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« Liberals Not Eggheaded Enough? | Main | Filibuster compromise » May 24, 2005The Internet Will Devour Your SoulAn article in last month's Chronicle of Higher Education profiles a disparate group of ivory-tower Luddites discontent with the consequences of information overload. The advocates for a slower, more boring life point out that overuse of technology is diminishing the time we spend interacting face-to-face, which in turn will lead to a generation bereft of the basic skills needed to maintain interpersonal relations and achieve even the most basic level of reproductive success. More importantly, however, we’re no longer reading books as they're meant to be read, as Middlebury scholar in residence Bill McKibben suggests: "My basic point is the best thing to do with a scholarly book is to sit and read it," rather than skim an excerpt that is revealed by a search engine. "A book is not just an accumulation of facts, it's an argument, a cumulative piece of knowledge, and is designed to be read sequentially." These brave new technologies, however, did not spring into being fully formed, but gradually evolved from cultural precursors. The style of information browsing and retrieval that weblogs have created, in which one topic leads to another in an expanding web of information, is strikingly similar to the method of scholarly research, especially scientific research. The average Nature article is only about twice as long as a verbose blog post. Extended narratives certainly have their niche in the intellectual ecology, but science (and current events and other subjects that thrive on up-to-date information) have always thrived on rapidly accessed chunks of information. Today, those chunks are even smaller, and can be accessed even more quickly, but the process remains, if not the same, at least very similar. As for the argument that a book is designed to be read in a certain manner, well, that doesn't necessarily matter. It's likely that Beethoven meant for his symphonies to be heard in their entirety, but if I want to listen to one of his slow movements out of context I don't feel guilty for a second. McKibben goes on to suggest that somehow today's students are losing the ability to contemplate: "There's the real danger that one is absorbing and responding to bursts of information, rather than having time to think... What's only gradually becoming clear is not just a pragmatic drawback but an intellectual drawback to having so many trees that there's no possibility of seeing the forest." It's not clear what the difference is between thinking and responding to bursts of information; indeed, to proponents of modern-day neuroscience there is no such difference. If, in fact, the history of science tells us anything, it's that one very well-established fact is worth a thousand sweeping generalizations. Darwin's masterpiece On the Origin of Species, for example, begins with a ludicrously detailed account of his experiences breeding pigeons, understanding that eventually led to one of the greatest intellectual revolutions in the history of mankind. Trees can be just as valuable as forests. There may well be drawbacks to the modern information revolution, and its effects should be studied carefully. However, just as information technology should not be blindly accepted, it should also not be blindly pushed away. The average American fifth-grader's brain contains knowledge far beyond the horizons of what the ancient Greeks could even have contemplated. If, to gain this knowledge, we have had to sacrifice a bit of serenity, that seems to me a Faustian bargain worth making. Posted by Adam Tierney at May 24, 2005 04:35 AM CommentsMy impression has long been that Bill McKibben dislikes any technology unavailable to Thomas Jefferson, or perhaps Augustine. Posted by: Paul at May 24, 2005 08:07 AM | permalink The sacrifice of serenity wouldn't concern me nearly as much as the sacrifice of spirituality and/or wisdom. Knowing a lot of facts or theories is not the same as understanding how to put them to use for the betterment of society. I know that firthand. Technology is far more a plus than a minus, but it presents its own challenges to living in civilized society. The ability to get along through interpersonal relationships needn't stifle acquiring knowledge, but an overzealous quest for knowledge per se could put a damper on meaningful relationships. Posted by: Joel Thomas at May 24, 2005 10:33 AM | permalink Sounds trite, but I just think they are just scared about possibly losing their roles as gatekeepers. Knowledge that is not trapped by its physical location seems to represent a real threat to them, but the thing is most folks are always going to need a guide. These profs just need to learn to change their delivery a little bit. Posted by: scof at May 25, 2005 05:02 AM | permalink Post a comment |
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