Is Google Making Us Stupid?
Is Google Making Us Stupid?
The article written by Nicholas Carr criticizes the Internet’s (not just Google’s) effects on our cognition. It points out the problem of lower concentration and contemplation and the problem of decreased focus on long pieces of writing or reading. It also states that according to the research users are not reading in traditional sense online.
Even though I am highly aware of negative effects of Internet, there are still many advantages that Internet and Google brought to our lives. After reading the article I become even more aware of my lack of concentration but on the other hand I still believe in many positive effects that use of Internet have. The Internet is a machine designed for efficient and automated collection, transmission and manipulation of information, which are nowadays main source of knowledge. Google’s mission is “to organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful”, which makes our lives easier in the way of faster gathering of the information that we are looking for. But at this point we should not forget about all the false information that can be found on the Net, so we must become more critical and be able to selectively look for correct information. Nowadays, in the time of information flood, is even more important to find the right information as fast as possible, than to have all of them memorized in our brains.
Moreover, we are not necessarily losing our ability to remember things. Rather, the internet is changing how we remember. Our information recalling ability might have declined but our ability for remembering where to find forgotten information is increasing. It is also true that multitasking is making our memory worse, since our short-term memories while multitasking impairs over time, but there are still certain types of memory that are improving.
On one hand, I could totally agree with the title, but on the other hand, not using Google makes us stupid, too. The
The article written by Nicholas Carr criticizes the Internet’s (not just Google’s) effects on our cognition. It points out the problem of lower concentration and contemplation and the problem of decreased focus on long pieces of writing or reading. It also states that according to the research users are not reading in traditional sense online.
Even though I am highly aware of negative effects of Internet, there are still many advantages that Internet and Google brought to our lives. After reading the article I become even more aware of my lack of concentration but on the other hand I still believe in many positive effects that use of Internet have. The Internet is a machine designed for efficient and automated collection, transmission and manipulation of information, which are nowadays main source of knowledge. Google’s mission is “to organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful”, which makes our lives easier in the way of faster gathering of the information that we are looking for. But at this point we should not forget about all the false information that can be found on the Net, so we must become more critical and be able to selectively look for correct information. Nowadays, in the time of information flood, is even more important to find the right information as fast as possible, than to have all of them memorized in our brains.
Moreover, we are not necessarily losing our ability to remember things. Rather, the internet is changing how we remember. Our information recalling ability might have declined but our ability for remembering where to find forgotten information is increasing. It is also true that multitasking is making our memory worse, since our short-term memories while multitasking impairs over time, but there are still certain types of memory that are improving.
On one hand, I could totally agree with the title, but on the other hand, not using Google makes us stupid, too. The