In today's class, we will be writing responses to the question "Is the internet making us dumber?" For this activity, please complete the following steps:
1) Post a response in the comments of this blog post to the following question: Do you think the internet is making us dumber? Why or why not?
2) Post a reply to another student's comment (indicating who you are commenting to by writing @name at the beginning of the response).
3) Discuss the issue in class.
Whether or not the internet is making you dumber, this activity will make you smarter!
No, I do not think that the internet is making us dumber; I think that the internet is making us smarter. It may be making us lazier by presenting us with all the information we could possibly want so we don’t have to get out the encyclopedia every time we have a question but definitely it’s not enabling us to learn all the information out there. It is making it easier for us to learn new stuff. We are learning how to think differently when it comes to all aspects of life via the internet – we have so many more outlets for information to only build upon our knowledge. Also by learning how to use the internet and various applications of the internet we are expanding our minds in turn making us smarter.
ReplyDeleteI don't think the internet is making us dumber. We are becoming dependent upon it, however. Have you ever lost your phone for a day? I've thought, before, "Oh, i lost my phone.... I should text ... and let them know. Oh, wait." You're brain does become dependent on technology, sure. If you lose your internet, and you need it, that freaking sucks. If your router stops working or something, if you somehow go without internet for extended periods of time, you do feel like you're missing it, but you don't just walk forward into a wall until you die. And, we're also dependent upon electricity in the same way. Have you ever had to sit in a house without electricity? You don't have ANYTHING to do. You're at a complete loss. But this doesn't mean or imply that electricity has made us stupid, it has opened up a whole realm of new things and ideas.
ReplyDeleteThe internet is the same way. there is no reason to think that it makes us stupid, that makes no sense - especially when i can google anything I want, right now, and learn about it in stunning complexity and depth. It's stupid to say that the internet makes you stupid. Ever heard of open source software? It's communities of people that get together, using only the internet, to make entire operating systems and programs completely free of charge. Sure, stupid blogs of old ladies about their cats might be stupid, but there is no reason to extend that to all of humanity just because some people are stupid. Some people are smart, and crave knowledge and education and learning. the internet facilitates this incredibly. Sure, it also facilitates porn and gambling and whatever else, but who cares. Deal with it. I can understand gravity or string theory or quantum mechanics if i google it and read for a while. The argument that the internet makes you stupid is breathtaking in its inanity.
I don't think that the Internet is making us stupid as much as it is distracting some people from doing more profitable things. The Internet is a temptation of endless links and information that is easily accessed in a variety of situations. Therefore, when someone should be working, they may be tempted to idly browse the Internet instead. However, the Internet is not evil because it has the power to make people waste time. People simply need to use self-control when confronted with the temptation of the Internet.
ReplyDeleteI don't think the Internet is making us more stupid, but I think it is making us more impatient. We can find information so quickly and efficiently on the Internet that reading a book to learn more about a subject may seem intolerable. This is not necessarily a bad thing; we can gain more surface knowledge about many subjects by using the Internet. However, if we want to learn about a particular subject in depth, it might be better to read a book.
I feel that neither article presnets enough evidence to conclusively say whether or not the internet is making us "dumber". I don't think that their is any conclusive evidence that points the way we read the written word to be better than the way we read electronic texts. This not to say that I am not open to the idea that the internet may have a limiting affect on our ability to maintain long periods of attention. I think the more interesting question to ask is why do so many people who have no contact with each other all surf the internet in similar ways. No one really teaches you to search the internet and yet it seems like so many people have the same habits. So, I guess the more pertinent question about the internet would not be how does the internet shape the brain, but how does the human brain shape the internet?
ReplyDelete@Kate - you hit the nail on the head. we do have so many more outlets to express our knowledge, now, and so many ways to build further upon our knowledge, all thanks to the newly opened avenues of digital information.
ReplyDelete@ The Universe is an Atheist - I totally agree with you on the idea of us being dependent on technology. And I recommend a board game or a game of cards in the case of no electricity.
ReplyDeleteIt is hard to say, with the current lack of solid evidence, whether the internet really is "making us dumber." However, it is hard to argue with the fact that it certainly is changing the way we think. I think it's safe to say that people today are more accustomed to scanning through text for immediate information rather than reading and pondering books at length. As Carr says, every new technology has affected the way we as humans interact in think. I think one of his best points is when he talks about the basic invention of mechanical clocks. Everyone started to think about their actions and the world in terms of specific segments of time rather than acting on their senses. He says that today instead of our minds working "like clockwork" they are "like a computer" - information processors. Perhaps this has impaired our ability to concentrate and access our "deep reading" brains. As many have stated, our brains have adapted to the introduction of all past technologies as they've been introduced, but the basic functions of our brain have not changed - simply how we are teaching them to think.
ReplyDelete@The Universe is an Atheist
ReplyDeleteThe potential problem with Internet learning is that many sources on the Internet may not be reliable, because anyone can publish information on the Internet. I believe that a random traditional book about a topic will generally provide more accurate information than a random Internet article on the same topic. This is because books must go through an editing process in which the information in the books is reviewed by others before it is published.
@Shaun
ReplyDeleteI agree that the internet is not making us more unintelligent, but definitely more impatient. Needles exposition might be on its way out and I think that speakers who are intentionally unclear or ambiguous like Derrida will no longer have a place in the English curriculum... or maybe that just wishful thinking on my part.
@ Shaun, actually studies show that wikipedia is at least as reliable as the encyclopedia Britannica... and I tend to think that i would prefer information from everyone rather than just from approved sources. If we do that, there is no stopping the history writers from changing things to their favor. but, yes, if you get your information from a random blog you shouldnt just assume it's true. Sources such as TED and Fora.tv are reliable in the same way as books in that they are published things. Except free of charge
ReplyDelete@The Universe is an Atheist - I completely agree. We certainly have become dependent on technology and the internet, whether that is good or bad. But it certainly doesn't make us stupid - it's whatever we make it out to be. We can use it to access a world of information to increase our knowledge, hence, making us smarter if we let it.
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