Summary Of Is Google Making USupid By Nicholas Carr

The internet, in short, is our everyday savior when in distress. Technology is a need in the 21st century. It is our main source of communication, socializing, learning and many others. However, according to Nicholas Carr’s “Is Google Making Us Stupid?”, published in the July/August 2008 issue of the Atlantic, the internet is reprogramming his memory, and remapping his neural circuitry. Despite using logos intensely and multiple rhetorical approaches in convincing the reader of his point of view, Carr fails to make a logical, persuading argument for multiple reasons.
To begin with, Carr starts his article by attracting the audience attention in the introduction, by citing a piece from Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey, in which HAL says

He uses the phrase “I think I know what’s going on” (Carr 314) which proves his uncertainty of the reason. He also contradicts himself by stating that research now is much easier than it used to be before the internet, which brings the audience to question themselves and Carr about his point of view. And to be more self-contradicting, Carr states that the internet is a “Godsend” (Carr 314) to him as a writer, making his argument out of shape. Carr is also known to write multiple repetitive articles and about the issues caused by the usage of technology, but from what humans are experiencing so far, technology did nothing but improvements to the human culture, facilitating research, and helping to bring scientific discoveries to the surface.
Later, Carr mentions Scott Karp and Bruce Friedman, Friedrich Nietzsche, who underwent the same problem as his, which seems to be an approach using ethos to gain credibility. However, he denies that by writing “Anecdotes don’t prove much.” (Carr 316). Then, switching for ethos to logos, he cites a study from University College London, explaining how internet users have the tendency to skim over articles, and to save web pages, but never return to them, but Carr doesn’t explain how it relates to his loss of focus or how it is making us “stupid”, which takes away the credibility he is trying to

Previously, when there was no internet, people’s memory could recall full pieces of the information, but now, they might not recall the information as efficiently, however they can remember where they found the information and go back to it when in need. In fact, certain parts of the memory are improving. Like what Carr mentioned, the internet affects our cognition; a study states that not using Google makes you stupid, too. “Experienced Internet users actually showed increased brain activity, with more advanced decision-making skills and complex reasoning. In simple terms, the inexperienced Internet users lagged behind.” (Estes