'Is Google Making USupid' 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. The author can relate his personal experiences with the scene where Dave admits he as felt someone tinkering his brain and not being able to think like he used to because of supercomputer HAL. Carr cannot focus

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.

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. Carr is effective in his argument by sharing his fears and personal experiences to have an effect on the audience utilizing pathos and ethos. Not only does he include his own experience, but he also includes other people’s point of views. He goes on to support his claim of how technology

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. Carr believes that we depend on the Internet more than just looking up the answers in the book ourselves. He is trying to prove that our generation is consumed by the Internet. In addition to this, I feel his argument is effective because he builds credibility with personal facts, using statistics, and making emotional appeals throughout the essay. He gives many details and examples to backup and support his argument.

Technology has defied all odds as it has been progressing over the years.At the same time, technology has become a hindrance in schools. There is a proposition for our school to participate in the National Shut Down Your Screen Week. This would be a great opportunity for us to take a break from technology and develop some social skills that allow us to connect with each other and not through a screen.

Carr opens up his argument with his personal struggle to focus on reading the text. Unlike the past when he enjoyed reading lengthy articles easily, he acknowledges that his mind constantly drifts away from the text and that he looks for something else to do. “I’ve been spending a lot of time online, searching and surfing and sometimes adding to the great databases of the Internet....Research that once required days in the stacks or periodical rooms of libraries can now be done in minutes… Even when I’m not working, I’m as likely as not to be foraging in the Web’s info-thickets”(Carr 348). He realizes that the increasing amount of time spending on the Internet has caused his intellectual pain. By exposing his personal experience and analyzing it, he successfully points out the issue he faces.

Nicolas Carr, an author and researcher, insinuates that people who use computers and the internet are becoming more shallow human beings and that this technological tool, despite its advantages that are applauded by many, is harming society as a whole. Carr has discussed these thoughts in his book The Shallows, on television in an interview with Stephen Colbert, and in an article in The Atlantic entitled “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” While Carr believes that the internet has its place and that it has been extremely helpful to him as a researcher and writer, he also believes that the internet encourages multitasking and boosts superficiality. I share these same thoughts with Carr. While the internet has been extremely helpful in producing a more efficient and fast-paced environment, it has at the same time produced challenges and weaknesses in our society, like multitasking and frivolity.

In today’s society, technology plays a very important role in its ability to function, it helps people find information, communicate with others far away and provides entertainment. In “Fahrenheit 451”, a book written by Ray Bradbury, a dystopian future where books have been made illegal is presented. In the article, “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” by Nicholas Carr, raises many questions about technology and its effects on society. It’s quite evident that we have become quite dependent on technology due to our overconsumption of it.

“With the exception of alphabets and number systems, the Net may well be the single most powerful mind-altering technology that has ever come into general use. At the very least, it’s the most powerful that has come along since the book.” From The Shallows : (Carr: 118). States that The internet is by far the best invention on all of human creation. The internet is a great source for multitasking, gain of knowledge, and saves a lot of time.

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.

William Badke assessment of the article by Nicholas Carr “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” has a unique twist. As an associate librarian at Trinity Western University, he feels online search engines like Google or Yahoo restricts profound thought and retrains comprehension. Badke states “we can keyword search right to the best stuff without reading much of the book itself.” (online) He accepts research by Gary Small and Gigi Vorgan called iBrain, which submits the brain, adapts to the surrounding environment. IBrain coins the phrase “digital native” and “digital immigrants (newcomers to the digital world) to compare how the brain operates in each setting. This research is producing a new generation, Net generation or “IBrain generation” causing

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. He is extremely focused on the online reading’s distraction that most affects people’s mind.

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.

Phones, iPods, televisions, tablets, computers. Go back about 100 years or so and you’ll be lucky to find a landline or payphone. Today, technology is a part of our everyday lives. Most say that technology distracts kids, isolates them, and crazes them into addiction. “Shut Down Your Screen Week” is a national movement, challenging families to drift away from technology for a week. However, a “screen free week” here in SLH would do nothing but take away kids’ social ties, take away great opportunities of education, and could even jeopardize their safety. Spring Lake Heights Elementary should not participate in “Shut Down Your Screen Week”.

In The Shallows, Nicholas Carr discusses the internet’s effect on human thought. This is perfectly shown in Chapter Nine which is titled “Search, Memory.” Carr speaks on how the internet effects long term memory. The chapter quotes one of the smartest minds in the history of Western Civilization, Socrates. Socrates is quoted, “Writing down their thoughts and reading the thoughts of others had written down, they become less dependent on the contents of their own memory.” (The Shallows, Pg. 173) Socrates was onto something, just not in the right in the right part of history. With all of the knowledge available online and just a few key strokes away, there comes a loss of the long term memory. Why retain any knowledge if it just a hyperlink away?