Do Our Gadgets Really Threaten Planes?

　　WAS ALEC BALDWIN RIGHT? When the actor tussled withAmerican Airlines personnel last December over his desire tocontinue playing a game on his phone during takeoff, he wasevicted from the flight. Defying airline safety rules is not a goodidea, but was Baldwin perhaps correct not to take the dangerseriously?

　　On Aug. 31, the Federal Aviation Administration requested public comment on its longstandingpolicy of prohibiting the use of personal electronics during takeoffs and landings. The restrictionsdate back to 1991 and were motivated in part by anecdotal reports from pilots and flight crewsthat electronic devices affected an airliner's navigation equipment or disrupted communicationbetween the cockpit and the ground. Over the years, however, Boeing has been unable toduplicate these problems, and the FAA can only say that the devices' radio signals 'may' interferewith flight operations.

　　To gather some empirical evidence on this question, we recently conducted an online survey of 492 American adults who have flown in the past year. In this sample, 40% said they did not turntheir phones off completely during takeoff and landing on their most recent flight; more than 7% left their phones on, with the Wi-Fi and cellular communications functions active. And 2% pulled afull Baldwin, actively using their phones when they weren't supposed to.

　　Consider what these numbers imply. The odds that all 78 of the passengers who travel on anaverage-size U.S. domestic flight have properly turned off their phones are infinitesimal: less thanone in 100 quadrillion, by our rough calculation. If personal electronics are really as dangerous asthe FAA rules suggest, navigation and communication would be disrupted every day on domesticflights. But we don't see that.

　　Why has the regulation remained in force for so long despite the lack of solid evidence to supportit? Human minds are notoriously overzealous 'cause detectors.' When two events occur close intime, and one plausibly might have caused the other, we tend to assume it did. There is no reasonto doubt the anecdotes told by airline personnel about glitches that have occurred on flights whenthey also have discovered someone illicitly using a device.

　　But when thinking about these anecdotes, we don't consider that glitches also occur in theabsence of illicit gadget use. More important, we don't consider how often gadgets have been inuse when flights have been completed without a hitch. Our survey strongly suggests that thereare multiple gadget violators on almost every flight.

　　Fear is a powerful motivator, and precaution is a natural response. Regulators are loath to makepolicies less restrictive, out of a justifiable concern for passenger safety. It is easy to visualize thehorrific consequences should a phone cause a plane to crash, so the FAA imposes thisinconvenience as a precaution.

　　Once a restriction is in place, though, removing it becomes a challenge because every day withouta gadget-induced accident cements our belief that the status quo is right and justified. Unfortunately, this logic is little better than that of Homer Simpson, who organized an elaborateBear Patrol in the city of Springfield and exulted in the absence of bear sightings that ensued.

　　We are not suggesting that people should disobey the current rules. But we believe strongly thatpolicies like the FAA's ban should be based on evidence rather than on fear. The evidence showsthat nearly every flight must have some phones and gadgets on, and those flights have not beenfalling out of the sky.

　　亞歷克?鮑德溫(Alec Baldwin)做得對嗎？2011年12月，這位演員堅持要在航班起飛時繼續玩手機游戲，與美國航空公司(American Airlines)的空乘人員發生爭執，結果被趕下飛機。違反航空公司的安全規定不是一個好主意，但鮑德溫認為飛機起降時使用手機并沒那么危險的觀點有沒有可能是正確的呢？

　　2012年8月31日，美國聯邦航空管理局(Federal Aviation Administration，簡稱FAA)就其長期以來堅持的禁止在飛機起降期間使用個人電子設備的規定向公眾征詢意見。這項禁令可以追溯到1991年，部分是源于一些飛行員和空乘人員的非正式反饋，說電子設備會影響飛機的導航設備，或干擾駕駛艙與地面的通訊。然而，這么多年來，波音公司(Boeing)一直無法證實這類問題的存在，FAA也只是表示，電子設備的無線訊號“可能會”干擾航班運營。

　　為搜集電子設備是否會干擾飛機起降的實際證據，近期我們對492名在過去一年中搭乘過航班的美國成年人做了一項網上調查。在該樣本中，40%的受訪者表示，在其近期的大多數航程中，他們沒有完全關閉手機；7%以上的受訪者說他們沒有關機，無線Wi-Fi和手機通訊功能都處于啟動當中；還有2%的受訪者則跟鮑德溫一樣違反了相關規定，在飛機起降時仍在使用手機。

　　讓我們想想這些數字意味著什么。一架美國國內班機平均能容納78名乘客，而根據我們的粗略計算，這78人全部關閉手機的可能性是無窮小的：小于十萬萬億分之一。如果個人電子設備真像FAA所說的那么危險，那么美國國內航班的導航系統和通訊設備每天都會受到干擾，但我們并沒有看到這些現象。

　　為什么在缺乏確鑿證據的支持下，這種禁令還能持續這么長時間？眾所周知，人類的思維往往會不假思索地“下定論”。如果兩個事件接連發生，而其中一個事件貌似導致了另一個事件的發生，人們就會傾向于做出這種假設。空乘人員說當他們發現有乘客違反規定使用電子設備時，航班上的設備出現了這樣那樣的故障，我們沒有理由去懷疑他們說的這些故事。

　　然而，在這些故事中，我們沒有去驗證無電子設備違規使用時導航設備是否運行正常。更重要的是，我們沒有考慮有多少航班是在一些手機打開的情況下順利起降的。我們的調查結果顯示，幾乎每次航班都存在幾個打開手機的乘客。

　　恐懼是一個強大的助推劑，謹慎從事則是一種自然反應。出于為乘客安全著想的正當理由，監管當局不愿放松相關規定，他們的腦海中無法擺脫因使用手機而導致飛機墜毀的悲慘畫面，因此FAA寧可讓乘客不方便，也要確保安全第一。

　　一旦禁令實施，要想廢除它就變得十分困難，因為一直都沒有發生因電子設備而導致的航空意外事故，從而進一步鞏固了我們的信念，認為目前的規定是正確和正當的。然而，這種邏輯與動畫片《辛普森一家》(The Simpsons)中的情節一樣可笑：在片中，辛普森爸爸(Homer Simpson)煞費苦心地在斯普林菲爾德(Springfield)組織了“防熊巡邏”(Bear Patrol)，并歡欣鼓舞地認為，沒有發現有熊出沒要歸功于“防熊巡邏”，而不是因為這個城市本來就沒有熊。

　　我們并非建議大家違反現行的航空安全規定，而是強烈認為，FAA對于電子設備的禁令應該基于證據而非恐懼。證據表明，幾乎每個航班的起降都有手機和電子設備開啟，而這些飛機并沒有從天上栽下來。