I find your scientific proof, impecable. Excelent work!

I buy it. I can hardly monotask, let alone multi…

[…] via: 43folders.com […]

[…] So many women proclaim that they can multi-task successfully. This statement of feminine oneupmanship has somehow been used to beat simplistic men around the ears for years now. Logically it isn’t possible to multi-task, but I will not go down that road now. Then I came across this post on Merlin Mann’s wonderful blog, 43 Folders that showed this by Tim Morgan. […]

I have to disagree. Everyone I know on the Internet uses at least 5% of their brain power thinking about coffee.

[…] Found courtesy of 43 Folders […]

QUICK! Without checking, tell me is the orginal author male or female? Yet, more proof of what the female of the species have always know, men have yet to evolve to a point where they can multitask!

emily,

The humor of your quip asside, I’ve known women who think that they can multitask well, and indeed can better than any guy I’ve known. It comes with a dear cost. Care and stress. As stress mounts, you lose the ability to do things with care. It bites you in the end. Inevitably.

The traditional lifestyle of most women, housekeeping, does train them better for multitasking. But the relentlessness of it doesn’t train them how to relax. And that’s what men can do, with aplomb!

We should train each other as much as possible and find the middle ground, no?

Your first assignment is to go lie on the couch for an hour and a half!

As a male who thought until recently that he could multitask, and has watched women who thought they could multitask, I have to say that it’s a myth. As Jonathan says, you lose all ability to do things with care, you are at the mercy of stress, and as stress takes over, you lose the ability to focus. Sure, you think you can focus, but what you’ve really done is bit off the heads of all the “fools” who “can’t multitask” and have rammed your own idea down the pike by force of grating personality alone.

Also, Emily, your second assignment is to learn how to punctuate. ;-)

[…] I realized that my ability to multi-task has diminished quite alot. It seems I end up wasting more time getting things done then if I firmly see each one through with 100% of my concentration. Maybe the myth of multi-tasking is true after all. […]