Saturday, August 11, 2012

Is technology harmful or helpful?

     As I keep reading through The Shallows: What the Internet is Doing to Our Brains, by Nicholas Carr, I keep finding things Carr is saying that I could not agree more with. When Carr says that " it was then that I began worrying about my inability to pay attention to one thing for more than a couple of minutes", I knew exactly what he was talking about. Carr in this quote is referring to how scanning a web page for key words has changed our brains from the traditional enthrallment of a book. For, as I was reading this passage in the book, I found myself doing that exactly! I was just scanning through the book, not even realizing the mistake I was making. Then, once I realized the truth Carr was telling, I began to slow down and read every single word, comprehending what the author was really trying to say. I think that Nicholas Carr has many good points about how technology has helped us and how it has also  hurt us. What do you think? For, we all see pros and cons to the situation, but which do you really think it is? Is technology good or bad for humans?

-Alexa Moore

6 comments:

  1. I think that technology is good and bad for us. Its good because we can get information at a very fast pace, but then this leads us to the bad. We are so used to getting information so fast that when our internet is slow or we have to read a book to find the information we get mad because its not instant. So technology has many benefits to it but it puts us in this state where we need everything now, and everything has to be fast and instant.

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  2. I believe that CURRENT technology bears little benefits. Yes, technology is wonderful in general. It's how we humans have gotten so far. To me, the internet seems good, but doesn't seem too useful.
    As said by Carr, "While acknowledging that it's now hard to imagine living without the Internet and online tools like Google search engine, he stressed that 'their heavy use has neurological consequences'" Trading heavy focus for quick attention shifting doesn't seem fair to me. We also don't take internet use into moderation unless we make ourselves. Human's heavier dependency on the internet as time progresses, doesn't make me optimistic about the future.

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  3. I believe technology is helpful or harmful only based on how we use it of course. The internet has provided a way of communication between ourselves and everyone else in the online world. However, it has severely degraded our attention spans causing us to become impatient and less thoughtful. From this I can really see why you would have to slow down to comprehend everything; we probably all have that issue! And although technology is considered to be a "life-saver" in our modern society, it really causes us to lose crucial cognitive abilities.

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  4. Having read the books that we were assigned for this class, I am quite informed about the harmful effects of technology upon humans. I do believe, however, that technology's great benefits outweigh these negative implications. Work is accomplished at a much more rapid pace and under much more flexible circumstances, which is why I believe it is beneficial. Information is scattered all over the internet, and why struggle to find something when you can look it up and have it right then and there?

    It would be quite hypocritical of me to say that I'm against what technology is doing to our minds when I personally cannot survive without it. It has become so essential to our lives that whether or not the deterioration of our brains is a greater consequence than the benefits we receive from technology does not even matter. I say that technology is probably good for us, but not that it really matters since we've already been consumed by it.

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  5. Reading, writing, walking, talking, listening and living in general will always have its distractions. Technology has not only enhanced the effects of distractions or shortened our attention spans but also made our generation rely on it. Technology can be arguably beneficial or harmful. Our generation has so quickly adapted to this new technology, without it most of us will not survive.

    Technology allows us to connect with one another on a simple push of a button or receive an answer on the click of a mouse. The question is not if technology is good or bad for us, because either way we're receiving information that is beneficial or harmful. Our lives have already seemed to adapt to this life style and will not rid of it. It gives us an easier life but shows us how hard is was for our ancestors. By the time information is all over the web, we have no insight on the hardships of finding information through a simple textbook. In the end my opinion its great for us but everything has a bad side.

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  6. Technology is good for humans. Technology provides a simpler means of communication throughout the world. Technology has made advances in medical discoveries and more. What does it matter if technology has become vital for people of today? Honestly, I think we were never introduced to another way of life. If anything, technology makes us more realistic. We don't need to send messenger owls to communicate, we can spend two minutes typing an e-mail. Let's face it. Technology is upgrading our world. Yes, technology distracts us from the little things in life, but let's look at the big picture. The future generations have more to build on. Future generations will be more dependent on technology than today. It's a given.

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