Is Google Making Us Stupid

Now that technology is quickly advancing, it is really easy to find information with a click of a button. One highly used search engine in the internet is Google. Many people believe that using Google has made people not use their brains therefore making them stupider. I on the other hand, believe that the internet is a great resource and tool for many things if used right and can actually help you learn and make you smarter. For example, having a question and quickly going to Google to find your answer before thinking about it first and coming up with the answer yourself, is not using it right and we shouldn 't take advantage because in this way it may make us stupider instead of making us learn and expand our knowledge about a particular subject.

Technology nowadays always use to have so much information at our fingertips, but is this a good thing? That is what Jamais Cascio’s “Get Smarter” and Nicholas Carr’s “Is Google Making Us Stoopid?” both discuss; they specifically address the effects that new technology, such as the internet, has on the way humans think. The difference is that Carr argues that this new technology is making us stupid while Cascio argues that it is making us smarter. Nicholas Carr’s article discusses the negative effects of the internet and technology like it. It specifically mentions slight changes in the way people do things because of the influence of technology and gives many historical and anecdotal examples. Jamais Cascio’s article is about the advancements of technology and how it is makes people smarter. Cascio talks about Twitter, mental enhancement drugs and AIs, focusing a lot on the benefits of the advancements.

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

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.

The internet has made an immense impact on every generation since its existence as it continues to grow throughout time. Its effectiveness is prodigious; the internet allows people to gain information that once took days to retrieve it in a few minutes (Carr 1). Writer Nicholas Carr, in his article “Is Google Making Us Stupid?”, explains that the use of internet and technology causes harm to people and their brains. Carr’s purpose is to address to internet users that Google (or any electronic helpers) is making them “stupid” and lazy because it minimizes their concentration and willingness to think. He attempts to adapt to his audience, dedicated internet users, as he uses the rhetorical appeals to try to convince them of his purpose. However, this was not enough. Nicholas Carr’s article, “Is Google Making Us Stupid?,” is ineffective because of his poor use of ethos and logos despite his good use of pathos.

In the article, “Is Google Making Us Stupid”, the main argument the author, Nicholas Carr is trying to make is to explain how the Internet becomes our only source of information. Carr is also trying to warn oncoming generations in how the Internet has affected our ability to read long pieces or to be able to retain information for a long period of time. Carr provides personal experience, imagery, and a professional analysis that is backed by research to hook the audience in and persuade them that in today’s society, the Internet is only causing problems rather than any solutions.Throughout the article Carr provides an abundant amount of rhetorical modes by giving examples and studies from different organizations . Carr gives an insight on the positive ways the Internet had influenced his life.

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

In the essay “Is Google Making Us Stupid”, Nicholas Carr expresses his beliefs and personal experiences on how the internet has altered our brains and how we think. He addresses the fact that, although our brains’ abilities to deep read and concentrate are suffering, the internet is extremely beneficial and convenient. Because of the easy accessibility, it takes little to no effort to find information, and therefore, a minimal amount of thinking is required. Carr highlights that people are more impatient because of the internet and that our minds are becoming more erratic. The author used research, conducted by a U.K. educational consortium, to show that a new form of reading is developing over time; rather than reading every word on a page, it has turned to more of a skimming method. Nicholas Carr realizes that we may be doing more reading than ever due to the internet, but it is different in the way that people have to interpret the text. Reading, unlike talking, is not a natural ability. One must learn to deep read, make connections, and translate the underlying meaning. Overall, Carr believes it is a mistake to rely fully on computers because in the end, it will just be our own intelligence that morphs into artificial intelligence.

With the advent of Worldwide Web, telephones, telegraphs and other technologies human race has advanced with a speed, which was never even imagined few decades, down the line. Many people have been impacted with this change and a lot of people have questioned the effects of Internet on cognitive abilities and Human brain. There has been a debate to this argument whether Internet has a negative impact on cognition and human brain thus de-humanizing the human race or is it benefitting us by reaching the unimagined areas and achieving a comfortable lifestyle and setting us free from the shackles of stressful efforts.

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.

In the modern era, there are significant developments in technology with the internet being one among the numerous developments. The internet has become a necessity for people from all walks of life and it has greatly influenced how people live, study, communicate and work. Knowledge acquisition has also become easier as many people now look up for new and advanced knowledge in internet search engines like Google. In his essay "Is Google Making Us Stupid?"Nicholas Carr uses his personal experience and research results to illustrate the impact internet create on its user. Although the title of the statement mentions the influence created by the search engine, Google, the article also describes some subtle changes that have happened on human brain and body during the progress of the technology. As a web writer, the author is gradually accustomed to the convenient acquisition channel of information provided by the network during his daily life. Even at the time he is not working, he spends a large amount of time surfing the internet, searching for headlines, writing blogs and acquiring all sorts of information.

Nicholas Carr’s story about Google tells us about how we are on the site spending a lot of time online, searching and surfing too. He claims that the Web is a godsend, and it is the truth because when we are on the internet looking at Google it can help us find things. Bruce Friedman, who blogs all the time about the use of computers in medicine has described how being on the internet had changed his mental habits. He claims “I now have almost totally lost the ability to read and absorb a longish article on the web or in print.” Maryanne Wolf, a developmental psychologist at Tufts University, says that when we read online we tend to become “Mere decoders of information.”

Nowadays, if a young adult hears a new terminology, instead of going to a library and looking it up in an encyclopedia as what his or her parents would have done, he or she will pull out his or her smartphone and “google” it. Thanks to Google and all other commercial Internet companies, we are closer to all kinds of information, both useful and useless, than any other time in human history. In Nicholas Carr’s article “Is Google Making Us Stupid?”, he admits how the immediate access to the rich store of online information benefits him largely as a writer (Carr, 589). While enjoying this positive influence of the Net, however, he brings up a side effect of the Internet which is hardly ever mentioned: The Internet is diminishing our capacity

Stephen Covey stated, “Every human has four endowments – self-awareness, conscience, independent will and creative imagination. These gives us the ultimate human freedom…. The power to choose, to respond, to change ("Independence Quotes." Brainy Quote. Xplore. Web. 16 Nov. 2015.).” The Declaration of Independence allows people to do whatever they please as long as it’s within the law, but Google is restraining what people can really do. It may not seem that a search engine can limit people, but one needs to think about the many things Google consists of that doesn’t allow people to choose what they want to do. Nicholas Carr, the author of “The Shallows”, which talks about what the internet is doing to peoples’ brains, also writes an article containing evidence on how Google is putting restrictions on humans. In Carr’s article “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” he explains that Google and the Net are affecting the quality of life, because Google is stripping people’s sense of independence.