📘 Part 3: Feeling tired

This episode's vocabulary

Multitasking (noun) - a person's or product's ability to do more than one thing at a time.

To drain (verb) - to make someone very tired.

Complexity (noun) -the state of having many parts and being difficult to understand or find an answer to.

Nuance (noun) - a very slight difference in appearance, meaning, sound, etc.

To get to grips with something (idiom) - to make an effort to understand and deal with a problem or situation.

Fine (adj.) - very exact and delicate, or needing to be done, treated, or considered very carefully.

Taxing (adj.) - difficult or needing a lot of thought or effort.

To sanction (verb) - to formally give permission for something.

Automation (noun) - the use of machines and computers that can operate without needing human control.

Fatigued (adj.) - tired.

Geriatric (adj.) - for or relating to old people.

Practitioner (noun) - someone involved in a skilled job or activity.

To emit (verb) - to send out light, sound, or a smell, or a gas or other substance.

Blue light (noun) - a band of the visible light spectrum that has a shorter wavelength and produces higher energy than other colours of light: occurring in sunlight and emitted by electronic devices that use LED technology.

Questions and Answers

M: Why do people feel tired in today's world?

R: Oh, all kinds of reasons. There's a lot going on. Probably the biggest one is... It's when you try to do things at the same time. Multitasking. That's it. People are always trying to multitask. And I think that really drains your energy.

M: How could studying and learning make people tired today?

R: I'm not sure it does any more so that it has in the past. However, let's say it does, maybe it's all the complexity and nuance. Yes. The nuances that are required, or the nuances that students are required to be aware of at higher levels of education. So getting to grips with all those finer points could be quite taxing because of all the effort involved.

M: When do people usually feel tired?

R: Oh, we already talked about multitasking, but generally they have a lot on. There are more people to see, things to do, both in terms of raw numbers and what people have on their schedules. That's enough to make anyone feel drained.

M: Do people have fewer holidays now than in the past?

R: Well, that depends how you define the word holiday. I mean, they probably have more holidays given officially. No. Sanctioned. Yes. By the state compared to the past. And there are more opportunities to visit far flung places. However, if you just mean downtime away from work and school, then I think there actually might be fewer holidays. Yeah.

M: And what about the future? Do you think people will have fewer holidays in the future?

R: Well, if it's about official state-sanctioned holidays, then I imagine they might actually have more because as automation increases, we'll have more free time.

M: What are the differences between feeling tired after studying and after exercising?

R: Well, one is more psychological and the other is more... Oh, not psychological, physiological in nature. You can feel tired in your head after taking notes for ages, whereas you'll feel fatigued in your body after working out, though you could lie there and think clearly while you rest.

M: How can people solve the problems of old people getting tired easily?

R: I honestly have no idea. I'm not a doctor or a, what, specialist in old people, a geriatric practitioner. That's it. But if I were to guess, though, I'd imagine we could provide more nutritious food and opportunities to exercise and maintain or build energy to keep them up and running.

M: How can technology such as smartphones or computers contribute to feeling tired?

R: Oh, there's that thing that they emit. It's called... It's a colour. Blue light. Yes. The blue light makes people feel awake, even when it's the time when they would usually sleep. That's why it's always a good idea to spend an hour away from your phone before you sleep. Or maybe you could get some sort of anti-blue light screen or something like that.