Nicholas Carr writes in The Atlantic about what he fears the Internet may be doing to our brains. Read Is Google Making Us Stupid? and decide for yourself. Do the advantages of the Internet outweigh the potential dangers?
Brisbane
14 years ago
i thought that this reading was a very interesting topics esp. for today's society, but i felt that the author stretched his theories and references. In my opinion, less than half of the reading was about the internet and its effects on our brain. yes i agree the with majority of what he talks about, but was entirely too long and a lot of information could have been cut out. Again, just my opinion.
ReplyDeleteI thought that the article was very interesting and informative. He had many sources, and seemed to be very informed on what he was talking about, not just saying that he is the one feeling this way. I thought it was a little too long, and like he says, not a lot of people want to read all of that. I kind of agree in some ways, but I don't think Google makes people stupid.
ReplyDeleteAlthough this was a long essay, and a lot of information to sort through, I think it had a lot of valuable information. I agree with Nicholas Carr that the internet does make us more lazy. We have slacked off with our reading abilities and I feel that Carr stated this well. Carr went very in-depth with his article, and I had a hard time following some parts of it, but overall I agree with his opinion.
ReplyDeleteWhat i thought was really ironic about this article was that people were saying it was soo long which is just what the article was about. I see the authors points but i do believe in the later part of his article, where he talks about history's doomsdayers. I think we all adapt and as long as they still; teach the classics and not twilight in schools we are good.
ReplyDeleteThis is a good article. It makes a lot of legitimate points I would have never of thought of. It makes you think, and believe exactly what the author is saying. After reading this I am persuaded one way. Google has made searching very easy for use to access information, is that a good thing or bad?
ReplyDeleteAt first I thought the concept was a little ridiculous, but then when he got into how it's so hard to keep focused on a long piece of writing it made me start thinking. I am use to reading short blurbs with pretty much everything I do: the internet, text messages, notes, and even conversations. When I go to read an article or a book I find myself skimming it because I get bored and I just want the main points of the story. However, I found it rather odd how he was talking about not being able to read long articles, but his article was extremely long and my mind went off in tangents while reading it.
ReplyDeleteI agree with this article, because of all these internet search engines we now no longer read. I myself tend to skim over pages, not as often as this articles mentions, but still enough to realize there's a problem.
ReplyDeleteThis article is very informative, so informative that i felt a little overwhelmed with facts and info. I get what Carr is getting at but i don't feel that he needed all those facts, because it's easy to get off track when reading it. But then again maybe i've been using google too much.
ReplyDeleteOverall I thought this was a decent article. It really made me think about the effect Google has had on my life. If I want to know ANYTHING I just have to go to Google and type it in. However, I still use other sources. Google has revolutionized the way that people find their information, there is no doubt about that. It has it's pros and it's cons, and this article did not miss one of them.
ReplyDeleteThe author had this planned out very well. I really like how they used so many different sources and cited them. It made it a lot more credible.
I thought that this article was very interesting. Although at first before we had started reading it I had my mind set that Google is good for us, making information easier to access, I now believe that Google is wasting our brains with its "quick-links".
ReplyDeleteTo me this article was information packed. I agree with the author saying that since we have Google and there is so much information out there to use we skim everything we read. I also believe that we do read more now a days than people did in the past. This article was planned out very well and with all of the other sources, it made the article seem more realistic because other people were talking about it also.
ReplyDeleteHe had some valid points and ideas. He had A LOT of examples, stories, and sources so you must take into consideration what he is trying to say. I think this article is way too long though. It is so long, most will do exactly what he is saying, skim it. People lose interest after so long. I agree with him on most of his points, but that doesn't necessarily mean google is making us stupid. It may be making us lazier, but no one can make you stupid besides yourself.
ReplyDeletei agree that google does make us lazy. There used to be a day when searching for sources was done through books, not on the internet. These sources that are so easily found may not even be that reliable. Since i have grown up in the internet age i can tell that i am easily distracted when it comes to reading long articles, which is what made this article hard to get through, and i didn't even have to read the whole thing! This article was well-researched and had plenty of evidence.
ReplyDeleteThis was actually a very interesting article. I find myself reading less books whereas I used to read all the time for fun. I also get very impatient when I sit down to read something and it is very long. Take this article for instance, the topic was interesting and had many good points but I got bored with it after the first page. Before I surfed the web and relied on the internet for research I could sit down and read through books, now I can't sit still and focus on something that is longer than a page.
ReplyDeleteI found myself growing more and more annoyed as the article went on. It wasn't because it was long, but I don't agree with Carr at all. I understand where he's coming from, but I love having the entire world at my fingertips and I still see rapid dispersal of information as progress. I too gather short snippets from facebook and RSS feeds and headlines, but I've also been known to pore over wikipedia articles for hours at a time. On top of that, no matter what kind of literary genius Bruce Friedman thinks he is, he can't cite his inability to focus on "War and Peace", of all things, as evidence for anything.
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed this article, because technology is the reality of the future. It brings up the argument of practicality is creating stupidity. I don't agree with the entire argument but it has interesting points and I am ready to talk about them.
ReplyDeleteThe article is really comprehensive covering all the main point of the argument that google makes us stupid. I especially liked the article because it provides lots of reasonings and examples to verify his points. However, the reader might lose interest because it is too way long an essay, but it has a potential to persuade the reader the google can make us stupid. I believe that if the author made a few pages that would be enough for him to get across his message as the issue seems to be really broad and requires real contemplation.
ReplyDeleteThis article is really long for me. The first time I read it, I can not focus. But after reading a second time, I find it really a informative essay. It makes me think about something. The issue brought up in this article is really worth thinking. Is google making us more and more stupid? At least we rely on it more and more, and it really makes our life easier.
ReplyDeleteI've read papers in which raeding from word to word became a headache. I think this is due to the new age poeple are so intertwined with. So many acronyms, symbols, and slang to creat shortcuts where ever possible degrades one's ability to write a fully developed essay. In a way, the more technologically advanced our society becomes, the less our brains work. Back in the day people knew how to speak eloquently at very young ages. Now you can find college students writing at 6th grade levels. This can almost deffinatly be blamed upon technology. Social networks such as Facebook, Myspace, Twitter, Chat rooms, and Texting have caused our generation to become "watered down". At our age, we should be capable of writing very professional papers but due to our need to get thing fast, we've cut all the richness out. You can certainly see how our advanced society has so many positives, but with those advantages come disadvantages. The problem is, society hasn't igured out a way to balance the two.
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