the internet... is it making us smarter or dumberererer?

[muzby]

we live in the age of the "education revolution"...

we have a myriad of information available at our fingertips through the wonders of the interweb...

we can speak to people 24/7.. if you have a question, there are so many places to look for (simple) answers.. eg 1234, nurse on call etc etc..


yet, is all this information making us smarter? or is it just exposing ourselves to more idiots with opinoins (IWOs from now on..)

why do i ask this? all you need to do is take a trawl through areas such as wikipedia, the millions of forums around, and not to mention the bullshit that gets posted on the millions of company web pages, advertising the new latest trend, or the next biggest threat....

not to mention blogs... so many IWOs can simply post a rant into a blog, and all of a sudden mindless idiots (and at times, educated fools) may take this as gospel, and it becomes the latest topic to discuss with friends or colleagues...

for the start of this discussion, i'm going to use the example of forums...

just recently i have been looking to make a few modifications to my car, so i started trawlling through forums both here and overseas to see what others had done, and also to find out reputable aftermarket parts sellers etc... there were numerous times where someone had posted a question asking how to do something to their car, but would get three different replies.. each one of those could possibly damage their car rather than help it...

so.. i then went trawlling some medical forums.... and to see that people were looking for advice from just any old person versus actually going to see a doctor was just scary.....


anyhoo, enuff of my wafflings... what are your thoughts? is this internet phenomenon making us smarter? or is it actually making us dumber???

 

[preacha]

it's negatively affecting our retention of information; being able to retrieve data so quickly rather than being forced to memorise it

it seems as though we're developing into a nation well versed in basic concepts, rather than the acute specialisation seen in generations past. maybe this generation is just the stepping stone between being shitty at fighting and 'i know kung fu' from having a disks worth of information crammed into your head. we have greater tools to retrieve information now more than ever, but with that people need to finely tune their bullshit meter to compensate.

i'd say i'm not necessarily smarter because of the internet, but my intellect is more well rounded due to it because of the opinions and information i CHOOSE to surround myself with

 

[muzby]

it seems as though we're developing into a nation well versed in basic concepts, rather than the acute specialisation seen in generations past.

very well put.

 

[Klue]

I didnt know where South America was on the map until I met a HOT Brazilian chick on msn messenger.
Probably my most used google image search now is "Brazil+bikini"
Hehehe


:D

 

[AcidRain]

I like to see it as an extension of our minds, just like a tool is an extension of your hand...

I think its ultimately helping more than its harming.

 

[Immortal Teknique]

I didnt know where South America was on the map until I met a HOT Brazilian chick on msn messenger.
Probably my most used google image search now is "Brazil+bikini"
Hehehe


:D

Do you live in a hole? How in god's name could you not know where South America is. 8)

 

[Klue]

Note: Smiley
(maybe should've been a wink )

But chatting to people around the world has definantly made me more aware of geography.

:D

 

[frizzantik]

muzby are you being deliberately ironic? *golf clap*

 

[muzby]

^^ hehe.. well, trawling through bluelight you come across both sides...

sometimes i can become quite enlightend with what i can read..

other times i leave feeling like i didn't just kill some braincells, i tortured them spanish inquisition style.

 

[lostpunk5545]

The Internet has expanded our ability to pacify average americans better
than ever by offering fantastical adventures to every corner of the
imagination. Your home office is the window to your world, and the heart of
your social life. Such reclusive behaviour helps clear the roads and public
works from overburden like the lower middle-class and others who depend
shamelessly on their government. Today you are freer than ever to do what
you want, provided you can pay for it!

- Bad Religion

In all seriousness though it's part entertainment for me but mostly I learn things. It's a million or so times more useful to me than The Tree of Knowledge which my Nanna bought piece by piece for me when I was younger. Every time I have a whim, an inkling of a question, the answer is there in the corner of the room, lurking just behind the keyboard and mouse.

Today I realised how little I knew about most of the world. So today I look at a map of the globe, pick a country I know nothing about, and get googeling.

We live in a golden age.

As for actual information and just internet bullshit, it's pretty easy for any generally educated person to get truth out of the mix, just keep reading a variety of sources, never stop at the first web page, use wikipedia as a jumping point, and follow the links at the bottom. Subscribe to a journal.

 

[MDPVagrant]

It's making some of us smarter, and some dumber.

 

[Rated E]

It's about knowing the difference between opinion and fact.

The internet is simply a medium by which I can be exposed to the opinions of millions, if I so choose. That exposure shouldn't necessarily be bad or good. With the ability to discern between the opinions of idiots and the opinions of the slightly more reasonably minded and the all important ability to think for yourself, the internet should be of no real threat to your intelligence.

I'd also like to compare the internet to television. And I think that the two certainly can be compared, as time spent on one generally takes away from time spent on the other (and I don't wish to go into internet television here, that's a technicality, and for the purpose of discussion can just be considered "television"). At least I know with myself, I tend to spend hardly any time at all watching TV, opting instead to spend any spare time that I would have spent doing that by surfing the internet. A key difference between the two mediums would be that the internet allows the consumer to be the contributer as well.

I believe what MDPVagrant said rings true. Some people will get smarter, some people will get dumber. Really, you're steering the internet for yourself, more so than you ever would have been steering the television with a remote control.

 

[Immortal Teknique]

I find it hard to imagine someone getting "dumber" as a result of the internet. The information they are being exposed to may be completely irrelevant, however the magnitude of the internet and the information that it contains is always going to have some sort of educational value, be it good or bad.

 

[preacha]

I find it hard to imagine someone getting "dumber" as a result of the internet.

r U rEaLLy ShUrE bOuT DaT?

 

[Immortal Teknique]

True. But how you spell/write is slightly different from the wealth of info on the net. Thats more what im getting at.

 

[Rated E]

r U rEaLLy ShUrE bOuT DaT?

Well he said the "magnitude of the internet". There will always be a lowest common denominator involved with any medium.

Television being the closest foreseeable alternative to the internet (at least in terms of what the common person spends their free time doing), I don't think that the internet could really be much worse.

However, this might be a faulty method of reasoning on my behalf. As just because the internet might be more beneficial for intelligence in general than television, that does not mean that it is necessarily beneficial for our intelligence or making us smarter.

I would just like to say that it could be making us smarter if the alternative is television.

 

[Immortal Teknique]

Internet provides information on demand. TV is sit back and watch type of deal. Without the internet, my scores in Year 12 would have been significantly lower in comparison to having it available.

Thats one example.

 

[Rated E]

Internet provides information on demand. TV is sit back and watch type of deal. Without the internet, my scores in Year 12 would have been significantly lower in comparison to having it available.

Thats one example.

My scores in the HSC might have been significantly higher had I not spent so much time surfing internet forums, reading articles unrelated to my school work and chatting on msn, haha.

Basically, I still think that time spent surfing the internet has expanded my understanding of a lot of things, particularly people's opinions. Just because I didn't decide to focus my attention or brain power on school related endevours doesn't make me any less intelligent in my own eyes, except in the sense that I may have made some poor time management and motivational issues.

 

[Immortal Teknique]

Yeah well thats exactly it, the internet can act as a double edged sword, if its not used for the required purpose then you're not going to gain anything, but that also doesn't mean it reduces your intelligence. Anyway fuck it, the interwebz is teh cool.

 

[eggman]

I see it like most things; you get out what you put in

If your utilisation of this tool is to downlaod porn, read celeb gossip or debate trivial topics on message boards, then I guess the Internet is not going to make you smarter.

On the other hand, if you approach it with the attitude of "I am going to educate myself" then you can make yourself smarter. Finishing a university degree or short course by distance education is a good example of how the Internet can be extremely valuable when it comes to making someone smarter. Researching topics with some consequence is another. Try reading diverse journal or newspaper articles and take its a step further by carrying out additional research into those topics or words that you perhaps did not understand

Having said that though I seriously believe Internet users really need to be cognisant of the information sources. Ensure what your reading is an actual fact before being satisfied that you learnt something. So dont write off the old school sources of learning i.e. books and journal articles. Join a library or if your near a university enquire about becoming a nn student member