babble
Wednesday, October 01, 2003
Unplugged:
Jon Udell made a really good point recently about how technology is affecting our memory:
We all like to joke, nowadays, about how Google has become humanity's collective memory, and we're properly grateful not to have to remember a lot of things that we know we can just look up. We've gone through this before, of course. Pre-Gutenberg, we routinely memorized vast amounts of verse. Then we learned to offload chunks of memory to print. Now we're learning to offload a whole lot more memory to the Net. I'm not saying I'd have it otherwise, but sometimes I wonder about the tradeoffs we're making.
He gave some examples from his own life, which resonated with me because I find myself doing many of the things he mentions. I find myself forgetting more and more things, or not bothering to commit them to memory because I know I can just go to Google, or dig through my e-mail, or even check my 'blog archives for the answer. I don't have anyone's current phone number memorized anymore, because I can just look it up in my phone. (Oddly enough, though, I still remember old phone numbers that I knew pre-cell phone.)
Now that I've thought about it some more, I realize that much of the information I don't retain or have difficulty recalling is information that I gathered from an electronic source. For example, I recall things I read in books or magazines more easily than I recall things I've read online. I, like Jon, wonder about the tradeoffs we're making; however, I might just use this as a good excuse to disconnect and go read a book.
babbled by Kat @ 11:39:00 AM |
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