The byline 'How the Intenet is Changing the Way we Think, Read and Remember' says it all. Originally published in 2010 when Carr had his doubts about the Internet and how it was changing him, it has come with a new edition where he is now pretty much convinced that it does and will change us unless we safeguard ourselves. As usual Abhinay gifted me this book which broaden my perspective so much, so thank you Abhinay.
Carr begins by going back to the 2010s and before when everyone was sure that the Internet was going to make humans smarter, because they will have more information and can make better choices. But then they did not realise that not everyone on the internet had these naive ideas - because pretty soon the people who ran the Internet started making the choices for us. Carr quotes a study or a book by Marshall Macluhan in 1964 titled 'Understanding Media - The Extension of Man' where he says 'the media is the message which primarily means that whenever a new media comes along people get caught up in the information while the technology behind it disappears (we do not give a thought to how the technology can slowly change our behaviors - like children who are given a dangerous toy we forget about what's behind it). Carr says the content does not matter because the medium influences the way we think and act. Technology alters patterns of perception steadily without any resistance from us ( we are busy with our toys). He quotes a film critic who says 'doubts can be rendered feeble in the face of the certainty of the medium'.
Carr says he feels like Hal the computer in Kubrick's 1968 film - 2001: A Space Odyssey which laments that it is losing its mind. Carr says he has found that his concentration while reading has reduced (me too) and he feels that the net has turned him into a flesh and blood word processor. There is a change in the way we read - we skim now, and read deeply less - and it changes the way we read and write. Carr refers to many studies that proved that unlike the earlier thought that the brain is constant and cannot change, newer studies prove that the cells of our brains develop and grow with use and atrophy with disuse. Brains are neuro plastic and change with use and disuse. He quotes William James who spoke of two minds - the physical and mechanical brain and the subconscious spiritual mind. Brains change and can reprogram itself on the fly, altering the way it functions. He cites a case where a paralysed man used the paralysed side everyday and healed himself - changed the wiring in his brain so to say. Even more powerful is this thought - its not just repeated physical activity but even purely mental activity can alter neural circuitry. For example the London taxi drivers of yore before maps who had to remember complex routes - a part of their brain was bigger. Suffice to say that our thoughts exert a physical influence on or at least cause a physical reaction in our brains.
No wonder neuro plasticity has been linked to depression and OCD and tinnitis - the more the sufferer concentrates on his symptoms the deeper the symptoms are etched into his neural activity. Carr gives the example of how the human mind changed with new technologies like maps and clocks which altered our perception of space and time and changed the way we thought. Carr says that technology is an expression of human will and it can be used to 1) extend physical strength (plough, needle, jet) 2) sensitivity (microscope, birth control pills), reshaping nature to fulfil our needs and desires and 4) intellectual technology (maps, clocks) to extend and support our mental powers. Of all, this is the most intimate (and dangerous as all things intimate are). The broader implications of intellectual tech Carr says are that the inventors intellectual ethic has the most profound effect on us. Used unethically he says that human beings become a little more than the sex organs of the machine world.
He says that the debate between determinists (anti tech) and instrumentalists (pro tech) will never end. But technology influences how our minds change by influencing how we find, store and interpret information, how we direct and engage our senses, how we remember and forget. Maps and clocks changed our language. Dependence on a particular technology will alter the mind and make it shallow (we can lend that part to tech and forget about it). Carr says how readign made people more atentive, imaginative and enabled them to lose themselves. Guetnberg came along with his printing press and reading improved people's experience of life and nature.
But now we have people who multi task - distracted from distractions by distractions - which make fundamental changes to our mental makeup. Heavy Internet usage has neuro consequences. Experiments have been conducted on multi media versus text only groups and the text only group scored better. Multi taskers sacrifice the primary task for interruption.
Carr bemoans the Taylor algorithm of productivity - measure everything and improve it. Google has taken that to an extreme and they do not believe in subjectivity - its all measurement. Initially started with the idea of making people use their computers more effectively Google is now on a mission to organise the world's information and make it accessible and useful. However since Google is a profit making corporation it has figured out Adwords which is a subtle way to place ads based on what you search for (and speak about and think perhaps). The more they keep people online, the more they find ways in which to place ads and the more revenue and profits they generate. Not just directly they also sell complementary products. Through all this Carr says Google definitely shapes our behavior, thinking and the way we act.
Off loading of memory to external data threatens depth and distinctiveness of self. Carr says that culture is more than just the world's information. When we outsource memory to machines, culture withers. The price of technology Carr says is alienation. Technology mutes the faculties it is supposed to amplify.
Carr says we are bringing in frenziedness into our souls. Our intelligence flattens with AI. One study says that Americans now spend half their time looking at screens - on smartphones they spend an average of 5,05 hours with 85 unlocks. The performance of students in an experiment where they had a phone beside them with its screen down, phone in the bag and away from them and phone in another room showed distinct results - phone next to them affected scores adversely while phone in next room worked best. Its almost like the phone is an extension of themselves. People showed lesser sense of reasoning, social skills and maintaining relationships.
Carr says smart phones are super normal stimulus and that we are being programmed by unethical technology use. We suffer the illusion of knowing more when we actually know less. Data, he says, is memory without history. When we construct our capacity for reasoning or recall, or transfer those skills to a machine we sacrifice the ability to turn information into knowledge. As Yuval Noah Harari says, we become cows.
Carr takes great pains to explain how our thinking changed from the times of Socrates who believed that writing would affect memory (it would because now we know we can access it later which means we concentrate lesser), the development of language, of writing, of the press, of studies on brains, on Google. He makes a convincing case and shares how he tried to get away from technology by moving to a small place, keeping the phone away and all that - and how he is slowly going back to his old ways. I am going through the same phase now and am trying to keep it in balance but I can see my screen time increasing, unlocks increasing, find myself surfing stuff I never used to earlier. Drastic measures may need to be taken so we do not become shallower than what we have become.
It's a lovely book and thought its not an easy read, has great content and well argued. Thanks Abhinay for another wonderful book that opens up a new area for me (he has given me books on sleep, on breath, on comfort and several others so far).
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