Katie on "Is Google Making Us Stupid"

Since reading the thought-provoking and intriguing “Is Google Making Us Stupid”, I’ve been asking myself a lot of questions about our society today and comparing it to our society less than a decade ago.

Today everything and everyone feels the need for speed. Fast cars, fast computers, fast phones. Ads on TV are constantly boasting “The Fastest 3G Network” and the quickest new gadgets so that people never have to be without their Facebook accounts or their Twitter updates. Some commercials even display people distraught because they have fallen into a dreaded “dead zone” and can’t access the aforementioned social networking sites.

It isn’t just the fact that people are becoming stupid by the technological crutches that we have been endowed with, it’s also enabling laziness and giving the idea that technology will always be there to help us. With the internet always accessible, young students don’t need to learn how to use an encyclopedia or a dictionary because all that information is easily and readily available on the internet. I’m no exception. I don’t remember the last time I used an encyclopedia. I couldn’t tell you where my family’s dictionary is right now. I was taught, but no longer use those skills. So I guess you could say, yeah, Google has made me kind of stupid. I used to be an avid reader, but now pretty much the only reading I do is for school. I tell myself that I just don’t have the time, but really, I just don’t make the time. Up until high school, every class had the opportunity a few times a week to go into the library, hear about new books, and then go pick a few out. The AR program (though annoying at times) promoted reading outside of school. I’ve even noticed a decrease in my reading speed. It takes me longer to get through a book now than it did when I was in 5th grade. That is due to a lack of focus.

I could really relate to what Bruce Friedman said here about the “staccato quality” to his thinking and how it has become difficult to read and absorb articles. We are all so distracted by so many different things now. Having music playing and TV on and internet open while we are doing homework. That “staccato quality” Friedman referred to comes from this, I believe. With so much media vying for our attention, it’s hard to pay attention to just one thing at a time for too long, before we become bored and need something else to entertain us.

I remember a research project we had to do in fourth grade on our favorite animal. Every day, our class would travel to the library where we would use the Dewey decimal system to find books relating to our subject, then sit down and take notes. Computers, internet, and Google were not part of our research time. My sister recently did that same project. I asked her if they ever got library time to find books and she they went once a week and didn’t get class time to take notes. On the other hand, she mentioned that they had frequent computer time where they were allowed to Google their animal and print out web pages to get information from.
I think Carr has something going here. It isn’t just Google, it’s all kinds of things that supposedly make our lives easier, fast internet, GPS, cell phones with everything you could possibly want, are just making it easier for us to become lazier.

Having said all this, I can’t imagine my life without Google or the internet. I would be lost if I had to try to complete those note cards without dictionary.com. Even this class is relying on the internet. All the materials we need and all the means we need to communicate are all on the internet. While the internet may be killing the written word (which sucks for me), I don’t know what I’d do without it.

Katie on "Talk of the Town"

For the most part, I don't understand to point of people owning guns. Yes, they are used for hunting. But why are non-hunting guns sold to the public so liberally? And why do teenagers have such easy access to guns?

Here are some facts about school shootings in the U.S. There have been 75 since 1966 in the United States alone. There have been three so far this year. California has had the most school shootings: 10. Wisconsin has only had two. 34 of the 50 states (68%) have had one or more school shootings. The Virgina Tech massacre of 2007 had the most fatalities: 33. Only five shootings have been classified as massacres.

These statistics make it difficult to fathome why more action hasn't been taken to prevent school shootings. If parents have guns, why are they not hidden and locked up? Why are teenagers able to buy guns? How are students able to get into school with weapons? What motivates these students to do this? Intolerance, bullying, teasing, and hazing. These are believed to be the causes behind the students coming to school with guns.

Gopnik names three specific cases where shootings occured and gun control laws were tightened and that helped prevent such shootings. I'm sure they're are others as well. Why can't that happen here? What is it going to take for people to realize that this is a problem? There have already been 204 lives taken by school shooters. When is enough going to be enough? Of all the issues debated in this year's presidential election, gun control was not a major one.

Why is it that other countries are able to take a stand against gun control and somewhat resolve the issue and we can barely talk about it? I like what Adam Gopnik said at the end of his piece: "There is no reason why any private citizen in a democracy should own a handgun". I think it is completely unnecessary.

The parents asking why in this story represent more than just parents. They represent everyone who wants to know why this happened...again. Why something was not done between 1966 and now to prevent innocent children from being killed. And those people asking why have a right to ask why.

Susan Sontag bummed me out a little. She talked about the "ineptitude of American intelligence and counter-intelligence, about options avaliable to American foreign policy, particularly in the Middle East, and about what constitutes a smart program of military defense". Meaning a lot of information is being kept from the public about Iraq as well as other issues.

She seemed very condescending and negative toward our government (which is not always the best way to get your point across), but she did make a good point. How are we supposed to stay strong when we aren't given all the information on certain issues?