Nicholas Carr's 'Is Google Making USupid?'

1028 Words3 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: The use of the internet and communication

Nicholas Carr, a periodic writer on issues such as technology and culture, wrote the article called “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” (743) In this, he discusses the way that not only Google, but also the advancement in technology, especially computers and computer engines is slowly altering our brain, along with the way we take in information. The process started back in the 1970’s and 1980’s when technology got a jump in society. For example “television was our medium of choice” says Carr (747). From then on it has been a slow decline for the way we process information. Throughout this essay Carr backs up the reasons why he feels the way by using different types of figurative language, deductive reasoning, plus the use of logical fallacies that can strengthen or may even weaken his argument. The figurative language used by Nicholas Carr is overall covering a broad spectrum of things. He states, “My mind now expects to take in information the way the Net distributes it: in a swiftly moving stream of particles. Once I was a scuba diver in the sea of words. Now I zip along the surface like a guy on a Jet Ski” (745). By Carr saying this, he is giving an example of personification describing the way the words once use to be and the way they are now as being so unclear, because he goes over them like a guy on a jet ski. This obviously is not …show more content…

Carr wants his readers to see his reason and he does. At the end of this he claims, “ In the world of 2001, people have become so machinelike that the most human character turns out to be a machine” (758). This is an example of deductive reasoning because it shows that because people are so machinelike that our most powerful search engine becomes like the human and we become like it. It is perplexing to think about, but it is true. All along this becomes an effective point for Carr. The transformation of the people in this day in time is so close to the way machines

Show More
Related

  • Analysis Of If Technology Is Making USupid, It's Fault By David Theo Goldberg

    1194 Words  | 3 Pages

    Goldberg, David Theo. “If Technology Is Making Us Stupid, It’s Not Technology’s Fault.” Blog. Digital Humanities. August 16, 2010. Gooch and Suyler. in Argument. Avenue of the Americas, New York.2011. 301-03. Print.

    Read More

  • Analysis Of Is Google Making USupid

    832 Words  | 2 Pages

    For starters, Nicholas Carr’s attempts to support his aim by making a connection between his writing and the audience’s sense of logic, logos. He uses countless amounts of outside authorities

    Read More

  • Is Google Is Making USupid? By Nicholas Carr

    1328 Words  | 3 Pages

    Finalist for the 2011 Pulitzer Prize, Nicholas Carr in his article, Is Google is making us stupid?, addresses his beliefs that the internet is creating artificial intelligence as it effects our mind and the way we think. Throughout the article Carr supports this claim with rhetorical devices as well as Aristotelian appeals. Carr begins by using pathos by stating an anecdote from a scene in the movie A Space Odyssey, then uses logos by stating factual evidence and statistics, lastly Carr uses ethos by conceding to opposition and stating appropriate vocabulary. In the article he compares the past and present and how the Internet has changed not only himself, but also people as a whole. In order to show his credibility, Carr uses research and

    Read More

  • Is Google Making Us Stupid?, by Nicholas Carr

    1419 Words  | 3 Pages

    With the rise of technology and the staggering availability of information, the digital age has come about in full force, and will only grow from here. Any individual with an internet connection has a vast amount of knowledge at his fingertips. As long as one is online, he is mere clicks away from Wikipedia or Google, which allows him to find what he needs to know. Despite this, Nicholas Carr questions whether Google has a positive impact on the way people take in information. In his article “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” Carr explores the internet’s impact on the way people read. He argues that the availability of so much information has diminished the ability to concentrate on reading, referencing stories of literary types who no longer have the capacity to sit down and read a book, as well as his own personal experiences with this issue. The internet presents tons of data at once, and it is Carr’s assumption that our brains will slowly become wired to better receive this information.

    Read More

  • Analysis Of Nicholas Carr's Article Is Google Making USupid?

    777 Words  | 2 Pages

    According to www.telegraph.co.uk, “[y]oung people aged between 16 and 24 spend more than 27 hours a week on the internet.” Certainly this much internet usage would have an effect on someone. What exactly is the effect of using the internet too much? Nicholas Carr’s article “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” argues that we are too reliant on the internet and it is making the us dim-witted and shortens our attention span. While Clive Thompson’s article “Smarter than You Think: How Technology Is Changing Our Minds for the Better” states that technology is not only a collection of knowledge, it also a method of sharing and recording our own knowledge. I fall between both Carr and Thompson. I agree with car on his points of us being too reliant on the internet but disagree when he states that it is making us less intelligent. Meanwhile, I also support Thompson’s statement that the internet allows us to assimilate vast amounts of knowledge but disagree with his opinion on how we should be reliant on

    Read More

  • How Google is Affecting Us

    587 Words  | 2 Pages

    If only my local library could hold the vast quantity of information that my hand held smart phone does. Carr insinuates that Google (and the internet) is making us stupid. I say they are making us lazy. In “Is Google Making Us Stupid” by Nicholas Carr informatively states that with the advancement of technology, Google search engine, and the internet we are become more distracted—with all the different forms of flash media, the amount of hyper-links after hyper-link after hyper-links, and clickable adds-- in turn we are doing less critical reading by way of the internet as opposed to a printed book. Being able to glance over several articles in hour’s verses days looking through books; being able to jump from link to link in order to get the information you need, never looking at the same page twice has decrease out deep thinking and reading skills. Now days, all forms of reading, e.g. newspaper, magazine, etc. are small amount of reading to get the main idea of what’s going on and if you would like more information you will have to go to another page to do so. In the end, C...

    Read More

  • “Is Google Making Us Stupid” and “Get Smarter”

    1364 Words  | 3 Pages

    Humans are becoming more technologically-efficient every day. New inventions and innovations are constantly being made. The Internet is becoming more “reliable” every day. However, how much do we really get from the constant advancement of Internet use and smarter technology? Should we look at their contributions to the world as a benefactor or a curse? The common effect of “artificial intelligence” in the technology we use every day is examined by two brilliant authors, Nicholas Carr and Jamias Cascio. In Carr’s article, “Is Google Making Us Stupid”, he explains the effects of the Internet and technology in our society and claims that the overuse of technology is dangerous and can affect how our mind operates. Jamias Cascio, on the other hand, uses his article “Get Smarter” to show the positive effects of technology in our constantly adaptive society claims that technology may just be making our society smarter and more efficient. While Carr and Cascio both use the claim of cause in their articles to provide valid points on how technology affects our society, Carr’s article proves to be more effective because it focuses on skeptical-based evidence and uses a variety of appeals and proofs.

    Read More

  • 'By Brooke Gladstone And Josh Neufeld's The Influencing Machine'

    770 Words  | 2 Pages

    Author Nicholas Carr’s article “Is Google making us Stupid,” discusses how the use of the computer affects our thought process. Carr starts out talking about his own experience as a writer and how he felt like “something had been tinkering with his brain, remapping his neural circuitry and reprogramming his memory”(313). Basically, he is acknowledging that since he started using the Internet his research techniques have changed. Carr believes that before he would immerse himself in books, lengthy articles and long stretches of prose allowing his mind to get caught up in the narrative or the

    Read More

  • Analysis Of 'How Facts Backfire And Is Google Making USupid'

    856 Words  | 2 Pages

    In the articles, “How Facts Backfire” and “Is Google Making Us Stupid”, Keohane and Carr explain the cognitive blocks we are faced with in society. Keohane explains how we can be misinformed because of our beliefs. These beliefs can cloud our judgement of what is true and what isn’t true. Carr focuses on how the internet has changed the way we think. Carr includes how the internet can distract us, making tasks harder to complete. Both Keohane and Carr show us the negatives side effects of cognition.

    Read More

  • Is Google Making USupid By Nicholas Carr

    1175 Words  | 3 Pages

    If you find yourself skimming through pages, looking for bullet points and your mind wandering off, you might be suffering the effects of Google making you stupid. These are the things that Nicholas Carr talks about in his essay “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” was originally published in July 2008 in Atlantic magazine. Carr argues that the use of technology on the daily basis has made us unable to go into deeper thought about things. Along with the opinion of Scientists and other “literary types” he asserts that the web has indeed made us change the way we think. Power Browsing is the new way people are reading, this is where you look from title to title, surfing the web from link to link. Overall, he advocates that eventually our brains will

    Read More

  • Rhetorical Analysis Of Is Google Making USupid

    769 Words  | 2 Pages

    In composing “Is Google Making Us More Stupid” Nicholas Carr wants his audience to be feared by the internet while at the same time he wants his work to seem more creditable. Nicholas Carr uses many different types of evidence to show us that we should be scared and feared as well as his credibility. Carr’s audience is people who think like him, who find themselves getting lost on the internet while reading something, someone who is educated and uses the internet to look up the answers to questions or to read an article or book.

    Read More

  • Is Google Making USupid

    1263 Words  | 3 Pages

    Humans have been creating tools that allow us to be do things that would be otherwise impossible since the beginning of our existence. The ability to use and develop new tools is what sets us apart from all other animals. Yet it seems that ever since these tools started being created there were also people that feared these new tools and claimed that they are bad for the human race. The present fear of new technology is illustrated in the essay “Is Google Making us Stupid?” by Nicholas Carr. In this essay Carr argues that the internet and other new technologies are changing the way we think in a negative way. Carr claims that new technology is making our generation stupid. In opposition the article “Smarter Than You Think” by Clive Thompson

    Read More

  • Analysis Of Is Google Making USupid And Sherry Turkle

    1240 Words  | 3 Pages

    Nicholas Carr’s “Is Google Making Us Stupid” and Sherry Turkle’s “How Computers Change the Way We Think” both discuss the influence of technology to their own understanding and perspective. The first work by Nicholas Carr is about the impact technology has on his mind. He is skeptical about the effect it could cause in the long term of it. He gives credible facts and studies done to prove his point. While Sherry Turkle’s work gives a broad idea of the impact of technology has caused through the years. She talks about the advances in technology and how it is changing how people communicate, learn and think. In both works “Is Google Making Us Stupid” and “How Computers Change the Way We Think” the authors present

    Read More

  • Is Google Making Us Stupid?

    739 Words  | 2 Pages

    Although the Internet is very helpful and has created many technological advances, we as humans are not created to function like a computer. Our minds require deep thought, human interaction, and thorough knowledge of things so we can remember and fully understand concepts. The Internet in itself is a very helpful tool. The advances that have fallowed are truly amazing, along with vast array of information available. Carr’s article “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” is very flawed and does not provided adequate resources to back up his claims. That being said, Carr points out things that might otherwise have been looked over and accepted as normal. His question is sincere, thought provoking, and one we all should be asking ourselves before its too late.

    Read More

  • Google vs. Intelligence

    1048 Words  | 3 Pages

    Google is “making us stupid” by contributing to a rising trend of superficial thinking. In this case, the definition of stupidity is based on Nicholas Carr’s belief that Google reduces our intellectual power by narrowing our focus and processing ability, which may alter the structure of our cognitive processes as we adapt to technology. This narrowing of thought impacts our critical thinking abilities, which contributes to our increasing dependence on technology. The combination of superabundant information and the decline of patience and slower thought may be creating a situation where we are passively watching as “our own intelligence flattens into artificial intelligence” (Carr). We seem to be moving towards a model where we lazily substitute Google’s ideas for our own, consuming instead of creating.

    Read More

More about Nicholas Carr's 'Is Google Making USupid?'

Open Document