Carr And Cascio Analysis

Professor Economakis
English- W270
06 September 2015
Carr & Cascio Analysis
Technology surrounds us every day in the modern world. It has become almost a necessity to most who use it, while others would beg to differ. There is debate surrounding both articles written by Nicholas Carr, “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” and Jamais Cascio, “Get Smart” both arguments provide opinion and evidence about the use of technology. Carr discusses how the use of the computers affects our thought process. Carr begins by talking about his own experience as a writer and how he felt like “something had been tinkering with his brain, remapping his neural circuitry and reprogramming his memory”. (Carr, 1). On the contrary Cascio’s article "Get Smart," Cascio urges

his readers to change themselves and as the title of the article suggests, "Get Smart". Cascio begins his "Get Smarter" by mentioning the long passed eruption of Mount Toba. Cascio states that this eruption forced the world into such a harsh climate that it forced humans to evolve or more simply, "to get smarter." Cascio leads this opening idea into a statement that men evolve through the process of becoming smarter. Both articles make valid points, but one of them is the most relatable.
Looking at Carr’s argument he does make some statements that most people would tend to agree with.

One for example is when he talks about how he used to be deeply immersed in readings and now after two or three pages he says “I get fidgety, lose the thread, begin looking for something else to do. I feel as if I’m always dragging my wayward brain back to the text. The deep reading that used to come naturally has become a struggle.” (Carr, 1). Most people would look at the statement and agree. With social media prevalent in society today and with the length of articles getting shorter and advertisements constantly popping up it’s hard to stay focus on just one story. People only scratch the surface when they read now instead of diving deeper into the story. Carr argues that people’s attention spans have gotten shorter over time. But, it’s not only reading stories on the internet, it’s how we’re connected to our electronic devices. A perfect example is we’re always within arm’s reach our phones, ipads, laptops, etc. which can make people lose focus. When’s the last time you looked at your phone to look at a text or check Facebook? Was it 5 minutes ago or even 2 minutes ago? The things we can do with our phones is so technically advanced and Carr believes it’s taking over our minds in a negative way. This generation of children and young adults today are connected to the web constantly. An answer for something is always a click away, which can be a good thing and a bad

thing.
On the contrary in the article “Get Smart” written by Cascio he argues the exact opposite when it comes to technology. Carr uses terms like “intelligence augmentation” (Cascio, 96) to describe effective use of information technology in augmenting human intelligence. Carr uses this term to simply describe it as “You+.” Most would believe that Cascio’s argument carries more weight than Carr’s. Cascio describes the attention deficit disorder that is associated with this new technology is a short term problem. Cascio states “The trouble isn’t that we have too much information at our fingertips, but that our tools for managing it are still in their infancy.” (Cascio, 96). This sentence has the most impact throughout the article in my opinion. The problem isn’t the technology, but the people who use it. Cascio also explains the amazement he finds in all the detail put fourth into today’s video games, and graphics as well as some pharmacological advances. Having a pill that now permit us to concentrate for hours past someone’s normal capacity, one would believe it’s the pill that makes us smarter, but it’s actually your mind that makes us concentrate and focus.
Carr’s vision is for people do read deeper into information and stories. Cascio believes that why read deeply into information when we can quickly gather information faster than we ever have before. The benefit for Carr to adapt to this new way of gathering information is too simply just adapt. The information field is rapidly expanding and people have to adapt with it. Websites similar to Google and Facebook aren’t going away anytime soon and Carr should be more open to adapting to technological advances because they can actually help you if you use it in moderation. Cascio is all for technology and optimistic for what the future holds. He claims that it is our technology, how we adapt to circumstances, how we grow, and advance from these situations is how we get smarter. Like our ancestors before us, it’s in our DNA to grow and advance as a species. Cascio however, is a bit ambitious when it comes to ideas of the mind running like a machine platform. Cascio should realize that these ideas and only ideas. Taking pills to further enhance the mind can be dangerous and farfetched. An idea such as planting computer chips in your brain is an idea and a concept that is meant for the distant future.