New Delhi, Nov. 2 -- You may have heard, your attention span is abysmally short these days. It would appear that it is remarkable that you have reached the second sentence of this column. You were not always this way, they say, yet this is one of your defining qualities today. In fact, nobody is sure what exactly is modern about you except your attention span.

The world is in a tizzy about your new incapacity to focus. Entire industries are wondering how to deliver their products to you in that fleeting time when you are attentive. And they are going terribly wrong, because your attention span is not the problem.

A few days ago, I saw a headline in the UK's Times that paraphrased the Scottish writer Ian Rankin, one of the most popular w...