Is the Internet making us stupid?
This is the question Michael Brown asks in his recent article about Nicholas Carr’s new book, The Shallows.
My take:
The Internet (and the portability of technology in general) is making us more distracted than ever. When it’s harder to focus, your ability to maintain a single line of thought is extremely inhibited, if not impossible.
One distraction leads to another. Interruptions pile on. Next thing you know, you can’t remember what you set out to accomplish in the first place.
So is the Internet to blame? Yes and no.
The Internet itself isn’t necessarily the problem — it’s the lack of boundaries. Without boundaries, there’s very little to control our behavior.
Therefore, I would argue that the heavy, undisciplined use of the Internet (and cell phones, iPads, etc.) is indeed making us stupid.
Want to kick your IQ up a few points? It’s simple, really.
Just turn off all your electronic devices that could distract you and focus on a single task for an hour or two straight. I dare you.
-Ryan M. Healy
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RT @healymonster Is the Internet Making Us Stupid? http://bit.ly/c0C5Pp
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Is the Internet Making Us Stupid? – Is the Internet making us stupid? This is the question Michael Brown asks in his… http://ht.ly/17RosB
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Is the Internet Making Us Stupid? http://bit.ly/c0C5Pp
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RT @HeyHealy: Is the Internet Making Us Stupid? – Is the Internet making us stupid? http://ht.ly/17RosB
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Fully agree with #HeyHealy that being productive as a freelancer means not using the internet the way it wants you to: http://bit.ly/97tV1e
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This page is all squiffy…
I just opened my email to look something up and saw your email about this post Ryan. It caught my eye, I clicked through and read it, now I don't remember what I was looking for. So if the internet isn't to blame, does that mean I can blame you? :-)
I don't think it's just the lack of boundaries on the internet, I think it's the easy availability of information in many forms. I've got a pile of books on my desk, of which I'm halfway through 3 or 4 and the rest are tempting me to crack them open before I finish the others.
This glut of information was never so easily available in the past. The internet just compounds it by making it even easier and faster to find stuff.
Ugh. I suffer from this, I really do.
I know it's not good for me. but like millions of others, face with the choice of spending time alone with my thoughts and whipping out my iphone and checking email/twitter/my website stats – I usually choose the latter.
Ian
For those of us prone to ADHD, the Internet is all its forms is a major source of distraction. I have the default page on my browsers set to blank. If I did not, every time I went to use a browser there is a good chance some bit of news will catch my eye, and bingo its ten, fifteen minutes later and I have completely lost my train of thought.
To the degree that the Internet has replaced TV as the great pacifier, yes it is a dumbing down effect. To the degree that it becomes the endless source of distraction and diversion, then in some ways even worst.
John Deck
I don't know about making us stupid in general. I think it depends on what you're using the internet for. I know many people who use it for research and because there is so much more information in one place, these people have increased their knowledge. On the flip side, I know a lot of people who aimlessly surf and in turn don't really gain anything by it.
That being said, I do think the internet can be a distraction. I find myself distracted by it many times and have learned to just turn it off during my heavy working hours.
Totally agree Ryan. I came to this very conclusion a few months ago. The hard part is actually disconnecting the modem & leaving it off.
The availability of so many other opinions is also hard to resist sometimes. “I wonder what Google has about idea x” is what I've relied on for years. My own creativity and problem solving has no doubt suffered as a result… or maybe those grey hairs really are a sign of something… ;-)
Ryan,
It's totally about limits! Limit yourself to say thirty minutes reading the “news” of the day, focus on your tasks at hand, take a break, read some more, then refocus. Lots of good ideas come from reading just the headlines. I break by actually reading a physical fiction book. Thanks for all the food for thought!
The multitasking action the Internet and our connectedness allows actually rewires our brains into a disorganized mess.
Ryan hit on the solution. Concentrate on one thing at a time. And you'll rewire your brain to concentrate on one thing at a time.
Well the internet makes us more multitasker but it is true that it divides our attention. It also lead to addiction because it's a virtual reality world that somehow absorb our aspirations and what if's.
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