I recently finished reading The Shallows: What the Internet is Doing to Our Brains by Nicholas Carr. I found it to be a fascinating read. It played to my interests in reading and education, but also kept my attention while covering topics in neuroscience and biology.
The basic premise of the book is an evaluation of how technology, specifically the Internet, changes the way we think. While not being a total alarmist, the author encourages his readers to think about what we’re losing (in addition to what we’re gaining) with each technological advance. His conclusion? The more we use the Internet the more we train our brains to be distracted and shallow in their thinking.
“When we go online, we enter an environment that promotes cursory reading, hurried and distracted thinking, and superficial learning. It’s possible to think deeply while surfing the Net, just as it’s possible to think shallowly while reading a book, but that’s not the type of thinking the technology encourages and rewards.” (Pg. 166)
Greatest strength of the book: His synthesis of ideas across a variety of fields.
Greatest weakness: The beginning of the book. The complaining tone and arbitrary quotations from unknown bloggers made me not want to continue reading.
Interesting insights:
- History of writing, print, and books from clay tablets to Twitter. Did you realize early writing didn’t contain spaces between the words? Can you imagine how much work it’d take to decipher a writer’s text, much less their meaning?
- Reading online (with hyperlinks and hypermedia) is like reading without spaces between the words. It requires greater processing power, leaving less available for close, deep reading. We begin to simply decode information instead of decoding, evaluating, and synthesizing information.
- We sell ourselves short when we compare our brains to computers or machines.
- In opposition to the current trend which views memorization as a mechanical, mindless process, Carr highlighted Erasmus’ use of memorization as a tool to creativity and deeper understanding.
- Quoting Barnaby Rich, who in 1600 said, “ One of the great diseases of this age is the multitude of books that doth so overcharge the world that it is not able to digest the abundance of idle matter that is every day hatched and brought into the world.” I wonder what he’d think today?
As you can see, I’m not going to stop using the Internet, but I will consider when and how I use it.
2 comments:
I recently listened to it as an audiobook. There seemed to be a bit of irony in multitasking to hear it while I washed dishes and did other tasks.
I was a bit concerned at the beginning. When he quoted McLuhan, I was afraid it was going to be as horrible as Postman's Amusing Ourselves to Death, and if I had been reading rather than listening, I might not have continued.
I was pleasantly surprised though, and I enjoyed reading it. I think it will have an impact both on how I read and how I blog.
Nicholas Carr also has a blog that has interesting articles: Rough Type.
Do you own the book and if so, can I borrow it?
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