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Technology And Literacy In Plato's 'The Cave'

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Close your eyes, Now imagine the world without all the technology we have today. Hard to imagine right? Anyone born in the Twenty-first century has grown to know modern technology. From the printing press to the iPhone 7, We have all used and grown accustomed to the benefits of modern technology. We have become enslaved to technology due to the fact that we have become blind to the dangers of technology, our literacy skills have decreased, as well as we are too dependent on technology. In Plato's “The Cave” shows us a group of prisoners chained to face a wall. A fire behind them casts shadows on the wall their facing of a variety of different things however they cannot see what they truly are. The prisoners only reality is the shadows …show more content…

Whether it be a textbook or a text message, we are always reading something. However, as technology advanced our literacy skills have decreased. We have begun to lose the ability to read longer pieces of text. Nicholas Carr stated in his article “Is Google Making Us Stupid” that “The more they use the web, the more they have to fight to stay focused on long pieces of writing.” Technology has made us lazy. Instead of focusing on details we prefer to skim it and summarize it. In any piece of writing the details included are what makes the article make sense in the first place. As humans, we have the ability to adapt to our environment. We have seen that our current society prefers short summaries, so as a result, we have reduced the amount we write. Instead of detailed four-page papers we have settled for a one paragraph summary. Who's to blame? Technology is. Social media has become a key part of our current society. Most Millennials you ask will have at least one form of social media. Twitter is one of the popular social media platforms, it allows for people to express themselves. However, the limit that twitter has placed is a 160 character post. This a prime example of how modern technology influences the decline in the amount we write. Instead of truly expressing how we feel, we abide by technology's rules and reduce our feelings to a couple of basic sentences. As technology continues to advance it will continue to reduce the amount we write until it's just a couple simple

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139 Words | 1 Pages

Nicholas Carr’s essay, “Is Google Making Us Stupid,” discusses the benefits and dangers associated with technology, and the internet, or Google is the focus of the essay. He argues that technology is changing humans cognitive thought process, and not in a healthy way. Carr admits that he notices the changes in his own ability to concentrate and comprehend lengthy readings. Not only does he express concern about his own capability of reading he also mentions several other bloggers, and philosophers’ experiences with their ability to decipher long articles. Moreover, he emphasizes historical technologies that have influenced change in our intellectuality such as, the typewriter, the printing press, and the mechanical clock.

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250 Words | 1 Pages

Is Google Making Us Stupid?: Reading Response Author Nicholas Carr claims that the internet is making humans depend more heavily on short, summarized information online instead of reading books and long text, thus making us “stupid.” Carr uses anecdotes, typewriting “algorithms,” and shortened newspaper abstracts as evidence of humans’ deteriorating attention span (Carr 735-748). His explanation of other advancements in technology and the history of looking for shortcuts supports his argument in Google’s hand in making us lazier.

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In Nicholas Carr's article, “Is Google making us Stupid?” (731-745) his thesis is, “...what the Net seems to be doing is chipping away my capacity for concentration and contemplation.” (733) According to Carr, the Internet affects the way that we read, think, and live. It affects the way we read because through the continued use of the Internet we have been conditioned to skim through information quickly and efficiently.

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758 Words | 4 Pages

It has happened many times, reading a full page only to realize none of the information was retained. Was it always this way? Nicholas Carr thinks he knows what happening, in “Is Google Making us Stupid?” he discusses the fact that technology is having a negative impact on our thinking and learning. He holds the belief that technology is changing the way our brains process information, which is affecting attention spans and the ability to think critically. Carr’s article is an effective analysis on the impact technology has on our brains.

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1170 Words | 5 Pages

The cave as a whole represents the visible realm. In the dialogue, the prisoners are chained so that they can only see what is in front of them and being depicted on the wall. “They’ve been there since childhood, fixed in the same place, with their necks and legs fettered, able to see only in front of them,” (514b). A prisoner is freed and dragged outside the cave,

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1150 Words | 5 Pages

“The Allegory of the Cave” by Plato is about a group of prisoners that were chained up in a cave with their backs facing the exit of the cave, unable to see what was going on in the outside world. They occasionally would see shadows on the wall and would

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952 Words | 4 Pages

Technology is making things was difficult into something as simple as clicking a button; however, this is making people too easy to access information. Nicholas Carr examines the consequences of people is growing dependency on technology in his essay Is Google Making Us Stupid? Carr argues Google is making it too easy for people to access information, which causes people not to think deeply about the information they are reading; therefore, the convenient technology has caused people to become stupid. Carr remarks that in the past, it was easier to reading a book or a long article. Carr

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451 Words | 2 Pages

Book VII ("Allegory of the cave"), describes a scene carry out in a dark cave. In this scene, a group of human beings have been living in a cave since birth; they have never seen the light of day. These people have only focused on what is in front of them but never what is beyond what they can see, "chained, can't turn their heads." Behind them is a fire and behind the fire is a wall. There are various statues placed and manipulated by other people on top of the wall.

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In life, the world one lives in is always assumed to be the reality, without anyone questioning its credibility. As Iris Murdoch once said, “[People] live in a fantasy world, a world of illusion. The great task in life is to find reality. ”(Iris Murdoch Quotes). In The Allegory of the Cave by Plato, prisoners are trapped in a cave and chained so that they are to face a wall and only see the shadows of objects that pass behind them.

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Socrates’s allegory of the cave in Plato’s Republic Book VII is an accurate depiction of how people can be blinded by what they are only allowed to see. The allegory does have relevance to our modern world. In fact, all of us as a species are still in the “cave” no matter how intelligent or enlightened we think we have become. In Plato’s Republic Book VII, Socrates depicts the scenario in a cave where there are prisoners who are fixed only being able to look at the shadows on the wall which are projections of things passing between them and the light source.

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817 Words | 4 Pages

Plato tells of a group of prisoners held in a dark cave chained to the walls. These people have never stepped outside into the world and can only experience shadows that are displayed on the opposite side of the cave through the light outside of the cave. One of the slaves, now liberated steps outside of the cave and is able to experience reality, or what we can distinguish as objective truth. After returning to explain to the other what he has seen there seems to be quite a difference in opinions(Plato). In his article Plato’s Cave, T.F Morris attempts to dissect Plato’s allegory and explains his belief that “… the shadows on the wall of the cave correspond to what we call reality…(Morris 417)”

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The Partial Light In The Allegory of the Cave, Plato, the brilliant Greek philosopher introduces a complex idea in the form of a story in a fashion similar to that of Aesop or Jesus. The Allegory tells the story of prisoners in a cave who see shadows created by artificial objects passing in front of a fire. The prisoners observe objects projected on the wall by the light a fire supplies, therefore displaying an image of a false reality before their ignorant eyes Sunlight, as discovered by an escaped prisoner, supplies light that reveals the true world; conversely, the light of the fire serves to shroud the prisoners in intellectual darkness [3]. According to Plato, the prisoners symbolize the individual and the shadows on the wall symbolize

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728 Words | 3 Pages

Because of this they cast shadows on the wall of the cave. The prisoners are unable to see these real people that pass behind them. What the prisoners see and hear are shadows and echoes of the people whom they do not

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445 Words | 2 Pages

In “The allegory of the Cave by Plato”, great philosophers offer a theory concerning human perception. Plato described it starting with three prisoners; these prisoners would have face the wall of the cave in a set position. They would not be allowed to move. A fire would be placed behind them with a walkway between. Along the walkway, people would walk carrying different items.

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1159 Words | 5 Pages

In Plato’s Allegory of the Cave the people think that their entire reality is the shadows that they see on the walls of the cave. Plato explores the truth and criticizes that humanity does not question what is real. Plato explores that the human understanding and accepting of what is real is difficult and

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