Analysis and Summary Essay
William Pangilinan
Professor Zuidervaart
English 100, CRN: 10654
October 14, 2011
Is Google is Making Us Stupid or is it just making us more demanding?
In the movie, “2001: A Space Odyssey,” Stanley Kubrick writes, “As we come to rely on computers to mediate our understanding of the world, it is our own intelligence that flattens into artificial intelligence.” In the essay “IS Google Making Us Stupid?” by Nicholas Carr, M.A. a writer and blogger, talks about the Internet and specifically search engine Google as an example. He points out that beside the fact these technological advancements making life much as easy through easy access of information. However, the Internet does not have all the information even though most of it is found there. In addition people should not base the truth that is used in most of the situations on such sources. The Internet has led to people ignoring the pre-existing information along that would be found manually just because it can be found on the Internet.
One of the main arguments that have been depicted by Carr in this essay it that information has slowly been systemized through such inventions and this has dehumanized it. This implies that unlike the older days when humans had manually look for information then transfer it to others, things have changes in which these systemized search engines provide everything one needs through a single click. This information will be eventually applied in other situations without any further attempts to try to find out if the information that has been given is actually genuine or one’s fabrication. Hence Google has been able to give one all the information that one may require except the truth. Truth in the older days was self created after a laboured effort of trying to find out how it came about through work that is done by the human mind and decisions made that are based on this effort. Today all this can be done by Google and in the process reducing the effort that one’s mind
Professor Zuidervaart
English 100, CRN: 10654
October 14, 2011
Is Google is Making Us Stupid or is it just making us more demanding?
In the movie, “2001: A Space Odyssey,” Stanley Kubrick writes, “As we come to rely on computers to mediate our understanding of the world, it is our own intelligence that flattens into artificial intelligence.” In the essay “IS Google Making Us Stupid?” by Nicholas Carr, M.A. a writer and blogger, talks about the Internet and specifically search engine Google as an example. He points out that beside the fact these technological advancements making life much as easy through easy access of information. However, the Internet does not have all the information even though most of it is found there. In addition people should not base the truth that is used in most of the situations on such sources. The Internet has led to people ignoring the pre-existing information along that would be found manually just because it can be found on the Internet.
One of the main arguments that have been depicted by Carr in this essay it that information has slowly been systemized through such inventions and this has dehumanized it. This implies that unlike the older days when humans had manually look for information then transfer it to others, things have changes in which these systemized search engines provide everything one needs through a single click. This information will be eventually applied in other situations without any further attempts to try to find out if the information that has been given is actually genuine or one’s fabrication. Hence Google has been able to give one all the information that one may require except the truth. Truth in the older days was self created after a laboured effort of trying to find out how it came about through work that is done by the human mind and decisions made that are based on this effort. Today all this can be done by Google and in the process reducing the effort that one’s mind
Cited: Carr, Nicholas. Is Google Making Us Stupid? The Atlantic Magazine, July/August 2008. Web. 5th October 2011 <http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2008/07/is-google-making-us-stupid/6868/>