Interconnectivity
This is more and observation about modern life than anything else. Primarily that we have become so interconnected with the world around us.
When I was a kid and at school the total sum on knowledge available to me was what was in the local and school library and the city and local papers. Today kids have access to entire online libraries with millions of titles. Not only that they have ready access to information found in general web searches, some subjects having literally thousands of sources.
But I don't think it has made us any smarter. In fact I think it has done away with the need to remember since the information is always at our fingertips. We have become lazy even with our spelling. The web and instant messaging has made us shorten words, use symbols and then we have spell and grammar checkers to make sure that we get it right. We don't even have to think in a logical order when writing any more because we can cut and paste paragraphs to make it flow better. So in turn we get lazy and don't use structure in our writing.
Now don't get me wrong its nice to have all these things but there are reasons that they are bad as well. Hell I like the flexibility of moving thoughts around on the page, but I still use the skills I was taught when you had to hand write everything. I even laugh at that these days as my handwriting is pretty average.
I think to that because we are so interconnected that in a lot of ways we have become hard and cold, we no longer soicalise like we used to where social norms and rules applied. These days people work their social standing out by the number of friends on Facebook. There is a real danger here, as because of the lack of intimacy the dropping of so called friends is often done by text, leaving the dumped with no social clues as to why.
I also think that at times that we simply need to switch off. Turn off the mobile phone, turn off the internet and TV and just do something. Go get a hobby.
Ultimately I am not one to talk, my life is dominated by technology and it always has been, I look at everything I have owned or had and its always been technology orientated. But I am finding now I need to switch off every now and again. I let the phone go flat and go play with the dogs. Life is not all about friends on Facebook and how many readers you have on Blogger, its about the memories you make the fun times with real friends and your family. In the end the friend who dumped you on Facebook probably would never have been your friend anyway.
When I was a kid and at school the total sum on knowledge available to me was what was in the local and school library and the city and local papers. Today kids have access to entire online libraries with millions of titles. Not only that they have ready access to information found in general web searches, some subjects having literally thousands of sources.
But I don't think it has made us any smarter. In fact I think it has done away with the need to remember since the information is always at our fingertips. We have become lazy even with our spelling. The web and instant messaging has made us shorten words, use symbols and then we have spell and grammar checkers to make sure that we get it right. We don't even have to think in a logical order when writing any more because we can cut and paste paragraphs to make it flow better. So in turn we get lazy and don't use structure in our writing.
Now don't get me wrong its nice to have all these things but there are reasons that they are bad as well. Hell I like the flexibility of moving thoughts around on the page, but I still use the skills I was taught when you had to hand write everything. I even laugh at that these days as my handwriting is pretty average.
I think to that because we are so interconnected that in a lot of ways we have become hard and cold, we no longer soicalise like we used to where social norms and rules applied. These days people work their social standing out by the number of friends on Facebook. There is a real danger here, as because of the lack of intimacy the dropping of so called friends is often done by text, leaving the dumped with no social clues as to why.
I also think that at times that we simply need to switch off. Turn off the mobile phone, turn off the internet and TV and just do something. Go get a hobby.
Ultimately I am not one to talk, my life is dominated by technology and it always has been, I look at everything I have owned or had and its always been technology orientated. But I am finding now I need to switch off every now and again. I let the phone go flat and go play with the dogs. Life is not all about friends on Facebook and how many readers you have on Blogger, its about the memories you make the fun times with real friends and your family. In the end the friend who dumped you on Facebook probably would never have been your friend anyway.
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