Fix Your Eyes On...

I am deeply honored (and admittedly somewhat anxious) to be here tonight. Thank you most certainly for this opportunity.
 
I would like to do three things in this presentation: I would to engage us all in a common experience. Then, I hope to use this experience to say “congratulations” and to issue a sort of challenge for us all to consider. Let’s get to the experience!

In just a moment, you are going to view a short video segment. As you watch, you will see people wearing black T-shirts and white T-shirts. The people wearing white shirts are passing a basketball to one another while the people in black T-shirts are passing a different basketball to one another. The task for each of you (and I’m serious here!) is to silently count the number of passes by players wearing white shirts. Do not count passes by the players in black—only passes between the players in white. This counting task requires concentration, so I ask that you count silently to yourself so as not to distract your neighbors. Everyone here can undoubtedly do what I am asking you to do as long as you concentrate. Let’s go ahead and view the video segment.

[video—basketball passing between people wearing white and black T-shirts]

How many passes did you count? By the way, nod your head if you noticed anything unexpected in this segment. What is it that surprised you? A gorilla appears to have been seen by some of us here. Let’s rewind and watch one more time to see if this could possibly be the case. Watch again.

[video again—basketball passing between people wearing white and black T-shirts]

Hmmm… A good number of us appear to have noticed the gorilla, but judging from the laughter, a good number of us did not. How could this happen?

Lest you think that it is only strange event, like gorillas, that people might fail to notice, let’s watch one more segment. Here you will see an experimente, a university student, approach an unsuspecting pedestria, a white-haired man with a beard, and the student you’ll see is asking the man for directions on a university campus. Watch what happens during their interaction.

[video—the “switcheroo” involving the bearded man and a university student]

Important note: When studied in research settings, of the observers who were engaged in the counting task involving the gorilla, 50% failed to notice the fully visible creature moving across the screen. Similarly, 50% of all observers who were focused on giving directions failed to detect the substitution of one person for another like you just saw. Further, many observers (like many of you) expressed utter surprise that they could have missed such obviousness.

A term in literature for this sort of cognitive blindness is called “inattentional blindness” put forward by a psychology professor named Dan Simons of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Simons noted that when people are engaged in an attention-demanding task, people often fail to notice unexpected objects or events.Somehow the focusing task prompts observers to overlook the seemingly obvious.

I would like to use this phenomenon to draw two parallels that seem appropriate to our honors celebration here.

First parallel: One of the positive aspects associated with “inattentional blindness” is that persons can focus so effectively on a task that all other distractions can be blocked effectively.  Our special guests tonight, you honors students, have concentrated on the intellectual tasks presented to you and blocked out many different distractions. You are an accomplished group who are to be honored for your focus, sacrifice, and determination. I offer congratulations to you and to those who support you.

Second parallel:“Inattentional blindness” has positive as well as negative implications to consider. One humorous instance of this fact occurred when I was a graduate student who was near and yet so seemingly far from finishing my dissertation. My grad school colleagues and I kept a list based on our experiences that was titled, “You know you are a graduate student when…” For instance:

1. you take your laptop with you wherever you go—even to the bathroom!

or

1. You regard acetaminophen as a vitamin and you wonder how long you can live on pasta without getting scurvy.

The item on this list that displays “inattentional blindness” went something like the following: “You know you're a grad student when… you pause in the midst of work on your dissertation and fail to notice until the third bite of a sandwich that you are literally consuming the paper liner often placed between cheese slices in packages of cheese!" Yes, I admit; I was so focused on analyzing data that I failed to notice until “bite three” of a sandwich that I made for myself that the texture of my sandwich was quite unusual and wrong.

This last experience prompts me and I hope prompts all of us to consider potentially negative implications of “inattentional blindness.” Obviously, such consequences can be humorous, but on a more serious note, this tendency has potential to result in challenging negative implications.

Think on a personal level with me for a moment. In our work, I submit that we may be SO focused on a task that we fail to observe around us what ought not be missed. For instance, while engrossed in reading a piece of literature, watch that you don’t fail to notice your four-year-old daughter who wants desperately to dance with you as she twirls in her new dress; while thinking deeply about a sermon or brief you must write, do not overlook the opportunity to foster a relationship with a friend who urgently needs to know he or she is loved. While pursuing a novel pharmaceutical treatment, pause to determine whether or not the process you’re undertaking is mindful of God’s precious creation. Most importantly, while hard at work doing what is likely very good work, let us not fail to notice that God deserves our focused worship and devotion. Hebrews 12, verse 2 reads, “Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross.”

In closing, let me say: When I think of all that you honors students, especially the graduates here, have accomplished, I am confident that you will be put in positions of great responsibility which will demand your focused careful attention. You are well prepared for these responsibilities. At the same time, I challenge you to stand alert so that as you work you don’t miss the “gorilla in the room.”  

Blessings to all of you. Thank you.