![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Are Teh Internets Making Us Stoopid?
Jun. 9th, 2008 10:30 amSlashdot linked to a rather interesting article (which itself links to another article, woo), regarding the state of the modern intellect and the effect the internet has had on our cognitive processes. Mostly it's a guy commenting, but he brought up some interesting points, and the conversation threads on Slashdot regarding said article has given me much to think about.
The basic argument a lot of people make is that while our general memorization skills have dramatically dwindled, that's not necessarily a bad thing, because the internet now gives us instant access to most any knowledge we could ever want. In essence, the internet has become the extension to our memory. Thus, the new form of intelligence is not necessarily focus on how much you can recall, but how well you can process and sort knowledge coming in from the internet. I disagree with this argument to an extent, and try to remember every bit of information that I can. However, I do agree that the ability to process is now a highly important skill to basic functioning.
However, there is a very large problem with this whole idea. The problem is that most people are actually using these enormous quantities of information in any sort of intelligent manner. They are not learning even the basic methods of sifting and sorting. If anything, this instant access to knowledge has made people far lazier and more stupid than ever before. It's as if the very possibility of accessing the knowledge is enough for people. I realize I'm generalizing, but it's a generalization based on my observations of many friends. And what I see is a distinct lack of interest in learning, or even finding things out. It's already out there, so they figure it's not important for them to look it up themselves. So not only do people not bother to learn the new skills, they don't even have the same amount of personally learned information that people used to have.
What the net has done is to make people lazy and complacent, and that is a terrible place to be in, especially when our connection is so very tenuous. If you've ever had the net cut out unexpectedly, you know just how much basic information you suddenly lose. You forget how to do even simple things because you can find it all online, so when it's gone, you suddenly find a number of tasks that you can't remember how to do anymore. So what happens if a large group of people suddenly lose this connection? Nothing but empty heads, bumping into each other...
The basic argument a lot of people make is that while our general memorization skills have dramatically dwindled, that's not necessarily a bad thing, because the internet now gives us instant access to most any knowledge we could ever want. In essence, the internet has become the extension to our memory. Thus, the new form of intelligence is not necessarily focus on how much you can recall, but how well you can process and sort knowledge coming in from the internet. I disagree with this argument to an extent, and try to remember every bit of information that I can. However, I do agree that the ability to process is now a highly important skill to basic functioning.
However, there is a very large problem with this whole idea. The problem is that most people are actually using these enormous quantities of information in any sort of intelligent manner. They are not learning even the basic methods of sifting and sorting. If anything, this instant access to knowledge has made people far lazier and more stupid than ever before. It's as if the very possibility of accessing the knowledge is enough for people. I realize I'm generalizing, but it's a generalization based on my observations of many friends. And what I see is a distinct lack of interest in learning, or even finding things out. It's already out there, so they figure it's not important for them to look it up themselves. So not only do people not bother to learn the new skills, they don't even have the same amount of personally learned information that people used to have.
What the net has done is to make people lazy and complacent, and that is a terrible place to be in, especially when our connection is so very tenuous. If you've ever had the net cut out unexpectedly, you know just how much basic information you suddenly lose. You forget how to do even simple things because you can find it all online, so when it's gone, you suddenly find a number of tasks that you can't remember how to do anymore. So what happens if a large group of people suddenly lose this connection? Nothing but empty heads, bumping into each other...
