[JV153]

I wonder if the reason so many people are looking at their computer (or Ipod, smart phone, etc.) screen is because of some kind of phototactic response ?

[Sixstrings]

I wonder if the reason so many people are looking at their computer (or Ipod, smart phone, etc.) screen is because of some kind of phototactic response ?

I had to look that up.

Phototaxis is a kind of taxis, or locomotory movement, that occurs when a whole organism moves towards or away from stimulus of light.[1] This is advantageous for phototrophic organisms as they can orient themselves most efficiently to receive light for photosynthesis. Phototaxis is called positive if the movement is in the direction of increasing light intensity and negative if the direction is opposite.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phototaxis

I would say it's more Pavlovian. Text messages and Facebook, and even forums like this, hit those same areas in the brain as a slot machine does.

Especially text messages and the old "crackberry addicts."

I'm kind of neutral about it, it's like the next step in human evolution, and not necessarily bad. Like these aliens on Star Trek who communicated constantly in binary with these little devices stuck to their hips.

[JV153]

Yeah, you got it. If I recall that ST:TNG episode Riker gets stuck in some kind of holographic joint with a woman in red while the binars take over the Enterprise computer. I don't know, they look kind of pale and ill, those binars. Probably don't get enough sunlight.