Google and Human Brain

1111 Words3 Pages

The Internet has created a generation of the most efficient multi-taskers ever born. Many people will have at least four tabs open as a time (Google, Facebook, Youtube, Pandora, Wikipedia, Gmail, etc.). People are constantly jumping from one web page to the next, clicking on links and opening new tabs and browsers. The method through which knowledge is gained has transitioned from deep reading to fast skimming. Every time a web page is opened the viewer is bombarded with information, almost every page has advertisements or links to additional information lining its sides. The Internet has made mountains of information available to almost anyone. It is fast and easy to find information and facts. Essentially the Internet has become the fast food of knowledge. It is convenient but it skips the element of effort.
Nicholas Carr (a renowned author who has written extensively on this subject), reported in his article “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” cases of very intelligent, well educated people who have begun to notice a change in the way they think and study. These people are experiencing an increasing difficulty in remaining focused for long periods of time or while reading a work longer than a few pages. It’s as if mankind is being programmed to click on any link of button it is presented with and, more importantly, to look for them, even when they aren’t there. Human brains seem to be transitioning away from the careful, deeply focused mentality of an archer’s brain to the lively, constantly moving focus of a juggler’s brain.
Search engines, specifically Google, have probably contributed more to the distribution of knowledge than any other invention since the creation of the printing press. Google was created by Larry Page and Serge...

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...people to be careful with how much time they spend on the Web.

Works Cited

Carr, Nicholas. “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” The Norton Field Guide to Writing. 3rd ed. Eds. Richard Bullock, Maureen Daly Goggin and Francine Weinberg. New York: Norton, 2013. 731-745. PDF.
Christakis, Dimitri A. "Internet Addiction: A 21St Century Epidemic?." BMC Medicine 8.(2010): 61-63.Academic
Search Complete. Web. 9 Dec. 2013.
Levy, Steven, Brad Stone, and Peter Suciu. "All Eyes On Google. (Cover Story)." Newsweek 143.13 (2004):
48-58. Academic Search Complete. Web. 3 Dec. 2013.
Rosenwald, Michael. "Brain Gain." Popular Science 274.6 (2009): 35. Academic Search Complete. Web. 9
Dec. 2013.
Sathyanarayana Rao, T. S., Vishal Indla, and Indla R. Reddy. "Is digital boom spelling cerebral doom?" Indian
Journal of Psychiatry Oct. 2012: 301+. Academic Search Complete. Web. 9 Dec. 2013.

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