How Google Really Making Us Stupid?

Carr identifies how reading a book is different from reading online because when you read online, you don’t think deeply about what it is you’re reading, and you don’t have to concentrate nearly as much. Carr also mentions that the Internet is something people find themselves going to more often than books because it is more time efficient.

With the rise of technology and the staggering availability of information, the digital age has come about in full force, and will only grow from here. Any individual with an internet connection has a vast amount of knowledge at his fingertips. As long as one is online, he is mere clicks away from Wikipedia or Google, which allows him to find what he needs to know. Despite this, Nicholas Carr questions whether Google has a positive impact on the way people take in information. In his article “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” Carr explores the internet’s impact on the way people read. He argues that the availability of so much information has diminished the ability to concentrate on reading, referencing stories of literary types who no longer

Nicholas Carr in the article, “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” argues that the more people use technology, the more it’s making people stupid. Throughout the article he mentions many examples where he proves himself correct. Google is making us stupid because it’s affecting our concentration the more we rely on technology.

Nicholas Carr is an American author who writes the majority of books and articles about the continuously evolving world of technology and how it is effecting our society. Nicholas Carr’s The Shallows: What the Internet Is Doing to Our Brains, was a 2011 Pulitzer Prize finalist and a New York Times bestseller. In this essay I will be rhetorically analyzing Carr’s essay “Is Google Making Us Stupid” published in 2008. The purpose of Carr’s essay was to bring light to an issue that many of us face but only a meniscal few have come to terms with; and that is that technology is mentally incapacitating our society and simultaneously making us lazy. This essay was intended for anyone was has been consumed in today’s culture by new technological advances to the extent of not being able to function without some sort of device, IE cellphone, laptop or tablet on a daily basis.

Over history technology has changed mankind’s overall culture. From clocks to computers the use of electronics and tools is occurring every day in almost all situations. In Carr’s article “Is Google Making us Stupid?” he introduces the idea how the internet is changing our lives by making us mentally process information differently from the past, based off previous changes in history. Carr explains how we think less deeply and rely on quick facts, versus using critical thinking and research. Also he explains how our brain is malleable, and may be changed by the internet’s impression. Lastly Carr talks about what the

In his writing, Carr explains how his mind has become much more erratic since his use of the internet. “I get fidgety, lose the thread, [and] begin looking for something else to do,” Carr says (572). The availability of information that people have these days is astonishing, and their intake of it is even more considerable. In connection to the information people have access to in our day and age, it has promoted a culture of disinterest and boredom. You are able to see this clearly in a study of online research habits, conducted by scholars from University College London. The subjects displayed “a form of skimming activity,” jumping from source to source. They normally would read no more than one or two pages of a book or article before they would go to another site, seldom returning to any source they had already viewed.

As time progresses in our technologically propelled era and the internet continues to provide as the largest network source of information, our intellectual perception of information takes on a more distinctive and less analytical approach than before. The use of the internet has seized control over the vast connection of neural pathways in our minds, influencing our experiences and essentially hindering our natural ability to apply cognitive thinking.

With new technological advancements occurring more rapidly each year, it is no surprise that there is an extensive conversation about how these new progressions impact the brain’s development and cognition. One trend is evident: there is a universal acknowledgment that technology is indeed changing the way we think. Among the members contributing to this conversation, two strikingly different outlooks on how these changes will affect the future exist. Either we should be terrified, or worrying is premature. Articles written by experts specializing in psychology and the brain, such as Pinker’s “Mind Over Mass Media,” as well as "How Has the Internet Reshaped Human Cognition?" by Kee and Loh, as well as and finally “Children, Wired- for

Nicholas Carr is well known American writer who has written article and books based on business, technology and culture. In 2011, he was the finalist for Pulitzer Prize in General Notification for his book The Shallows: What The Internet Is Doing To Our Brains.In Nicholas Carr’s article “Is Google Making Us Stupid?”, he wrote for The Atlantic on Jul 1, 2008. It's very plausible, complicated and persuasive article. The article makes many believable connections to every day's life, compelling people by using metaphors, staying true to the point and using different rhetorical approaches.

What was once filled with intricate plots, deep narrative, and creative thinking, is now replaced . . . wait . . . what were we talking about? Let me Google the answer really quick. Oh, too bad; the article is so long, I don’t want to read it all. I’ll just skim the text and hopefully we can piece something together.

Author Nicholas Carr poses the question “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” This has set off a debate on the effects the internet is having on our brains. Obviously the internet is here to stay, but is it making us scatterbrained? Are we losing the ability to think deeply? Criticism of the Web most often questions whether we are becoming more superficial and scattered in our thinking. In the July-August 2008 Atlantic magazine, Nicholas Carr published "Is Google Making Us Stupid?" (http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200807/google). Like other critics, he sees change as a loss and not as a gain. The benefits of the internet are real and they are plentiful, but Nicholas Carr says they come at a price.

Carr’s premise is that the Web is interfering with our ability to focus on lengthy material. On the contrary, the internet is actually aiding our ability to focus on reading. This holds true for younger children, who are known as the digital natives in our generation. In a research conducted by The National Center for Education shows that “by altering the mode of reading material from traditional paper-based reading to online reading,” the interest of elementary school children increased (Wright 367). Because children of the 21st century are surrounded by technology, they are more likely to gear towards digital media for their mode of learning. Contrary to Carr’s view that the internet “is chipping away [the] capacity for concentration and contemplation,” these children are more likely to read and focus as a result of

Throughout history, no single piece of technology has been so heavily relied upon such as the internet. Things such as the first car, the first telephone, and even the first airplanes were not as easily, or readily accessible as the Net is today. In all reality, the internet is the greatest and most useful tool that humanity has ever dreamt up. From instant transferring of data to endless sources of information, the Net not only connects all corners of the world, but makes each and every person more knowledgeable and self-aware. But as with all new and virtuous things, there is a darker and more dangerous side. The internet is a tool that consumes the intellectual, changing the way the brain functions and ultimately creating a reliance. This reliance is so severe that all of life’s functions depend on the internet without the same dependency being reciprocated. The relationship is one sided, where the Net has much to gain while the user has little. Furthermore, in its relatively new state, the internet is very obscure and has very questionable ethics. Although beneficial in specific cases, the internet affects one’s emotional state and latently mars cognitive function while creating a devastatingly powerful and coercive reliance.

Nicholas Carrs article, “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” makes points that I agree with, although I find his sources to be questionable. The article discusses the effects that the Internet may be having on our ability to focus, the difference in knowledge that we now have, and our reliance on the Internet. The points that are made throughout Carrs article are very thought provoking but his sources make them seem invaluable.

All technological advancement has its advantages and disadvantages, but one can attest that most of this advantages outweigh the disadvantages. Is Google making us stupid? Does finding information easily make you dumb? No. Google as a search engine has enable the world to easily separate the chaff from the real information needed, it has enabled people acquire resources that could have been impossible to access. I use google daily to make very smart choices in most of my daily life, from my homework to online shopping. In this day when one is spoilt with choices sometimes making just a regular purchase can be very overwhelming, example: television sets come in so many brands and sometimes for a purchase to be made one may resort to google for brand types and reviews to make their decision.