in cities whenever they can, even when it isn't the simplest, fastest or least expensive means of travel. Measures that discourage the use of cars will almost always result in a higher quality of urban life in every respect, but they must be very powerful to work.