I just came across a highly interesting – and slightly worrying – article from Nicolas Carr in Wired. In short, the article analyses the impact that modern information technologies have on our learning behaviour and our perception of information. It discusses the impact of typical information retrieval strategies on our abilities to actually think, reflect and develop ideas – in short, to actually make use of all the information that is available to us.
And unfortunately, it looks as if the net actually does a very good job in distracting us from the real thing, as it seems to encourage the superfical skimming of a multitude of information, while at the same time hampering a deeper engagement with what we’ve read / perceived.
Some of the thoughts are not really new, they remind me a lot on Neil Postmans texts (“Amusing ourselves to death”, still very much recommended!). However, a major difference seems to be that now, even when we try to be productive, modern information technology seems to be yet another distraction that tempts us to loose focus.
Food for thought… I have to admit, that some of the behavioral patterns described the text sound awfully familar. Maybe we should be a bit more carefully evaluating the role of electronic, web-based tools, media and information sources in science and teaching?
Thomas
