Is Google Making Us Stupid? by Nicholas Carr and How Computers Change the Way We Think by Sherry Turkle both explore the effects of technology, or more specifically the effects of the internet in society and individual thought. Carr suggests that computers and other forms of technology are becoming of greater value than humans. He believes that humans are losing their natural instincts while everything and everybody are being measured up to the speed and vast knowledge of Google. Although Turkle agrees with many of Carr’s beliefs, Turkle focuses more on the aspect of how society is evolving with technology. She views the internet as a medium that carries new ideas, thoughts, and ways of self-expression. Carr and Turkle both use their essays to explain that although computers can lead to a lack of patience and depth, they can also increase productivity, build knowledge, and encourage acceptance of people from all different walks of life. …show more content…
By making something easier one can almost always expect to see some losses in the process. Carr explains how throughout time, with every new invention, there were people who were worried about the loss that the invention would incur. (59) He gives examples like how Plato’s Phaedrus Socrates was worried that the development of writing would make people forgetful and “filled with the conceit of wisdom instead of real wisdom.” (55) When people stop exercising the mind, its capacity will decrease. Turkle gives another great example of how technology has caused loss when switching from lectures to PowerPoints. He believes that PowerPoint “encourages presentation, not conversation.” (289) In keeping everything crisp and clean with bullets and pictures there is little room for grey areas, it is either black or white. Students do not take the time to question information that is displayed as clear cut
Rhetorical Analysis In the article “Is Google Making us Stupid?”, author Nicholas Carr expresses his idea that the internet is taking over society and our thinking process. Google is affecting our abilities to read books, longer articles, and even older writings. Carr believes that we have become so accustomed to the ways of the internet, and we are relying on Google 's ability to sort through the details for us so we don 't have to, in order to get the information we find necessary more efficiently. He finds that this process has become almost too handy, and that it is corrupting us from becoming better educated.
In the article, “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” Nicholas Carr clearly states his thesis and the idea that not only is google changing the way we as humans think, read, and write, but all of technology is affecting us in our everyday lives. The internet sources such as Google are created to find information fast and easy for users. Google does all the searching and hard work of having to read through huge articles. We are humans have it easy now, we no longer have to do all the reading and digging around of endless articles and papers.
With all the information we consume in a short amount of time Carr says we are acting like computers as he puts to paper saying “as we come to rely on computers to mediate our understanding of the world, it is our own intelligence that flattens into artificial intelligence” (580). This one again like all the other points is very evident in my life as I see it happen in the school system itself. The school system teaches us to memorize so many things and learn as much as we possibly can in my classes today memorization is key and without it I struggle in class, so learning as much as possible seems to me to be like the role of computers and not for humans. Computers supply us with every bit of information we need and with this power comes the want to be like it, so the school system and culture in general wants us to become like computers, knowing everything that will be useful to us at any given moment and this is taking away our ability to act as humans. In a world where the internet dominates, and has manifested itself in computers and our daily lives, this may be very well be the most important point to realize because if we lose our humanity we lose our ability to be human, and walking computers would be our next
Summary of "Is Google Making Us Stupid" by Nicholas Carr The internet has become a necessity for many people these days, it provides quick information and is a primary source of knowledge. In the article, "Is Google Making Us Stupid", the author Nicholas Carr, is describing the effects that technology has on the human brain. Carr begins with a scene from the end of Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey, where supercomputer HAL is being disconnected by astronaut Dave Bowman who was sent to space on a deadly mission by the machine.
Nicholas Carr, an American writer who publishes books and articles on technology, business, and culture, wrote the article, “Is Google Making Us Stupid.” This article reaches out to all to discuss how technology, mainly the internet, affects humans and how they process information. Carr gives various examples to explain his claim on why the internet might have negative effects on us. For example, he talks about how the use of the internet takes our focus away from our writings. Carr uses a new e-mail message as an example of distraction because when we receive an e-mail, we take our attention to it and our concentration fades away.
14 Nov. 2015. "Is Google Making Us Stupid?" by Nicholas Carr makes the argument that the search engine giant and center of the internet’s access to knowledge could actually be having a negative impact on our minds. The article begins by talking about how the Internet can be a guide to infinite knowledge for the masses. In turn, he is theorizing that our construct of knowledge is becoming solely dependent on technology. He makes the assertion that it is becoming a crutch for our productivity and attention span “The more they use the Web, the more they have to fight to stay focused on long pieces of writing.”
Rhetorical Analysis of Nicholas Carr’s “Is Google Making Us Stupid? We are at a time where technology is widespread; it has become a part of our everyday life leading to advantages and disadvantages. Technology nowadays has become the most important topic to discuss and everyone has developed their own unique opinion. In Nicholas Carr’s article published in 2008, “Is Google Making Us Stupid” he argues that as technology progresses people’s mentality changes.
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.
On one hand, new technology allows for people to grow because of the immediate responses that they provided to the user. These immediate answers that are given to the user allows for them to succeed because the answers allow them to understand how they are wrong and how they can succeed in the future. Gilbert explains in his essay how when people seem to fail in the world we often accept a “fake explanation [which] can cause us to tuck an event away and move along to the next one” (142). However, with the impact of new technologies, these “fake explanations” are few and far between since computers now give an actual explanation for the failure. With computers and technology advancing at a fast rate, these “false explanations” which could be given are beginning to die out.
He states that the presence of technology is changing the way people are thinking (Carr 54). I, in fact, disagree with his statement because technology has taken a huge role in the growth of knowledge for many people and allowing society to become much easier. Nicholas Carr writes about the
Brainless.com: Rhetorical Strategies in Carr’s “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” Do we depend on the Internet to answer all of our questions? Nicholas Carr, an American author, wrote “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” published in 2008 in The Atlantic, and he argues about the effects of the Internet on literacy, cognition, and culture. Carr begins his argument with the ending scene of Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey.
Nicholas Carr made quite a few of points in his book The Shallows. Car made a point in his book, the internet is making us more smarter. (Carr; 40) “ One click on a link led to a dozen or a hundred more” “ online articles are seen faster than print editions” “ Books are great, but the net is faster and won’t waste paper” Our IQ since the internet became the most used source, got higher. The internet has affected us as well. When we face a question that we have no clue about we don 't go to our
The Influence of Technology In the essay, “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” Nicholas Carr argues that utilization of the internet has an adverse effect on our way of thinking and functioning in everyday life. Whether it be reading a newspaper, or scrolling through Facebook, internet media has forever stamped its name in our existence. Carr explains to us that the internet is a tool used every single day in today’s society, but also makes most of us complacent with the ease of having the world at our fingertips.
Our way of thinking is beginning to change to the way that computers do. Advancements are made everyday. These new advancements are attempting to make life in general easier for everyone. Nicholas Carr makes the claim that, “as the internet because our primary source of the information it is affecting our ability to read books and other long narratives.” Carr suggests that using the internet is altering the way that our minds operate.
Nowadays, the internet is the biggest marketing and media tool that people can use today. It can have various effects on people’s daily life ranging from bad to beneficial. In the essay “Is Google making us stupid” by Nicholas Carr writes about how internet usage in the 21st century is changing people’s reading habit and a cognitive concentration. Particularly, he emphasizes on Google’s role in this matter and its consequences on making people machine like. Carr also stated that the online reading largely contributes to people’s way of reading a book.