“Brain Change”
In “ Mind over Mass Media” by Steven Pinker he writes how technology is not making us stupid, but is actually making us smarter: “ The Internet and information technologies are helping is manage, search and retrieve our collective intellectual output at different scales, from Twitter and previews to e- books and online encyclopedias. Far from making us stupid these technologies are the only thing keeping us smart.”(Pinker). The constant updates that these devices are giving us are yes, more convenient but not making us stupid. Pinker believes that the technology is very much distracting, but not if the users have some self control. Pinker said “ Distraction is not a new phenomenon. The solution is not to bemoan technology but to develop strategies of self-control, as we do with every other temptation in life. Turn off email or Twitter when you work, put away your Blackberry at dinner time, ask your spouse to call you to bed at a designated hour.” He argues that although these devices can distract us and interfere sometimes, they can easily be shut off to allow full focus. It is the users of these devices who are at fault, not technologies. In the essay, Pinker is very much disagreeing with Carr. While Carr takes the other side and argues that technology is altering the way we think in a negative way causing us to skim through things and expect the obvious answers, Pinker believes that using technologies like PowerPoint and search engines are causing us to be smarter and gain more knowledge effectively faster. With every generation, it seems people are finding a way to say something is making us stupid for example: When comic books were accused of turning juveniles into delinquents in the 1950’s, crime was falling to record lows, just as the denunciations of video games in the 1990’s coincided with the great American crime decline. The decades of