My 6year old son was expressing his desire for another snow day and stating that he doesn't like going to school. When my husband explained that he needed to go so he could keep getting smarter, his reply was,"I don't know why people want to be smarter when you can just ask other people stuff." I was mortified. I'm a college professor, and helping others to gain knowledge is what I do. How could he not want to learn?
His comment stayed with me for several days as I kept pondering its meaning. This morning I was struck by the realization that he is correct. His primitive description actually is quite accurate. When there is something I want to know, I no longer have to read a book on the subject or take a class. All I have to do is Google it. Who was the 14th President? I can Google it. What's the capital of Nebraska? I'll Google it. Am I spelling this word correctly? It doesn't matter because Spellcheck will fix it.
Has American society reached the point where we no longer need to know things? Can everything just be stored in short term memory while in use, and then wiped clean like a now obsolete chalkboard? What I find more disturbing is that we may not have the intellectual capabilities to analyze the information technology provides. If we don't have the fundamentals of a broad knowledge base, will we have the critical thinking skills required in order to be discriminate in using the data provided online? If my son asked me what time it is, I could tell him any time I desired, and he would not know otherwise. Are we as foolish and naive in our use of "facts" given online? Do we believe it because it's published on the computer?
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Are you nuts, too?