"Is Google Making Us Stupid?" by David Carr: Response

(1) Thesis: the human brain has begun to devolve in its capacity to sponge useful information from long format sources, and that the internet and instant media sources are the responsible for the creation of mental disorder's like ADHD.

(2) I agree with Carr on the subject of Google's influence in the world's inability to focus and develop skills in reading literature in its totality and then picking out the key information. It is common knowledge that on college campuses around the country, students are using Wikipedia, and Google, to do most of the work for them, when in the age without computers, one had to read a book from cover to cover to truly understand a subject in its totality. Even as I type this right now, I did not capitalize Wikipedia or Google, and my computer's spell check let me know that they are meant to be capitalized.
I also agree with Carr on the idea that our brains are so malleable that this new form of research and learning, has retooled our brains capacity and even the manner in which we develop ideas and process information. I really enjoyed the excerpt on Friedrich Nietzsche and the way in which the technology of the typewriter, changed the manner in which he processed his words, perhaps its the non-personal touch of the keys rather than the pen to the page. I personally prefer writing things out before I type them, because I feel I have better control and develop better thoughts when I am writing freehand, rather than staring at a white screen trying to create a cognitive thought.
I do not however agree, and I am not sure he was actually saying this, that the nature of our current difficulties with reading and paying attention, can be blamed completely on the technology of today. Although, I do agree that it plays a large part in this general malaise, I believe that there are other factors which must be taken into account. Things like what we teach our children to appreciate, the importance of the past, and the passing down of generations of ideas, culture, and technology. Our separation from our heritage, and the replacement of the personal, all play enormous factors in our ability to connect and focus in today's technological world. We don't know what it was like without the internet. Instead of practicing cursive writing, we are having kids learn to write on keyboards. Its all connected, even when its not.