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Summary Of Is Google Making USupid By Nicholas Carr

2000 Words8 Pages

Macy Sadler
Mrs. Woodward
APEL: Period 4
5 February 2017
Quality Non-Fiction and the Internet
How often do you log on, scroll through, post, or “like” something on the internet and is that time used on the Web interfering with your cognitive abilities? Do credibility and sentence style make Nicholas Carr’s article a reliable source to reference and believe?
Carr’s article, “Is Google Making Us Stupid”, is full of irony, persona, and concrete examples all to help the reader understand or even change their outlook on the internet and how it affects our daily lives. Nicholas Carr is an American non-fiction writer who was a finalist for the 2011 Pulitzer Prize, and was awarded the Neil Postman Award for Career Achievement in Public Intellectual …show more content…

The article was chosen specifically by The Atlantic, at that time, because many assumptions and experiments were being made in that year, and the prior year, about what the internet is doing to our brains and the magazine wanted to be one of the first to publish such a work that they believed could be accurate and persuasive. In an attempt to sway the reader that the internet is affecting cognition, Nicholas Carr does not always meet the criteria …show more content…

However he doesn’t meet the criteria when he makes unsupported claims such as “[The Net] is reprogramming us.” (Carr 20). This claim is not quality because he doesn’t support this claim with a credible source, he just states it as an opinion. If he developed trustworthiness in himself early on in the essay, the reader might consider this claim to be a fact and believe Carr. Because he took on the many personas to establish credibility, he was most likely able to make this claim with no background support from outside sources and have the reader believe him. He backs up one of his claims that the internet is affecting humanity's cognitive abilities by using the opinion of a scholarly neuroscientist from the Krasnow Institute for Advanced Study at George Mason University, saying that, “The adult mind is very plastic, it has the ability to reprogram itself on the fly, altering the way it functions” (Carr

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Writer, Nicolas Carr, in his article, “Is Google Making Us Stupid”, expresses the search engine Google is effecting the human mind. Carr’s purpose is to covey his idea that the web changes the way humans think. He creates a pessimistic tone to his audience that spending a lot of time on the internet is bad for the mind. I don’t believe Carr made an effective argument on this article because of the tone he used, the references he provided, and how the article was laid out. Carr begins his article to the readers by acknowledging the web is messing with his brain and he is not thinking the way he used to.

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The purpose of Carr’s essay is to raise skepticism of the internet and the influences it has on the mind. The internet has become a part of my daily regimen. Online is where my homework

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In “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” by Nicolas Carr he enlightens us on how he feels that the internet is changing the way we think and process information. He tells us that he has experienced this and feels the reprogramming of his brain the most when he reads. He also uses the feedback and evidence from his colleagues to show the change patterns in other people. Carr uses present examples of how he feels that the internet is changing the way we thinking but he adds examples of history for example the invention of the clock and the way it has altered our behaviors. The author also brings in scientific studies to prove that there are changes happening to us because of the internet.

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Harvard Writer, Nicholas Carr, in his Advocacy article, “Is Google Making Us Stupid?,” Describes the altering effects of the internet and search engines on our brains. Carr´s purpose is to get the reader aware of the impact the internet has on our everyday life. He adopts a informative tone in order to appeal emotionally and logically to his audience. Carr begins his advocacy for the internet by acknowledging that in ¨A Space Odyssey¨ when they rely too much on Artificial Intelligence it could get a human killed, in this example the supercomputer HAL almost drifted astronaut Dave Bowman into a deep space death by the malfunctioning machine; Showing that the astronaut is superior than a machine. He appeals to the emotion of sadness by admitting that “I’ve had an uncomfortable sense that someone, or something has been tinkering with my brain” he is “not thinking the way i used to.”

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He mostly relates his article to the game of chess and makes the point that no matter how good you are with your critical thinking once the internet is added into the “mix” the internet gives the players the upper hand because no one is able to think of as many possible moves as the internet. The internet will continue to shape our critical thinking as it brings more tools to our brains. While, I mostly agree with Thompson there are some valid points that Carr makes as well. I agree mostly with Thompson  because he is saying the internet is shaping our critical thinking and we, as human, don’t realize how we are being affected.

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For example, Bruce Friedman, who Carr mentions, says, “I now have almost totally lost the ability to read and absorb a longish article on the web or in print” (348). This concludes that internet has altered his mental habits. He provides many evidences such as a few internet behaviors to let the audience to conclude about his points. Another example that Carr explains very well on how text on the internet is using fast and profitable. He talks about how the internet make other people money and how our critical thinking skills and reading skills are decaying in the process of using the internet.

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In Nicholas Carr's article, "Is Google Making Us Stupid?" is to inform the younger, upcoming generations on how the Internet may have negative effects on the human mind, in that, the way in which we abuse the Internet and not let our brains figure things out without the need of searching it on Google. Nicholas Carr begins by explaining how he feels that the Internet is causing his focus issues, in which he cannot keep focus while reading a book. Carr has his own personal experiences with the negative effects of the Internet, and he also provides research on how other writers had agreed with him on the subject to help support his strategies of logos. The use of the evidence from the other writers helps to draw in the reader and show them the effects of the Internet. Apparently reading on the Internet doesn't let people read the entire article and it is seen that they go from page to page, losing focus quickly.

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In the article “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” by Nicholas Carr he clearly states, “I can feel it, too. 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” (Carr). This quote suggests that the author feels the effects of the Internet just as everyone else has. Most people would agree that use of the Internet is a daily task yet few can deal with life without the Internet. The Net has made life easier but as Carr suggest it is my contention that it is changing the way people think thus making us “stupid”.

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He notes that the development of writing and the printing press led to significant changes in the way people thought and communicated. By comparing the internet to these historical developments, Carr suggests that the digital age is simply the latest iteration in a long line of technological advances that have fundamentally altered human cognition. In addition, Carr appeals to expert testimony to support his argument. He cites studies and quotes from prominent neuroscientists and researchers who suggest that the internet may be negatively impacting our ability to concentrate and process information.

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Drawing on his theories, this essay expands on Carr’s hypothesis to explain that not only is the the internet effecting our cognition, but that it is also encouraging the development

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