Ever wondered why swatting a fly is so difficult or even impossible? They have a scientific edge on humans. Compared to you and me, flies see our world in slow motion. That’s right. Flies experience each tick of the clock more slowly than humans.
The speed at which images are processed by our brain is called “flicker fusion rate”. In general, the smaller the species, the faster its critical flicker fusion rate – and flies, in particular, put us to shame. Humans average 60 flashes per second, turtles 15, and flies 250. As a general rule, the smaller the animal, the faster the flicker fusion rate.
In her “fly lab” at Cambridge University, Dr. Paloma Gonzales-Bellido demonstrated the killer flies’ hunting behavior by releasing fruit fly prey into a special filming box with a female killer fly. In our snail-like flicker rate, the fly twitched. But after reviewing the 1,000 frame slow motion film, what Dr. Paloma observed was the killer fly taking off, circling the fruit fly three times as it tried to grab it repeatedly, before succeeding in capturing the elusive fruit fly with its front legs.
Makes you wonder how you can more efficiently spend your time doesn’t it? We may be unable to biologically control our fusion flicker rate, but we certainly can maximize each moment by focusing on the things that deliver the biggest impact to the most people.
“Things may come to those who wait, but only the things left by those who hustle.” – Abraham Lincoln
“Time is what we want most, but what we use worst” – William Penn