---In [email protected], <s3raphita@...> wrote:
We're getting dumber. At least most everyone else is ;-)
The article only skimmed the issue but it's not clear to me why having instant
access to info via the internet makes someone smart. No more than being able to
look up an entry in the Encyclopedia Britannica.
Someone who had taken the trouble to learn how to speak a foreign language
(Latin, for example) will have disciplined herself and engaged parts of her
brain a keyboard tapper misses out on. That extra factor will have honed the
intelligence of the time traveller. Someone who has mastered the openings in
chess will have a keen edge to his intellect completely lacking in a modern who
just uses a computer to provide a ready-made solution.
A comment below the article quotes Albert Einstein : “Never remember anything
that you can look up”. But would you want a secretary who always had to look up
how to spell a word? You want the knowledge to be integral to the person - to
have that organic connection - and not be an add-on or an app.
Another nice post from Seraphita. Good thing you are so easy going here. You
could make mincemeat out of almost anyone here if you had a mind to. Instead,
you just seem to keep on finding interesting things to say and you have yet to
have allowed yourself to get into any fights! Nicely done.
---In [email protected], <turquoiseb@...> wrote:
This New Yorker article points out that the answer depends on what you mean by
"we." Does that include you and your smartphone, or just you?
http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/elements/2014/01/if-a-time-traveller-saw-a-smartphone.html
http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/elements/2014/01/if-a-time-traveller-saw-a-smartphone.html
