Is Our Technology Literally Changing Our Brains? (vox.com) 28
Nicholas Carr authored The Shallows: What the Internet Is Doing to Our Brains back in 2010. This week he offered an up-to-date assessment in his newest interview with Vox co-founder Ezra Klein.
"The point of this conversation is not that the internet is bad, nor that it is good," Klein writes. "It's that it is changing us, just as every medium before it has. We need to see those changes clearly in order to take control of them ourselves..."
But the conversation soon turns to neuroplasticity, the brain's special ability to physically adapt to changes happening in its environment: Nicholas Carr: When we adapt to a new medium — whether printed page or television or, more recently, the internet and social media and so forth — more and more neurons get recruited to the particular brain processes that you're using more often thanks to the different information technologies. But ways of thinking that aren't encouraged by the technology — we begin to lose those abilities... I think it was quite clear even back then [in 2010] that we were making this big tradeoff between getting lots and lots of information very, very quickly and developing a rich base of knowledge. What was lost was not only the ability to engage in deep reading and attentive thought and contemplation, but also when we come across new information, the ability to bring it into our mind and put it into a broader context. That takes time. That takes attention. That takes focus.
The fundamental argument of The Shallows was that we were making this tradeoff. What I worried about then, and what I still worry about, is whether that tradeoff is worth it — are we losing more than we ultimately gain? What's happened since then? On one level, I think it's magnified all of my concerns. Over the last 10 years, the smartphone took over as the dominant form of the computer. Unlike a laptop, the smartphone is always on. It's always with us. We can access it almost instantaneously. People walk around with it in their hands. So this constant distraction that I documented with laptops and desktops is now much more dominant. It goes on all the time.
Also social media exploded and became one of, if not the main, things people do with computers. And the way social media distributes information, the way it gives particular value or particular emphasis to very emotional information and simplified, kind of strong messages, I think all of this has made the problems I tried to delineate more intense in kind of [a] deeper set within society. What has also become clearer and clearer in the last 10 years is that now there's also a big social effect of the technology. On the one hand, all the distractions that we had 10 years ago have proliferated, but also the way we make sense of things socially has changed dramatically as social media has essentially taken over media.
"The point of this conversation is not that the internet is bad, nor that it is good," Klein writes. "It's that it is changing us, just as every medium before it has. We need to see those changes clearly in order to take control of them ourselves..."
But the conversation soon turns to neuroplasticity, the brain's special ability to physically adapt to changes happening in its environment: Nicholas Carr: When we adapt to a new medium — whether printed page or television or, more recently, the internet and social media and so forth — more and more neurons get recruited to the particular brain processes that you're using more often thanks to the different information technologies. But ways of thinking that aren't encouraged by the technology — we begin to lose those abilities... I think it was quite clear even back then [in 2010] that we were making this big tradeoff between getting lots and lots of information very, very quickly and developing a rich base of knowledge. What was lost was not only the ability to engage in deep reading and attentive thought and contemplation, but also when we come across new information, the ability to bring it into our mind and put it into a broader context. That takes time. That takes attention. That takes focus.
The fundamental argument of The Shallows was that we were making this tradeoff. What I worried about then, and what I still worry about, is whether that tradeoff is worth it — are we losing more than we ultimately gain? What's happened since then? On one level, I think it's magnified all of my concerns. Over the last 10 years, the smartphone took over as the dominant form of the computer. Unlike a laptop, the smartphone is always on. It's always with us. We can access it almost instantaneously. People walk around with it in their hands. So this constant distraction that I documented with laptops and desktops is now much more dominant. It goes on all the time.
Also social media exploded and became one of, if not the main, things people do with computers. And the way social media distributes information, the way it gives particular value or particular emphasis to very emotional information and simplified, kind of strong messages, I think all of this has made the problems I tried to delineate more intense in kind of [a] deeper set within society. What has also become clearer and clearer in the last 10 years is that now there's also a big social effect of the technology. On the one hand, all the distractions that we had 10 years ago have proliferated, but also the way we make sense of things socially has changed dramatically as social media has essentially taken over media.
Should never have tamed fire (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
Betteridge. (Score:3)
Literally everything is changing our brains you simpleton.
Re: (Score:2)
Op uses "we" instead of "I" like a moron does. Repeatedly. His craft is shit.
Re: (Score:2)
Na, he tries to establish common ground (or rather forcing it) with the audience. As most people are dumb beyond belief, this technique works on many people.
"social media exploded and became one of, if not.. (Score:2, Funny)
.. the main, things people do with computers."
Nobody uses a computer for social media, asshole. A cellphone is not a computer.
Re: (Score:3)
A cellphone is not a computer.
Fail.
Please turn in your geek card at the front desk on your way out.
Re: (Score:2)
Nobody uses a cellphone as a phone either.
Re: (Score:2)
Nobody uses a cellphone as a phone either.
I do. In fact it is my main use for that thing. The second and third one are checking email (not writing email) and mobile hotspot to use with a real computer.
Now, does that make me a fossil or avantgarde? I guess it depends from where in human history and future you look.
Re: (Score:2)
I use mine as a computer, you use your as a phone. I guess proof by contradiction worked, well done.
Re: (Score:2)
Thanks.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
It's time to have an honest discussion on how to purge these irredeemable "homeboys" from society.
Oh, the irony...
If you're going to post something old and boring (Score:1)
at least make it something that's also useful and interesting. Like:
http://obsceneworks.com/blog/w... [obsceneworks.com]
Information != Wisdom (Score:2)
"Ever learning, and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth."
Re: (Score:2)
Indeed. And most is not even information, it is data and noise. Seeing more and more is a sure path to understand nothing.
Why this strange treatment of neuroplasticity? (Score:5, Insightful)
... Like is was something separate from being just bog-standard ... *learning*!
Why are there so many so-called "scientists" acting as if specific higher functionality had a specific location in the brain, when people with physiologically unusual brains (Like the "Homer Simpson brain", or with complete parts missing) show time and time again, that it's just that we all grow up basically in the same environment (inside a normal human womb, etc.), and that's all there is to it.
So: Oh noes, our brains learn different things to adapt to different situation! Totally not the point of having a brain! Let's all be static and frozen, like our ofersimplified poor imitation "AI"s. :)
Re: (Score:2)
What is missing in his equation is computer gaming. No focus, online focus like no other other, twelve hours at a time, zeroed in, all else excluded.
On the internet it depends upon the kind of interaction. Empty, short comment, vapid communications, just seeking the brain chemical hit of a response back. Sure that is becoming more prevalent even on slashdot, no chat in the chat any more, too few characters to spare.
Way to broad a stroke is being pushed, many on /. avoid facebook and twitter (dead zones fu
You're a Product of your Environment (Score:1)
Perhaps gamify'ing it with "Spot the Sadist" could be a mini-game inside digital media. Points, prizes and a Podium might be more enriching to an audience.
https://www.psychologytoday.co... [psychologytoday.com]
The smartphone is always on. It's always with us. (Score:2)
Good way to an early grave, mate. Mine is not.
Of course not. (Score:3)
Our brains were intelligently designed by a deity to be perfect. Technology or the way we use it has no imp.... OF COURSE IT IS. Seriously did you even do biology in highschool? Literally EVERYTHING is changing your brain. Reading this post here is changing your brain too.
Of course. (Score:2)
Our brains help us change our environment more than any other animal has been able to do. And we know we all adapt to our environment, the one we're changing all the time. We're a live experiment in progress. Take lots of notes.
Resistance is futile (Score:2)