Analysis Of 'Is Google Making USupid?'

“Is Google Making Us Stupid?” Carr makes a statement referring to the negative impact that the Internet has had on him, “Over the past few years I’ve had an uncomfortable sense that someone, or something, has been tinkering with my brain, remapping the neural circuitry, reprogramming the memory” (731) he states, noting how he feels that his cognitive thinking has been altered by the Internet. Taylorism, also known as Scientific Management, is the theory of management that analyzes and synthesizes workflow. Taylorism is connoted as efficiency above all else and also bettering productivity. Carr touches on the idea that the internet overtime is gradually “chipping away at my capacity for concentration and contemplation” (733), which ties

Carr argues that the Internet, specifically Google, relies on Taylorism to drive its efficiency. However, these efficiencies actually reduce user’s attention spans, and mainly college students suffer from the information overload. Taylorism was first used during the Industrial Revolution to improve factory productivity which was introduced by Fredrick W. Taylor. Working in a factory, each individual was given one task to focus on and to execute all day long. Together, they all worked as one machine in order to efficiently accomplish a certain ambition. This “algorithm” resulted in skyrocketing productivity because Taylor was able to achieve his goal of “maximum speed, maximum efficiency, and maximum output,” out of his workers (Carr, 739). As Google took on the concept of Taylorism, the company stated that its goal is “to organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful,” and at present Google is the main source of Taylorism on the Internet by attempting to someday achieve the intention of “the perfect search

(Kirschner and Karpinski, 2010). Certain online social networks (OSNs) such as Instagram, Twitter, etc. are part of the reason that many college students cannot sit through a lecture without checking their phone. These distractions are not only affecting grades but they are affecting student-teacher-relationships as well. The rising obsession with online social networking is becoming so immense that class is no longer informative to them for the time spent in class is becoming “social hour”. Due to that obsession procrastination is becoming more of a problem. When it comes time for students to “crunch” for tests they refer to the internet and online summaries because they failed to acquire the information in class. Therefore, the lack of time management and critical thinking skills are prime reasons as to why the Internet is being