[Whit Blauvelt]

Don,

The negative affect some find in the default, mind wandering, daydream mode may not be, as you claim, the results of biological evolution, but merely a symptom of the modern discomfort in being in any state other than task-focused or entertainment-focused. I’ve always loved daydreaming. I’m sure I’m not the only one. Discomfort with it looks more like a culture-relative shortcoming, in our world where everything’s on the clock. Telling just-so stories about “programmed” “‘negativity bias'” where the evidence is nothing better than small studies on what tiny samples of modern college students feel when not occupied by work or entertainment is speculative, to say the least, not yet a proven scientific fact.

Not all of us become anxious when between tasks and entertainments. It may well be culture, not biology, which makes that the case for some.