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Summary Of The Dumbing Of America By Susan Jacoby

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The Dumbing of America by Susan Jacoby is an eye-opening passage about how American citizens are becoming dumber without even realizing it. The ignorance of American people is frightening for future generations. Since the invention of the internet and social media, people have spent less time reading, and more time doing mindless things. Because of this, people aren’t taking the time to learn about whats happening now or even what happened in the past. Without this essential knowledge people are making themselves dumber, and more likely to cause future problems. Most people believe whatever they see online or on tv, without fact checking it. The problem with that is people can upload anything online without it being true. If this false information
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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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When receiving information one must be able to take the time to digest and process the information. It gives one a better understanding of the information. This is related to society because people never really have time to relax and think about life and its meaning. They just hear about it and take it as the truth. People should be able to think for themselves and come to their own

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Attention! American media is relentlessly causing you to be stupider. Read on to find out how you can keep your smarts. It is titles like that, which George Saunders believes degrades the combined intelligence of the American population. More specifically, he identifies the problem as a gradual acceptance of media geared toward profitable news.

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People are becoming more moronic then we already are. In the “Pedestrian” by Bradbury, he believes that technology is ruining lives and our society. What he says is true people are becoming too infatuated. This is a story about a world where people are stuck watching television then being outside. If you don’t have a television you are presumed as crazy.

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In his seminal work, “Class in America 2012,” Gregory Mantsios challenges the prevailing belief in the American Dream, arguing that socioeconomic class significantly influences an individual’s opportunities and outcomes. As Mantsios himself states, ‘All Americans do not have an equal opportunity to succeed, and class mobility in the United States is lower than that of the rest of the industrialized world’ (Mantsios, 2012). This statement not only contradicts the idealistic view of America as a land of equal opportunity, but also highlights the stark reality of class immobility. Mantsios’s work was particularly relevant during the time of its publication, when societal focus on economic issues was heightened due to events like the Occupy Wall

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Ray Williams talks about how America as a whole is foregoing conventional knowledge and replacing it with what could be considered more self-absorbed information in his article “Anti-Intellectualism and the Dumbing Down of America”. He goes on to include a quote from Susan Jacoby, paraphrasing senator Moynihan, about “the triumph of video culture over print culture”. This is of great interest due to the fact that if someone wants to learn a skill or get information about how to accomplish something, one of the first places that individual goes is YouTube. Although senator Moynihan made a great point with his quote, the quote that resonated with me was made by Catherine Liu when she said “We don’t educate people anymore. We train them to get

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A Rhetorical analysis of “Generation Velcro” In “Generation Velcro,” Dorothy Woodend discusses the lack of basic skills and knowledge that is being passed down from generation to generation, and how this could be a fundamental problem for both generation Y and the future of planet earth. Woodend, setting the tone for her article, asks the question, “[i]s this generation heading into a coming dark age with little more than the ability to update their Facebook statuses and watch YouTube, all with laces untied?” (par. 7). She contends that “[t]he inability to concentrate in a world of competing bits of information and constant multitasking have led to brains that can no longer keep up,” implying that this problem of concentration is inhibiting this newest generation’s ability to learn the skills necessary to sustain our world properly (par. 12).

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The article “The Dumbing Down of the American Mind,” by Doug Soderstrom, states that there is a very dangerous phenomenon occurring in the United States of America. It is the willful tendency for Americans to forgo reality in favor of believing what they want to believe. The author, Doug, uses irony and sarcasm to voice out his opinion about the Bush-Cheney administration, and somehow relates it to the five reasons he gave why we are in the state of “dumbing-down.” According to Doug, the unwillingness to learn of this generation, the tendency of our country to compartmentalize their religious belief from science and philosophy, and the procurement of freedom with the expense of responsibility and the interest in the needs of others

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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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How lost is mankind, that nurtures itself so much on mindlessness, that it no longer functions properly enough to recognize its own demise? “Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business” written by Neil Postman and “Brave New World” written by Aldous Huxley. Never have I considered the society that we live in to be a dystopia before those books. I had always been politically-inclined enough to revel in the importance of society and the understanding of the intricacies of our government, the need for its perpetual criticism by the common man, and the value of young intellectuals, satiating themselves with the constant need to lead and play a role in government. However, in all I thought that I have grown to know, never had I truly known the pervasiveness of ignorance more than with each turn of the page from these books.

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In “The Internet Isn’t Making Us Dumber-- It’s Making Us More ‘Meta-Ignorant’”(New York Times, July 27, 2016), William Poundstone expresses his take on how the internet is changing societies definition of common knowledge. Poundstone starts by giving an example of how a bank robber was mislead into believing lemon juice would turn him invisible to any camera. Obviously, this is not the case and Poundstone describes this as the Dunning- Kruger effect, when people are not aware of the short extent of their knowledge. The people fallen victim must not be aware of how little they know and, according to a study by Davis Dunning and Justin Kruger, they believe they know more than up to two-thirds of other people.

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Freedom of speech is one of the many essential core values that The United States of America was founded on. The United States Constitution and Bill of Rights prohibits the United States government from making laws which may infringe on our natural right to free speech. Without free speech, our generation and future generations alike would lack intellectual vitality. Being exposed to different ideas and beliefs is necessary for people to be able to formulate their own personal beliefs. Taking away or limiting free speech would be living life fearing that you will express an unpopular opinion in the eyes of certain people.

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