Meaningless Learning, Essay Example

Meaningless Learning: Carr’s “Is Google Making Us Stupid?”

In “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” Carr asks a question which most Americans have asked at some point: what does the wealth of ready information do to our ability to recall, remember, and pay attention? Ironically, Carr writes a lengthy article to prove this point. He also  admits that even he and other “literary types” feel that their focus shifts much more rapidly than before this age of mass technology began, and each reports feeling the impatient need to move on to a new page after only seconds. Even though this article contained interesting information and good writing, as I read it, I had to take a few short breaks to process what I just read. Undoubtedly, finding a specific word, name, or date becomes easier when viewing a book online. Often, the reader simply types in a search item and then jumps directly to the correct page; the long flip through the pages, straining to remember the associations with that part of the book become unnecessary.

New British research supports Carr’s theory and shows that students even skim research websites, which require great attention to detail to thoroughly analyze. Carr points out that the growing acceptance of text shorthand only adds to this attention problem, i.e. “gr8. cyl.” replaces “Great. I’ll see you later.” Communication and information are being condensed into power snippets- ready for skimming. Unlike in written Chinese language or American Sign Language, each letter itself must be decoded. There is no larger sign for a whole word in spoken and written English; there is a system of letters pieced together to make sense after decoding. Google creators’ hope to make the website a better working computer than that old, outdated processor we call a brain, making it possible to forego some of the typical critical thinking and problem-solving needed in the past. The “current” person becomes more marketable and acceptable, an easy databank of random facts and meaningless learning.

Until a Man Full-Grown

Every person encounters a moment where nostalgia, imagination, and reality collide- where a revisited place appears different in some ways and the same in others and usually not in the expected ways. However, White’s paradise remained mostly untouched, and he, like many young men dealing with the transitions from man to husband to father, feels distracted by his personal comparison and contrast against the memory of his father and himself in the same spot.

The first sign of trouble comes with the changed paths. The horse path disappears, but the intrepid father chooses another path and feels disillusioned by the use of technology. This change annoys the narrator, who promptly takes his son out onto the river in a boat and teaches him the joys of boating without the clunky clutch that he remembered. Most of the joys of untouched nature remained the same, thanks to a family of farmers who cared for the lands surrounding the lake.

Change is reluctant. People only embrace change when something better is offered or when they run away from other challenges. The father remembers his experiences and “feels” the sensations again, and he pauses at each new experience for his son, knowing how it will all turn out. The narrator contrasts everything against his memory as dark and foreboding, but the old paths are traced with a beam of light, his son’s discovery described in laughter and amusement. Parents often project upon their children, try to live through them, or even try to influence the pursuit of dreams in favor of what they believe to be best. White writes about a parent’s dilemma, one which will not end until his son is a man full-grown and independent—and maybe not even then.

Title

In “The Ends of the World as We Know Them,” Diamond rather glumly explores the American history and current status through the eyes of the old adage, “Those who do not know their history are doomed to repeat it.” Diamond lists the factors of being a superpower city or society: environmental damage, climate change, enemies, trading, and shifts in response. Immediately, his words about the sudden collapse of the superpower societies brought to mind the impact that the successful and failed invasions of Rome have had over thousands of years and how all five factors changed in the year before its greatest fall in 500 AD. Today it is another city with a rich heritage and probably safer as one of the many.

Environmental damage is an issue which should worry Americans more today than it does, especially since the average person consumes and wastes more here than in most other places in the world. When a society pollutes their water, they may come down with new diseases, experience a water shortage, have damage from acid rain, and see a decline in general health as water becomes more precious and used less to sanitize foods and maintain personal hygiene. Polluted air- another big problem here- causes the air quality to be poor, general health of citizens to decline, acid rain, and change in weather patterns.

Most of the time when people think about the hardest changes for a society they think about a huge climate change or about enemies. Almost any place in the world has its dangers from the local climate: tornadoes, hurricanes, typhoons, volcanoes, earthquakes, floods, etc. These dangers are easy to see because they suddenly kill many people and happen over and over again for hundreds , thousands, or even millions of years. Enemies, too, are easy to spot- even though they change all of the time. A society can never really know who they have made peace with and who just waits for them to fall. While they may want their old enemies to be successful enough to be helpful, no society wants their enemies and former enemies to be stronger. The U.S. faced much criticism after World War II- when they provided financial aid to Japan to help rebuild the economy and repair the damage from the nuclear bomb. Will Japan one day become a strong enemy due to this helpfulness? This shift in the treatment of former enemies also places a financial strain on America and could backfire or secure our friendly relationship with another country.

Cofer’s East Side Story

Cofer writes about a touching rendition from West Side Story, which annoyed her, because- regardless of how English she was- she would always be seen and thought of as another Latino woman and expected to be some exotic and culture-specific woman. Although she was raised in one of those households, Cofer wanted to be able to explore herself as an individual and to experience the freedoms which she understands but does not agree with. Cofer, like many teenage girls and especially those of Latin descent, felt as though she was one of many girls that could not be distinguished from each other, a matching set of daughters, a matching set of uniformed students, and a matching mold of the Latina woman in the workplace- complete with showy, gaudy jewelry which emphasize shapely curves.

After a lifetime of living under the strict eye of father and brothers, Cofer feels forced to live within the stereotype of her skin color and descent. Non-Latinos expect the stereotype of the Latina, and the Latin community in its many different countries of origin criticize its women for forgetting the heritage, as though dressing differently and pursuing a life of fitting in with mainstream culture is a process of selling out one’s values and family.

Works Cited

Carr, Nicholas. “Is Google Making Us Stupid?: What the internet is doing to our brains.” The Atlantic Monthly Group. July/August 2008. Web. Retrieved 28 March 2014 from <http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2008/07/is-google-making-us-stupid/306868/>.

Cofer, Judith Ordiz. “The Myth of the Latin Woman/ I Met a Woman Named Maria.” Many Voices, Many Lives. Chapter 6. Web. Retrieved 29 March 2014 from <http://www.quia.com/files/quia/users/amccann10/Myth_of_a_Latin_Woman>.

Diamond, Jared. “The Ends of the World as We Know Them.” 2005. New York Times Online. Web. Retrieved 29 March 2014 from <http://www.nytimes.com/2005/01/01/opinion/01diamond.html?_r=0>.

White, E.B. “Once More to the Lake.” Web. Retrieved 27 March 2014 from <http://www.freewebs.com/lanzbom/EBWhiteLakeEssay.pdf>.