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Summary Of Is Google Making USupid By Nicholas Carr

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“My mind isn’t going—so far as I can tell—but it’s changing.” Nicholas Carr, a noted blogger and Pulitzer Prize winner, claims this in his article, Is Google Making us Stupid? He argues that humanity has adapted to a different type of thinking that is affecting individuals. Specifically, he feels as though he can no longer progress through a book with having difficulties concentrating. Only a few pages at a time are all he can get through before he feels the need to do other work. His other major point of emphasis focuses on the internet as a giant library available freely at ones fingertips. Rather than having to spend time going through multiple books in a library, a researcher can cut that time in half with the amount of information available …show more content…

Bruce Friedman, a pathologist from the University of Michigan Medical School, says, “I now have almost totally lost the ability to read and absorb a longish article on the web or in print….I can’t read War and Peace anymore…I’ve lost the ability to do that.” Instead of reading everything thoroughly, both researchers and individuals alike use a skimming technique, switching between sources quickly after reading a short part of it. Carr comes back and discusses how Google, motivated by a desire to use technology to solve problems, is a large reason for the mind morphing. Websites, like Google, are the reason people no longer exercise their memories and are becoming more forgetful. Society is becoming, “pancake people…spread wide and thin as we connect with the vast …show more content…

The issue is how. It may not be the same type of intelligence as an older generation, but it does not mean it is better or worse. For example, if you asked someone born in the 1920s to install an application on a cell phone, he/she may look at you with a blank stare. At the same time, if you ask someone born in 1999 if they wanted to roll a hoop with a stick you would get the same blank stare. Part of it is how individuals are raised in society. Not everyone has equal access to new technology, hindering them from potentially expanding their personal knowledge base. On top of that, technology moves and changes at such a rapid pace, even when you are up to date you are still essentially behind the times. As well, with each new piece of technology available comes a new way for society to contemplate reaching different

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