Wednesday, February 1, 2012

The Perils of Google

The article I chose to reread was "Is Google Making Us Stupid?" by David Carr. I actually really enjoyed it and felt somewhat similar to the author.

Questions:
1. I think the author's intent with this one was to raise a question in our heads. His writing provokes us to think and analyze our own lives to see if the internet has "rewired our brains." I think his writing does a great job of raising the reader's curiosity levels.

2. I loved the author's use of framing by starting and ending with the example from Space Odyssey. I think it really tied together the piece and made you reflect on what you had read. I even turned back to the first page to find the similarities between the two. Very effective. I also loved his analogy and simile on the second page: "Once I was a scuba diver in the sea of words. Now I zip along the surface like a guy on a jet ski." Not only does it illustrate his point, but it provides amazing imagery. He also does quite a bit of counterarguing, which really raises his credibility.

3. I think the audience's reaction to this article is exactly what the author intended it to be: to raise our curiosity. I don't think a reader could walk away from this paper without first reflecting on whether or not their reading habits had changed and whether it was due to the internet or not. I thought the article was extremely effective, as it made me skeptical of the internet molding my brain.

4 comments:

  1. Good pointing out of tools and strategies. The scuba and jet ski are very clever and keep the reader involved

    ReplyDelete
  2. I think that not only does the article raise our curiosity, but I know that for me, it definitely made me a little nervous to think about how the internet is making me less capable of deep thinking...

    ReplyDelete
  3. Good analysis. I really like the imagery of the scuba diver and jet skier as well. It was a really well written article and very interesting to think about.

    ReplyDelete
  4. I agree that it really made you re-evaluate how much your reading habits have changed. I like when you said, "...skeptical of the internet molding my brain," because it made me think of how in some ways the internet brain-washes us. It gives us good ideas and bad ideas and it is up to us what we do with them but are we changing in the direction of a one-way course? Are we all moving toward the same direction in the new way or reading and writing? Definitely something to think about.

    ReplyDelete