Dawn or Doom speaker: the internet changes the way you read, write and think – and not for the better
Best-selling author Nicholas Carr, whose book “The Shallows” says the internet is making us stupid, will be the Dawn or Doom keynote speaker.
When Nicholas Carr speaks at Purdue’s Dawn or Doom conference Nov. 5 the award-winning author and speaker knows that some in his audience – especially today’s college students who grew up on the internet – will be skeptical of his argument: That the internet, for all of its good, is actually making us stupid.
Carr, a best-selling author and journalist whose books include “The Shallows” and “Utopia is Creepy,” is not a technological curmudgeon yearning for a simpler time. Instead, he points to a growing pile of research that shows the way we use the internet is rewiring our neurological pathways, changing the way we read, write and think.
“I do think that what we are seeing is the rise of a more shallow culture,” says Carr. “We are losing the capacity to go deep, to understand and to have complex thoughts. We find ourselves needing to be stimulated constantly.”
Carr will discuss his insights into the unexpected ways the internet is affecting us all as the keynote speaker at Purdue’s Dawn or Doom conference. The annual conference explores the risks and rewards of emerging technologies. Dawn or Doom ’18 will be held on Purdue’s West Lafayette campus Monday and Tuesday, Nov. 5-6. The conference, now in its fifth year, is free and open to the public.
Dawn or Doom is aligned with Purdue's Giant Leaps Sesquicentennial Campaign and is part of the Ideas Festival theme, Giant Leaps in Artificial Intelligence, Algorithms, and Automation: Balancing Humanity and Technology. The Ideas Festival is the centerpiece of the campaign and connects world-renowned speakers and Purdue expertise in a conversation on the most critical problems and opportunities facing the world. Carr’s talk is scheduled from 5:30 to 6:30 p.m., on Monday, Nov. 5 in Fowler Hall.
Carr says he first noticed the way the internet was changing his behavior when he found it was becoming harder to immerse himself in a books or deep reading, and he admits the impulse has grown worse over time as the internet has become faster and mobile. Today, Carr argues that smartphones are hijacking our minds, offering a mix of convenience, diversion and anxiety.
“Their extraordinary usefulness gives them an unprecedented hold on our attention and vast influence over our thinking and behavior,” Carr says. “So what happens to our mind when we allow a single tool such dominion over our perception and cognition?”
The answer, Carr says, is seen in almost any area of modern life. People remember less because they know they can “Google” information later. Cell phones, even when turned off, have proved so distractive that one study found students who were separated from their phones scored a letter grade higher than students who had their phones within reach. The ability to connect to family and friends has given rise to anxiety when those connections do not instantly respond.
“The tough question is once technology is embedded in social norms and processes how can we change it?” says Carr.
Speaking at events like Dawn or Doom, Car says, is part of his attempt to encourage others to think critically about how the internet is changing humanity at a fundamental level.
“Clearly, there’s no going back,” says Carr, “but I do think that we need abandon this utopian, highly idealist view of technology – the idea that technology will solve all of our problems, that somehow it can remedy the negative aspects of human nature.”
By looking at technology more critically, Carr believes, the designers and developers of the future can foresee and better prepare for the problems and issues that are bound to come to with them. He says today’s college students will need to be more critical of the technology they help create, and acknowledge both its potential for good and harm.
“A good example is looking at the history of communication technology, and the idea that it will help bring people together,” says Carr. “And of course it does, but it also leads to propaganda and polarization and all these things that could have been foreseen and better addressed.”
Writer: Dave Stephens, technology writer, Information Technology at Purdue, 765-496-7998, steph103@purdue.edu
Last updated: October 1, 2018
