I am currently digesting a new article in The Atlantic Monthly that is the cover story of their July issue, Is Google Making Us Stupid. Nicholas Carr is of the impression that Google, with its ability to link us to all the information we can and can’t consume, is allowing us to overload our senses with information.
Maybe I am getting this wrong. Maybe he is suggesting that it isn’t allowing us to do it to ourselves, but rather that it is actually doing it to us. If this were the case Google’s Reader would be the equivalent of an anti smoking drug from Philip Morris. How well can it possibly work? The disease provides the cure?
The issue remains. I can’t possibly get through all the data that is marked ‘relevant’ without some technological assistance, and like Carr, I can’t seem to sit down with a book or article of length long enough to truly capture and synthesize all the data.
If the technologies themselves are changing us, then this change must be tangible or at the very least observable. This change is hinted at in Carr’s article here:
The process of adapting to new intellectual technologies is reflected in the changing metaphors we use to explain ourselves to
ourselves. When the mechanical clock arrived, people began thinking of their brains as operating “like clockwork.” Today, in the
age of software, we have come to think of them as operating “like computers.” But the changes, neuroscience tells us, go much
deeper than metaphor. Thanks to our brain’s plasticity, the adaptation occurs also at a biological level.
Are we destined to live in a world where information is jammed down our throats in 5 second bursts? I’m not building a library/bomb shelter just yet. If our inability to concentrate on text truly is a degenerative disease, we are still in the denial phase. Carrs article itself, at roughly 4,500 words, is a longer than average read compared to the majority of pieces currently found in high circulation periodicals. Then again, it is likely the longest article I will sit down with today, and at roughly 6 pages, it is short work compared to what I was expected to read daily in college.
Still, I can’t help but think that if our technologies are in fact shaping our method and ability to learn, that we aught to dwell a little longer on how the technology is developed and who is developing it.
I suppose we could be at a worse starting point, at least Google’s motto is ‘do no evil.’ (Though it is often forgotten that particular quote is actually in reference to making money…) As it is, this article has opened up a few areas that I am interested in knowing more about. I think Lewis Mumford’s work (mentioned in the article) is a logical next step.
Lastly, I find it oddly coincidental that while reading and writing this article my background music has been provided by Max Richters new album, 24 Postcards. A concept album, the central theme is the ring-tone, 24 short modern classical pieces.
Posted at 5:00pm and tagged with: atlantic, monthly, more, nicholas, carr, google, internet, concentration, mumford,.
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