Re: Look backwards for safety

From: Michael M. Butler (butler@comp-lib.org)
Date: Sun Sep 30 2001 - 22:44:36 MDT


John Clark wrote:
>
> Michael M. Butler <butler@comp-lib.org> Wrote:
>
> > Yep. The tradeoff is that many more passengers would get motion sick.
>
> Why?

Motion sickness has a lot to do with all one's neurosystems agreeing that
all (or most) sensory (perceptive and proprioceptive) information is in agreement
with the expectations of the prefrontal lobes and the limbic system.

People are accustomed to, and wired for, traveling, more or less, in the
direction they are looking (I think one of the words for this is "syntonic").

Vestibular and nystagmus inputs are more likely to appear unfamiliar; also,
things like horizon tilt must be decoded in an unfamiliar fashion.

Googling "motion sickness" backwards gives us

www.entnet.org/dizziness.html ,
12.14.200.4/sjhealth/health/stories/0626motion.htm ,
    and a host of similar sites with the same warning.

As a related matter, many extremely competent combat pilots are subject to motion
sickness *when they are passengers*. It is conjectured that they resolve their
sensory inputs with processing the eye-hand-vehicle control loop, and become
uncomfortable when that loop is not available.

MMB

-- 
Job One:  MAKE YOURSELF USEFUL.  If you're not part of the solution, 
  what are you doing scumming up the bottom of our beaker? --MMB  
"Let's roll." --Last words heard over Todd Beamer's cell phone 
   before the counterassault aboard UA93, 02001.09.11.~10:10EDT



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