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Steven Pinker Mind Over Mass Media Summary

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What the author pinker mean by “moral panic” is people who are becoming introduced to new technology and they begin to feel fearful of the new normal. The moral panic is fearful anxieties of media being evil and affecting society. The society has always had to adapt to new forms of medias and yet they will portray it as a bad evil. In the article ”Mind over mass media” by Steven Pinker. He argues that technology is actually helping us as a society to develop our intelligence even more. For example, He notes that ”If electronic media were hazardous to intelligence,the quality of science would be plummeting,Yet discoveries are multiplying like fruit flies, and progress is dizzying.” This explains pinker’s argument because he is trying
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Today generations have more access to technology than previous generations. The technology is a way to expand and distribute knowledge. Technology has not made this generation dumber, but it actually helped this generation to think of innovative ways that furthered our society. It made our life much easier, but it surely does not mean that the current generation is the dumbest. It actually helped the generation to grow smarter and made our brain smarter.

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In his book Smarter Than You Think, Clive Thompson aims to persuade the readers into believing that technology has had a positive impact on our society and the World as a whole. He claims that technology has improved our retention rates, allows us to write and think with global audiences and even improves our senses. How does he persuade us to believe his claims? He gives us many examples of people and their inventions, and how these inventions have had positive impacts on our society. One example he gives us is Ory Okolloh, a woman who created a website that played an important role during the disputed presidential elections in Kenya in 2007.

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“Is Google Making Us Stupid” is an article written by Nicholas Carr, where Carr tries to make the point that our ability to read books and other long pieces of information is being affected by the internet's ability to become our primary source of information. Carr States (2008) “ And what the net seems to be doing is chipping away my capacity for concentration and contemplation”(p.610).Even though the internet offers a highly efficiencient way of knowledge, it also melts our brain's ability to learn by experience. Carr starts by sharing a problem with the us about how he can hardly focus anymore when reading more the three or four pages. Carr goes on to prove how information on the internet is meant to be consis, and meant to get the point

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A moral panic is something that appears once in a blue moon it happens mostly when you least expect it to hit you. A moral panic is a feeling of fear that increases between a large number of individuals. The media describes them as “folk devils” a threat to the societies rule of conduct. The media also presents them in a negative way and over exaggerate the situation. The media make it a bigger issue than it seems in order to gain audiences and viewers .In

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It is stated that the average number of Google searches per day has grown from 9,800 in 1998 to over 4.7 trillion today. In the novel, 'What The Internet Is Doing To Our Brains; The Shallows' by Nicholas Carr, Carr explains the many positive and negatives of how the internet is influencing us today. Carr describes how the internet can be quite brilliant as it allows us to connect not only with people down the street, but people all around the world. The internet also allows us to easily access any and ALL ideas with the quick swipe of a finger or some swift taps on a keyboard. He does describe the many, many benefits the internet has given us yet it is easily seen that Carr believes the internet is causing us to have little connect to our heart, souls, and loved ones.

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Neil Postman Rhetorical Analysis Inventions are changing before our eyes and the world does not seem to question what new technology reveals and what its consequences will be. In the future of technology, there are many individuals who see technology as either a sanction or a burden. Many individuals cannot seem to imagine a world with no technology, however, there are many others who argue that humans are becoming too dependent on technology instead of their own observances and cognition. Technology continues to develop and has become affected people’s everyday life. This issue is addressed by an American Critic and an educator by the name Neil Postman.

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Nicholas Carr made quite a few of points in his book The Shallows. Car made a point in his book, the internet is making us more smarter. (Carr; 40) “ One click on a link led to a dozen or a hundred more” “ online articles are seen faster than print editions” “ Books are great, but the net is faster and won’t waste paper” Our IQ since the internet became the most used source, got higher. The internet has affected us as well. When we face a question that we have no clue about we don 't go to our

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Steven Pinker wrote “Mind over Mass Media” which tells of this claim is more false than true. Pinker reminds us that if technology was actually making us more stupid, then how are we scientifically better than ever before. Critics are believing that the mind is being shaped by everything it is seeing and hearing. The only problem here is the lack of self control people have when it comes to the distracting parts of the internet we use so often. People tend to find themselves reading tweets instead of articles now.

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Rhetorical Analysis of “Mind Over Mass Media” Many people believe that new forms of electronic media such as search engines, which offer easy access to incredible amounts of information are harmful to people’s intelligence because they allow us to understand only the main idea of the information provided instead of allowing us to gain an in depth understanding of the topic. Steven Pinker, a professor at Harvard University argues in his essay “Mind Over Mass Media” that these new forms of electronic media are actually beneficial to people's intelligence and the accusations made against it are unwarranted. He is successful in doing this because he brings up counterarguments and disproves them, he offers advice in practicing self control when

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The article “Mind Over Mass Media”, written by Professor Steven Pinker, describes the impact of media on human lives and brains. Pinker illustrates the benefits people gain from using the worlds quickly increasing technology and media. Pinker suggests that today’s technology such as, PowerPoint, Google, and other forms of social media can actually enhance and bring more intelligence to the mind, instead of being detrimental. Critics believe that the many different forms of media can lower intelligence. However, Pinker declares that scientists are using all of this technology everyone else is using, and are still discovering new things.

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Media is focused on people marginalized in society due to race, ethnicity and sexuality. It is based on well-known stereotypes and reinforces them. Moral panic sends society into mass hysteria over an issue or an event that occurs. Stanley Cohen believed that media created a moral panic. Stanley had published a book on folk devils and moral panics (1972) which says that moral panic occurs due to people or groups become threats to society and interests.

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In America, Media bias is everywhere, in the United States all the information that an average American received through everyday sources, the news was most likely processed through the media and told through a biased point of view, when the media gets their hands on news if it is important then it probably won’t be talked about or downplayed no matter the source like in the newspaper, radio, television, movies, as well as other outlets that the media uses, the media only seems to share the news that they find interesting, even then the media would most likely have changed the story, in what they say is just tweaked news, what actually happened and what really happened would be two different stories, also the story would be told from one person

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Carr’s argument that the internet is making us stupid is very easy to argue when thinking about all the resources we have today. For example like wikipedia, online schooling and even online college courses all things allowed by the web. Many people use wikipedia to help them learn about an unknown subject that will help them gain more information. The internet allows us to learn more about particular subjects, giving us more knowledge and making us feel less stupid. What people fail to realize is that although the internet has an endless amount of information, we the users don 't try to access all of it.

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When thinking of the media you think they are reporting the appropriate and accurate information not based on any personal opinions and feelings. Also one would not think the media would be reporting based on one side of politics or the other. The media is extremely biased when it comes to politics and news. While some of the media is conservative-biased I believe the mass media is liberal-biased. Majority of media outlets are liberal companies, media personnel and journalists will identify themselves as democrats and liberals more so than republicans or conservatives and lastly the left side (liberals) of the mass media is persuasive on what information to report.

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In only a couple of decades, technology has imbedded itself into people’s lives, to the point it would be difficult to live without using technology. In Neil Postman’s speech “Informing Ourselves to Death,” he explains how not all technology is being used for what its original purpose was, and how people are starting to drown in the useless information technology gives. Postman also makes the claim, “And therefore, in a sense, we are more naïve than those in the Middle Ages, and more frightened, for we can be made to believe almost anything” (5). Though Postman gave this speech about thirty years ago, this accurately describes modern society. Technology was meant to help people learn and improve their lives, but it has instead increased the naivety of the world.

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