We have the Internet, which allows easy access to information on symptoms and disorders such as depression or obsessive-compulsive disorder.
Share via Email Are our minds being altered due to our increasing reliance on search engines, social networking sites and other digital technologies? It turned out to be the blueprint for what eventually emerged as the world wide web. Immersing myself in a book or a lengthy article used to be easy.
Now my concentration often starts to drift after two or three pages.
I get fidgety, lose the thread, begin looking for something else to do. The deep reading that used to come naturally has become a struggle. His argument was that our deepening dependence on networking technology is indeed changing not only the way we think, but also the structure of our brains.
Oct 09, · The good thing about that -- because of the plasticity of our brains -- is that if you change your habits, your brain is happy to go along with whatever you do. Some neuroscientists have targeted which parts of the developing brain are affected by technology use. According to researchers at the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing, there are changes in the ways the prefrontal cortex, cerebellum and parietal lobe mature. Health + Behavior Digital technology can be harmful to your health Experts at a Zócalo/UCLA event point to lack of sleep, weight gain and other issues.
The web has become, in a way, a global prosthesis for our collective memory. People fretted about printing, photography, the telephone and television in analogous ways.
It even bothered Plato, who argued that the technology of writing would destroy the art of remembering. Carr argues that modern neuroscience, which has revealed the "plasticity" of the human brain, shows that our habitual practices can actually change our neuronal structures.
Unprecedented access to technology and the ability to absorb multiple sources of information and to sort it for future reference is part of what’s rewiring our brains and making them more elastic. Modern technology is changing the way our brains work, says neuroscientist. "The power of imagination" is not a metaphor, it seems; it's real, and has a . Technology can damage your health and only one group of people benefit. IT IS NOT YOU. Anybody could be one of the next two billion sufferers, your sister, brother, mother, father, grandparent, grandchild, friend or colleague.
The brains of illiterate people, for example, are structurally different from those of people who can read. Not all neuroscientists agree with Carr and some psychologists are sceptical.
But many commentators who accept the thrust of his argument seem not only untroubled by its far-reaching implications but are positively enthusiastic about them. Others argue that the increasing complexity of our environment means that we need the net as "power steering for the mind".
But if you exercise it regularly, and cross-train, your brain will be flexible, quick, strong and versatile. In one sense, the internet is analogous to a weight-training machine for the brain, as compared with the free weights provided by libraries and books.
Each method has its advantage, but used properly one works you harder. Weight machines are directive and enabling: The internet can be the same: It can substitute surface for depth, imitation for originality, and its passion for recycling would surpass the most committed environmentalist.
But of course what a Google search provides is not the best, wisest or most accurate answer, but the most popular one.
But knowledge is not the same thing as information, and there is no question to my mind that the access to raw information provided by the internet is unparalleled and democratising.
Admittance to elite private university libraries and archives is no longer required, as they increasingly digitise their archives. In the end, the medium is not the message, and the internet is just a medium, a repository and an archive.
Its greatest virtue is also its greatest weakness: This means that it is undiscriminating, in both senses of the word. It is indiscriminate in its principles of inclusion: This is changing rapidly, of course, as corporations and governments seek to exert control over it.
Knowledge may not be the same thing as power, but it is unquestionably a means to power. The jury is very much out. The internet itself is disinterested:Technology can damage your health and only one group of people benefit. IT IS NOT YOU.
Anybody could be one of the next two billion sufferers, your sister, brother, mother, father, grandparent, grandchild, friend or colleague. Health + Behavior Digital technology can be harmful to your health Experts at a Zócalo/UCLA event point to lack of sleep, weight gain and other issues.
Unprecedented access to technology and the ability to absorb multiple sources of information and to sort it for future reference is part of what’s rewiring our brains and making them more elastic.
Scientific American is the essential guide to the most awe-inspiring advances in science and technology, explaining how they change our understanding of the world and shape our lives. How Technology Affects the Brain Technology fosters learning and cognitive development not yet developed in young children, however, some teens suffer from an unhealthy use of technology.
Modern technology is changing the way our brains work, says neuroscientist By SUSAN GREENFIELD Human identity, the idea that defines each and every one of us, could be facing an unprecedented crisis.