The Reality Club: ON "IS GOOGLE MAKING US STUPID" By Nicholas...

I do not mean to suggest that all the information we gather is for civic purposes. That I need to know more to do my job goes without saying, but I also need to know more just to have friends. I manage to get by without knowing exactly why Paris Hilton is famous, but I cannot fully participate in society without knowing that she is well known. Of course, my own social clan has its own Charlie Rose version of celebrities, complete with must-read books, must-understand ideas, and must-see films. I am expected to have an opinion about the latest piece in The Atlantic or the New Yorker. Actually, I need to learn more just to understand the cartoons.

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why do we need so much information? Here is where we can blame technology, at least in part. Technology has destroyed the isolation of distance, so more of what happens matters to us.

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We evolved in a world where our survival depended on an intimate knowledge of our surroundings. This is still true, but our surroundings have grown. We are now trying to comprehend the global village with minds that were designed to handle a patch of savanna and a close circle of friends. Our problem is not so much that we are stupider, but rather that the world is demanding that we become smarter. Forced to be broad, we sacrifice depth. We skim, we summarize, we skip the fine print and, all too often, we miss the fine point. We know we are drowning, but we do what we can to stay afloat.

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We evolved in a world where our survival depended on an intimate knowledge of our surroundings. This is still true, but our surroundings have grown.

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We need to know more because we are expected to make more decisions.

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We will certainly lose some treasured ways of thinking but the next generation will replace them with something new.

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The problem with the Internet medium (or strength, as Malcolm Gladwell would argue) is how it pushes us towards "thin-slicing" or grazing information rather than digging in more deeply and considering it. Like a New Yorker piece that gives people the self-congratulatory and ultimately reassuring tidbits they need to discuss an issue at a cocktail party, the Web feeds in more bite-size doses.

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