To pee or not to pee

Prolific writer Tim Urban, while describing the great perils of social interaction, briefly touched upon the topic of the Silent Urinal Standoff Nightmare. He describes it thus,

… I become incapable of peeing if there’s some pressure to pee and I start to think too hard about it.

If you just snortled and thought, “shit! me too”, you are not alone. Some creative bloke even christened this the European Standoff. European — you’re a’ peein’. Geddit? God bless his soul.

Tim Urban is a crazy guy so he thinks about this and then writes about it too. It might seem obvious to assume that not a lot of people spend their hours solving the piddle riddle. But it is likely incorrect. Most of us might be consciously / subconsciously making efforts to avoid this situation.

Here’s how.

A pretty picture without the usually accompanying stench.

Consider above the commonly found public urinal array.

Now, consider primary pee-er P1. It can be stated a priori that the position of any P2 is dependent on P1’s choice of pod 1 or 2 in as much as it excludes the already chosen pod.

I will state another result here merely by observation, and without proof.

P2 will not choose a pod adjacent to P1, especially if it is not mandated by the lack of another choice. (see fig.)

This is not a law, of course. But if you observe carefully, it is a norm that a lot of people end up following without fully realising it. And nothing but a subconscious conditioning to negate the possibility of a European standoff can explain this.

The Devil

Some people just want to watch the world burn!

The above social norm presents some interesting situations. Consider the situation on the left. P1 is a nice guy who takes up pod 1 leaving the slots open for 2 more norm abiding citizens.

In walks Satan as P2. And occupies pod 4. Good samaritan P3 walks into the scene only to face a daunting conundrum. Truth be told a lot of P3s just choose to wait by with 3 unoccupied pods wasting away their ceramic life.

Don’t be P2. That literally pisses people off.

That should give you enough observation fodder for the next time you are taking a leak.

I won’t be surprised if you corroborate the findings. After all, the normative understanding is shared on a pee-er to pee-er basis.