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From: Cliff on 31 Jul 2010 17:44
From my inbox some days/weeks ago ... none of the graphics can posted here.


"There is a good book review on this exact subject in the Sunday Denver Post."
"The book reviewed in the paper was precisely "The Shallows" by Nicholas
Carr."

[
The Roman philosopher Seneca may have put it best 2,000 years ago: "To be
everywhere is to be nowhere." Today, the Internet grants us easy access to
unprecedented amounts of information. But a growing body of scientific evidence
suggests that the Net, with its constant distractions and interruptions, is also
turning us into scattered and superficial thinkers.

Journal Community (http://www.wsj.com/community)

The picture emerging from the research is deeply troubling, at least to anyone
who values the depth, rather than just the velocity, of human thought. People
who read text studded with links, the studies show, comprehend less than those
who read traditional linear text. People who watch busy multimedia presentations
remember less than those who take in information in a more sedate and focused
manner. People who are continually distracted by emails, alerts and other
messages understand less than those who are able to concentrate. And people who
juggle many tasks are less creative and less productive than those who do one
thing at a time.

Mick Coulas
The common thread in these disabilities is the division of attention. The
richness of our thoughts, our memories and even our personalities hinges on our
ability to focus the mind and sustain concentration. Only when we pay deep
attention to a new piece of information are we able to associate it
"meaningfully and systematically with knowledge already well established in
memory," writes the Nobel Prize-winning neuroscientist Eric Kandel. Such
associations are essential to mastering complex concepts.

When we're constantly distracted and interrupted, as we tend to be online, our
brains are unable to forge the strong and expansive neural connections that give
depth and distinctiveness to our thinking. We become mere signal-processing
units, quickly shepherding disjointed bits of information into and then out of
short-term memory.

In an article published in Science last year, Patricia Greenfield, a leading
developmental psychologist, reviewed dozens of studies on how different media
technologies influence our cognitive abilities. Some of the studies indicated
that certain computer tasks, like playing video games, can enhance "visual
literacy skills," increasing the speed at which people can shift their focus
among icons and other images on screens. Other studies, however, found that such
rapid shifts in focus, even if performed adeptly, result in less rigorous and
"more automatic" thinking.

56 Seconds
Average time an American spends looking at a Web page.

Source: Nielsen

In one experiment conducted at Cornell University, for example, half a class of
students was allowed to use Internet-connected laptops during a lecture, while
the other had to keep their computers shut. Those who browsed the Web performed
much worse on a subsequent test of how well they retained the lecture's content.
While it's hardly surprising that Web surfing would distract students, it should
be a note of caution to schools that are wiring their classrooms in hopes of
improving learning.

Ms. Greenfield concluded that "every medium develops some cognitive skills at
the expense of others." Our growing use of screen-based media, she said, has
strengthened visual-spatial intelligence, which can improve the ability to do
jobs that involve keeping track of lots of simultaneous signals, like air
traffic control. But that has been accompanied by "new weaknesses in
higher-order cognitive processes," including "abstract vocabulary, mindfulness,
reflection, inductive problem solving, critical thinking, and imagination."
We're becoming, in a word, shallower.

In another experiment, recently conducted at Stanford University's Communication
Between Humans and Interactive Media Lab, a team of researchers gave various
cognitive tests to 49 people who do a lot of media multitasking and 52 people
who multitask much less frequently. The heavy multitaskers performed poorly on
all the tests. They were more easily distracted, had less control over their
attention, and were much less able to distinguish important information from
trivia.

The researchers were surprised by the results. They had expected that the
intensive multitaskers would have gained some unique mental advantages from all
their on-screen juggling. But that wasn't the case. In fact, the heavy
multitaskers weren't even good at multitasking. They were considerably less
adept at switching between tasks than the more infrequent multitaskers.
"Everything distracts them," observed Clifford Nass, the professor who heads the
Stanford lab.

Does the Internet Make You Smarter?
Charis Tsevis
Amid the silly videos and spam are the roots of a new reading and writing
culture, says Clay Shirky.
(http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704025304575284973472694334.html)

It would be one thing if the ill effects went away as soon as we turned off our
computers and cellphones. But they don't. The cellular structure of the human
brain, scientists have discovered, adapts readily to the tools we use, including
those for finding, storing and sharing information. By changing our habits of
mind, each new technology strengthens certain neural pathways and weakens
others. The cellular alterations continue to shape the way we think even when
we're not using the technology.

The pioneering neuroscientist Michael Merzenich believes our brains are being
"massively remodeled" by our ever-intensifying use of the Web and related media.
In the 1970s and 1980s, Mr. Merzenich, now a professor emeritus at the
University of California in San Francisco, conducted a famous series of
experiments on primate brains that revealed how extensively and quickly neural
circuits change in response to experience. When, for example, Mr. Merzenich
rearranged the nerves in a monkey's hand, the nerve cells in the animal's
sensory cortex quickly reorganized themselves to create a new "mental map" of
the hand. In a conversation late last year, he said that he was profoundly
worried about the cognitive consequences of the constant distractions and
interruptions the Internet bombards us with. The long-term effect on the quality
of our intellectual lives, he said, could be "deadly."

What we seem to be sacrificing in all our surfing and searching is our capacity
to engage in the quieter, attentive modes of thought that underpin
contemplation, reflection and introspection. The Web never encourages us to slow
down. It keeps us in a state of perpetual mental locomotion.

It is revealing, and distressing, to compare the cognitive effects of the
Internet with those of an earlier information technology, the printed book.
Whereas the Internet scatters our attention, the book focuses it. Unlike the
screen, the page promotes contemplativeness.

Reading a long sequence of pages helps us develop a rare kind of mental
discipline. The innate bias of the human brain, after all, is to be distracted.
Our predisposition is to be aware of as much of what's going on around us as
possible. Our fast-paced, reflexive shifts in focus were once crucial to our
survival. They reduced the odds that a predator would take us by surprise or
that we'd overlook a nearby source of food.

To read a book is to practice an unnatural process of thought. It requires us to
place ourselves at what T. S. Eliot, in his poem "Four Quartets," called "the
still point of the turning world." We have to forge or strengthen the neural
links needed to counter our instinctive distractedness, thereby gaining greater
control over our attention and our mind.

It is this control, this mental discipline, that we are at risk of losing as we
spend ever more time scanning and skimming online. If the slow progression of
words across printed pages damped our craving to be inundated by mental
stimulation, the Internet indulges it. It returns us to our native state of
distractedness, while presenting us with far more distractions than our
ancestors ever had to contend with.

�Nicholas Carr is the author, most recently, of "The Shallows: What the Internet
Is Doing to Our Brains."Printed in The Wall Street Journal, page W1
]
From: His Highness the TibetanMonkey, Creator of the Movement of Tantra-Hammock on 31 Jul 2010 19:40
On Jul 31, 5:44 pm, Cliff <Clhuprichguessw...(a)aoltmovetheperiodc.om>
wrote:
>   From my inbox some days/weeks ago ... none of the graphics can posted here.
>
>   "There is a good book review on this exact subject in the Sunday Denver Post."
>    "The book reviewed in the paper was precisely "The Shallows" by Nicholas
> Carr."
>
> [
> The Roman philosopher Seneca may have put it best 2,000 years ago: "To be
> everywhere is to be nowhere." Today, the Internet grants us easy access to
> unprecedented amounts of information. But a growing body of scientific evidence
> suggests that the Net, with its constant distractions and interruptions, is also
> turning us into scattered and superficial thinkers.
>
> Journal Community (http://www.wsj.com/community)
>
> The picture emerging from the research is deeply troubling, at least to anyone
> who values the depth, rather than just the velocity, of human thought. People
> who read text studded with links, the studies show, comprehend less than those
> who read traditional linear text. People who watch busy multimedia presentations
> remember less than those who take in information in a more sedate and focused
> manner. People who are continually distracted by emails, alerts and other
> messages understand less than those who are able to concentrate. And people who
> juggle many tasks are less creative and less productive than those who do one
> thing at a time.
>
>  Mick Coulas
> The common thread in these disabilities is the division of attention. The
> richness of our thoughts, our memories and even our personalities hinges on our
> ability to focus the mind and sustain concentration. Only when we pay deep
> attention to a new piece of information are we able to associate it
> "meaningfully and systematically with knowledge already well established in
> memory," writes the Nobel Prize-winning neuroscientist Eric Kandel. Such
> associations are essential to mastering complex concepts.
>
> When we're constantly distracted and interrupted, as we tend to be online, our
> brains are unable to forge the strong and expansive neural connections that give
> depth and distinctiveness to our thinking. We become mere signal-processing
> units, quickly shepherding disjointed bits of information into and then out of
> short-term memory.
>
> In an article published in Science last year, Patricia Greenfield, a leading
> developmental psychologist, reviewed dozens of studies on how different media
> technologies influence our cognitive abilities. Some of the studies indicated
> that certain computer tasks, like playing video games, can enhance "visual
> literacy skills," increasing the speed at which people can shift their focus
> among icons and other images on screens. Other studies, however, found that such
> rapid shifts in focus, even if performed adeptly, result in less rigorous and
> "more automatic" thinking.
>
> 56 Seconds
> Average time an American spends looking at a Web page.
>
> Source: Nielsen
>
> In one experiment conducted at Cornell University, for example, half a class of
> students was allowed to use Internet-connected laptops during a lecture, while
> the other had to keep their computers shut. Those who browsed the Web performed
> much worse on a subsequent test of how well they retained the lecture's content.
> While it's hardly surprising that Web surfing would distract students, it should
> be a note of caution to schools that are wiring their classrooms in hopes of
> improving learning.
>
> Ms. Greenfield concluded that "every medium develops some cognitive skills at
> the expense of others." Our growing use of screen-based media, she said, has
> strengthened visual-spatial intelligence, which can improve the ability to do
> jobs that involve keeping track of lots of simultaneous signals, like air
> traffic control. But that has been accompanied by "new weaknesses in
> higher-order cognitive processes," including "abstract vocabulary, mindfulness,
> reflection, inductive problem solving, critical thinking, and imagination.."
> We're becoming, in a word, shallower.
>
> In another experiment, recently conducted at Stanford University's Communication
> Between Humans and Interactive Media Lab, a team of researchers gave various
> cognitive tests to 49 people who do a lot of media multitasking and 52 people
> who multitask much less frequently. The heavy multitaskers performed poorly on
> all the tests. They were more easily distracted, had less control over their
> attention, and were much less able to distinguish important information from
> trivia.
>
> The researchers were surprised by the results. They had expected that the
> intensive multitaskers would have gained some unique mental advantages from all
> their on-screen juggling. But that wasn't the case. In fact, the heavy
> multitaskers weren't even good at multitasking. They were considerably less
> adept at switching between tasks than the more infrequent multitaskers.
> "Everything distracts them," observed Clifford Nass, the professor who heads the
> Stanford lab.
>
> Does the Internet Make You Smarter?
>  Charis Tsevis
> Amid the silly videos and spam are the roots of a new reading and writing
> culture, says Clay Shirky.
> (http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142405274870402530457528497347269...)
>
> It would be one thing if the ill effects went away as soon as we turned off our
> computers and cellphones. But they don't. The cellular structure of the human
> brain, scientists have discovered, adapts readily to the tools we use, including
> those for finding, storing and sharing information. By changing our habits of
> mind, each new technology strengthens certain neural pathways and weakens
> others. The cellular alterations continue to shape the way we think even when
> we're not using the technology.
>
> The pioneering neuroscientist Michael Merzenich believes our brains are being
> "massively remodeled" by our ever-intensifying use of the Web and related media.
> In the 1970s and 1980s, Mr. Merzenich, now a professor emeritus at the
> University of California in San Francisco, conducted a famous series of
> experiments on primate brains that revealed how extensively and quickly neural
> circuits change in response to experience. When, for example, Mr. Merzenich
> rearranged the nerves in a monkey's hand, the nerve cells in the animal's
> sensory cortex quickly reorganized themselves to create a new "mental map" of
> the hand. In a conversation late last year, he said that he was profoundly
> worried about the cognitive consequences of the constant distractions and
> interruptions the Internet bombards us with. The long-term effect on the quality
> of our intellectual lives, he said, could be "deadly."
>
> What we seem to be sacrificing in all our surfing and searching is our capacity
> to engage in the quieter, attentive modes of thought that underpin
> contemplation, reflection and introspection. The Web never encourages us to slow
> down. It keeps us in a state of perpetual mental locomotion.
>
> It is revealing, and distressing, to compare the cognitive effects of the
> Internet with those of an earlier information technology, the printed book.
> Whereas the Internet scatters our attention, the book focuses it. Unlike the
> screen, the page promotes contemplativeness.
>
> Reading a long sequence of pages helps us develop a rare kind of mental
> discipline. The innate bias of the human brain, after all, is to be distracted.
> Our predisposition is to be aware of as much of what's going on around us as
> possible. Our fast-paced, reflexive shifts in focus were once crucial to our
> survival. They reduced the odds that a predator would take us by surprise or
> that we'd overlook a nearby source of food.
>
> To read a book is to practice an unnatural process of thought. It requires us to
> place ourselves at what T. S. Eliot, in his poem "Four Quartets," called "the
> still point of the turning world." We have to forge or strengthen the neural
> links needed to counter our instinctive distractedness, thereby gaining greater
> control over our attention and our mind.
>
> It is this control, this mental discipline, that we are at risk of losing as we
> spend ever more time scanning and skimming online. If the slow progression of
> words across printed pages damped our craving to be inundated by mental
> stimulation, the Internet indulges it. It returns us to our native state of
> distractedness, while presenting us with far more distractions than our
> ancestors ever had to contend with.
>
> —Nicholas Carr is the author, most recently, of "The Shallows: What the Internet
> Is Doing to Our Brains."Printed in The Wall Street Journal, page W1
> ]

It's a nice escape from the reality around here: gangs, homeless,
aggressive drivers, arrogant people and feral cats.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------


WHEN THE SOLUTION IS THE REVOLUTION

http://webspawner.com/users/BANANAREVOLUTION
From: FatterDumber& Happier Moe on 1 Aug 2010 07:19
Cliff wrote:
> From my inbox some days/weeks ago ... none of the graphics can posted here.
>
>
> "There is a good book review on this exact subject in the Sunday Denver Post."
> "The book reviewed in the paper was precisely "The Shallows" by Nicholas
> Carr."
>
> [
> The Roman philosopher Seneca may have put it best 2,000 years ago: "To be
> everywhere is to be nowhere." Today, the Internet grants us easy access to
> unprecedented amounts of information. But a growing body of scientific evidence
> suggests that the Net, with its constant distractions and interruptions, is also
> turning us into scattered and superficial thinkers.
>
> Journal Community (http://www.wsj.com/community)
>
> The picture emerging from the research is deeply troubling, at least to anyone
> who values the depth, rather than just the velocity, of human thought. People
> who read text studded with links, the studies show, comprehend less than those
> who read traditional linear text. People who watch busy multimedia presentations
> remember less than those who take in information in a more sedate and focused
> manner. People who are continually distracted by emails, alerts and other
> messages understand less than those who are able to concentrate. And people who
> juggle many tasks are less creative and less productive than those who do one
> thing at a time.
>
> Mick Coulas
> The common thread in these disabilities is the division of attention. The
> richness of our thoughts, our memories and even our personalities hinges on our
> ability to focus the mind and sustain concentration. Only when we pay deep
> attention to a new piece of information are we able to associate it
> "meaningfully and systematically with knowledge already well established in
> memory," writes the Nobel Prize-winning neuroscientist Eric Kandel. Such
> associations are essential to mastering complex concepts.
>
> When we're constantly distracted and interrupted, as we tend to be online, our
> brains are unable to forge the strong and expansive neural connections that give
> depth and distinctiveness to our thinking. We become mere signal-processing
> units, quickly shepherding disjointed bits of information into and then out of
> short-term memory.
>
> In an article published in Science last year, Patricia Greenfield, a leading
> developmental psychologist, reviewed dozens of studies on how different media
> technologies influence our cognitive abilities. Some of the studies indicated
> that certain computer tasks, like playing video games, can enhance "visual
> literacy skills," increasing the speed at which people can shift their focus
> among icons and other images on screens. Other studies, however, found that such
> rapid shifts in focus, even if performed adeptly, result in less rigorous and
> "more automatic" thinking.
>
> 56 Seconds
> Average time an American spends looking at a Web page.
>
> Source: Nielsen
>
> In one experiment conducted at Cornell University, for example, half a class of
> students was allowed to use Internet-connected laptops during a lecture, while
> the other had to keep their computers shut. Those who browsed the Web performed
> much worse on a subsequent test of how well they retained the lecture's content.
> While it's hardly surprising that Web surfing would distract students, it should
> be a note of caution to schools that are wiring their classrooms in hopes of
> improving learning.
>
> Ms. Greenfield concluded that "every medium develops some cognitive skills at
> the expense of others." Our growing use of screen-based media, she said, has
> strengthened visual-spatial intelligence, which can improve the ability to do
> jobs that involve keeping track of lots of simultaneous signals, like air
> traffic control. But that has been accompanied by "new weaknesses in
> higher-order cognitive processes," including "abstract vocabulary, mindfulness,
> reflection, inductive problem solving, critical thinking, and imagination."
> We're becoming, in a word, shallower.
>
> In another experiment, recently conducted at Stanford University's Communication
> Between Humans and Interactive Media Lab, a team of researchers gave various
> cognitive tests to 49 people who do a lot of media multitasking and 52 people
> who multitask much less frequently. The heavy multitaskers performed poorly on
> all the tests. They were more easily distracted, had less control over their
> attention, and were much less able to distinguish important information from
> trivia.
>
> The researchers were surprised by the results. They had expected that the
> intensive multitaskers would have gained some unique mental advantages from all
> their on-screen juggling. But that wasn't the case. In fact, the heavy
> multitaskers weren't even good at multitasking. They were considerably less
> adept at switching between tasks than the more infrequent multitaskers.
> "Everything distracts them," observed Clifford Nass, the professor who heads the
> Stanford lab.
>
> Does the Internet Make You Smarter?
> Charis Tsevis
> Amid the silly videos and spam are the roots of a new reading and writing
> culture, says Clay Shirky.
> (http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704025304575284973472694334.html)
>
> It would be one thing if the ill effects went away as soon as we turned off our
> computers and cellphones. But they don't. The cellular structure of the human
> brain, scientists have discovered, adapts readily to the tools we use, including
> those for finding, storing and sharing information. By changing our habits of
> mind, each new technology strengthens certain neural pathways and weakens
> others. The cellular alterations continue to shape the way we think even when
> we're not using the technology.
>
> The pioneering neuroscientist Michael Merzenich believes our brains are being
> "massively remodeled" by our ever-intensifying use of the Web and related media.
> In the 1970s and 1980s, Mr. Merzenich, now a professor emeritus at the
> University of California in San Francisco, conducted a famous series of
> experiments on primate brains that revealed how extensively and quickly neural
> circuits change in response to experience. When, for example, Mr. Merzenich
> rearranged the nerves in a monkey's hand, the nerve cells in the animal's
> sensory cortex quickly reorganized themselves to create a new "mental map" of
> the hand. In a conversation late last year, he said that he was profoundly
> worried about the cognitive consequences of the constant distractions and
> interruptions the Internet bombards us with. The long-term effect on the quality
> of our intellectual lives, he said, could be "deadly."
>
> What we seem to be sacrificing in all our surfing and searching is our capacity
> to engage in the quieter, attentive modes of thought that underpin
> contemplation, reflection and introspection. The Web never encourages us to slow
> down. It keeps us in a state of perpetual mental locomotion.
>
> It is revealing, and distressing, to compare the cognitive effects of the
> Internet with those of an earlier information technology, the printed book.
> Whereas the Internet scatters our attention, the book focuses it. Unlike the
> screen, the page promotes contemplativeness.
>
> Reading a long sequence of pages helps us develop a rare kind of mental
> discipline. The innate bias of the human brain, after all, is to be distracted.
> Our predisposition is to be aware of as much of what's going on around us as
> possible. Our fast-paced, reflexive shifts in focus were once crucial to our
> survival. They reduced the odds that a predator would take us by surprise or
> that we'd overlook a nearby source of food.
>
> To read a book is to practice an unnatural process of thought. It requires us to
> place ourselves at what T. S. Eliot, in his poem "Four Quartets," called "the
> still point of the turning world." We have to forge or strengthen the neural
> links needed to counter our instinctive distractedness, thereby gaining greater
> control over our attention and our mind.
>
> It is this control, this mental discipline, that we are at risk of losing as we
> spend ever more time scanning and skimming online. If the slow progression of
> words across printed pages damped our craving to be inundated by mental
> stimulation, the Internet indulges it. It returns us to our native state of
> distractedness, while presenting us with far more distractions than our
> ancestors ever had to contend with.
>
> �Nicholas Carr is the author, most recently, of "The Shallows: What the Internet
> Is Doing to Our Brains."Printed in The Wall Street Journal, page W1
> ]

Who cares. The article was to long to read, he should have summarized
it more. Did anyone take the time to read the whole article?
From: edspyhill01 on 1 Aug 2010 08:51
On Aug 1, 7:19 am, FatterDumber& Happier Moe
<"WheresMyCheck"@UncleSamLoves.Mee> wrote:
> Cliff wrote:
> >   From my inbox some days/weeks ago ... none of the graphics can posted here.
>
> >   "There is a good book review on this exact subject in the Sunday Denver Post."
> >    "The book reviewed in the paper was precisely "The Shallows" by Nicholas
> > Carr."
>
> > [
> > The Roman philosopher Seneca may have put it best 2,000 years ago: "To be
> > everywhere is to be nowhere." Today, the Internet grants us easy access to
> > unprecedented amounts of information. But a growing body of scientific evidence
> > suggests that the Net, with its constant distractions and interruptions, is also
> > turning us into scattered and superficial thinkers.
>
> > Journal Community (http://www.wsj.com/community)
>
> > The picture emerging from the research is deeply troubling, at least to anyone
> > who values the depth, rather than just the velocity, of human thought. People
> > who read text studded with links, the studies show, comprehend less than those
> > who read traditional linear text. People who watch busy multimedia presentations
> > remember less than those who take in information in a more sedate and focused
> > manner. People who are continually distracted by emails, alerts and other
> > messages understand less than those who are able to concentrate. And people who
> > juggle many tasks are less creative and less productive than those who do one
> > thing at a time.
>
> >  Mick Coulas
> > The common thread in these disabilities is the division of attention. The
> > richness of our thoughts, our memories and even our personalities hinges on our
> > ability to focus the mind and sustain concentration. Only when we pay deep
> > attention to a new piece of information are we able to associate it
> > "meaningfully and systematically with knowledge already well established in
> > memory," writes the Nobel Prize-winning neuroscientist Eric Kandel. Such
> > associations are essential to mastering complex concepts.
>
> > When we're constantly distracted and interrupted, as we tend to be online, our
> > brains are unable to forge the strong and expansive neural connections that give
> > depth and distinctiveness to our thinking. We become mere signal-processing
> > units, quickly shepherding disjointed bits of information into and then out of
> > short-term memory.
>
> > In an article published in Science last year, Patricia Greenfield, a leading
> > developmental psychologist, reviewed dozens of studies on how different media
> > technologies influence our cognitive abilities. Some of the studies indicated
> > that certain computer tasks, like playing video games, can enhance "visual
> > literacy skills," increasing the speed at which people can shift their focus
> > among icons and other images on screens. Other studies, however, found that such
> > rapid shifts in focus, even if performed adeptly, result in less rigorous and
> > "more automatic" thinking.
>
> > 56 Seconds
> > Average time an American spends looking at a Web page.
>
> > Source: Nielsen
>
> > In one experiment conducted at Cornell University, for example, half a class of
> > students was allowed to use Internet-connected laptops during a lecture, while
> > the other had to keep their computers shut. Those who browsed the Web performed
> > much worse on a subsequent test of how well they retained the lecture's content.
> > While it's hardly surprising that Web surfing would distract students, it should
> > be a note of caution to schools that are wiring their classrooms in hopes of
> > improving learning.
>
> > Ms. Greenfield concluded that "every medium develops some cognitive skills at
> > the expense of others." Our growing use of screen-based media, she said, has
> > strengthened visual-spatial intelligence, which can improve the ability to do
> > jobs that involve keeping track of lots of simultaneous signals, like air
> > traffic control. But that has been accompanied by "new weaknesses in
> > higher-order cognitive processes," including "abstract vocabulary, mindfulness,
> > reflection, inductive problem solving, critical thinking, and imagination."
> > We're becoming, in a word, shallower.
>
> > In another experiment, recently conducted at Stanford University's Communication
> > Between Humans and Interactive Media Lab, a team of researchers gave various
> > cognitive tests to 49 people who do a lot of media multitasking and 52 people
> > who multitask much less frequently. The heavy multitaskers performed poorly on
> > all the tests. They were more easily distracted, had less control over their
> > attention, and were much less able to distinguish important information from
> > trivia.
>
> > The researchers were surprised by the results. They had expected that the
> > intensive multitaskers would have gained some unique mental advantages from all
> > their on-screen juggling. But that wasn't the case. In fact, the heavy
> > multitaskers weren't even good at multitasking. They were considerably less
> > adept at switching between tasks than the more infrequent multitaskers.
> > "Everything distracts them," observed Clifford Nass, the professor who heads the
> > Stanford lab.
>
> > Does the Internet Make You Smarter?
> >  Charis Tsevis
> > Amid the silly videos and spam are the roots of a new reading and writing
> > culture, says Clay Shirky.
> > (http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142405274870402530457528497347269....)
>
> > It would be one thing if the ill effects went away as soon as we turned off our
> > computers and cellphones. But they don't. The cellular structure of the human
> > brain, scientists have discovered, adapts readily to the tools we use, including
> > those for finding, storing and sharing information. By changing our habits of
> > mind, each new technology strengthens certain neural pathways and weakens
> > others. The cellular alterations continue to shape the way we think even when
> > we're not using the technology.
>
> > The pioneering neuroscientist Michael Merzenich believes our brains are being
> > "massively remodeled" by our ever-intensifying use of the Web and related media.
> > In the 1970s and 1980s, Mr. Merzenich, now a professor emeritus at the
> > University of California in San Francisco, conducted a famous series of
> > experiments on primate brains that revealed how extensively and quickly neural
> > circuits change in response to experience. When, for example, Mr. Merzenich
> > rearranged the nerves in a monkey's hand, the nerve cells in the animal's
> > sensory cortex quickly reorganized themselves to create a new "mental map" of
> > the hand. In a conversation late last year, he said that he was profoundly
> > worried about the cognitive consequences of the constant distractions and
> > interruptions the Internet bombards us with. The long-term effect on the quality
> > of our intellectual lives, he said, could be "deadly."
>
> > What we seem to be sacrificing in all our surfing and searching is our capacity
> > to engage in the quieter, attentive modes of thought that underpin
> > contemplation, reflection and introspection. The Web never encourages us to slow
> > down. It keeps us in a state of perpetual mental locomotion.
>
> > It is revealing, and distressing, to compare the cognitive effects of the
> > Internet with those of an earlier information technology, the printed book.
> > Whereas the Internet scatters our attention, the book focuses it. Unlike the
> > screen, the page promotes contemplativeness.
>
> > Reading a long sequence of pages helps us develop a rare kind of mental
> > discipline. The innate bias of the human brain, after all, is to be distracted.
> > Our predisposition is to be aware of as much of what's going on around us as
> > possible. Our fast-paced, reflexive shifts in focus were once crucial to our
> > survival. They reduced the odds that a predator would take us by surprise or
> > that we'd overlook a nearby source of food.
>
> > To read a book is to practice an unnatural process of thought. It requires us to
> > place ourselves at what T. S. Eliot, in his poem "Four Quartets," called "the
> > still point of the turning world." We have to forge or strengthen the neural
> > links needed to counter our instinctive distractedness, thereby gaining greater
> > control over our attention and our mind.
>
> > It is this control, this mental discipline, that we are at risk of losing as we
> > spend ever more time scanning and skimming online. If the slow progression of
> > words across printed pages damped our craving to be inundated by mental
> > stimulation, the Internet indulges it. It returns us to our native state of
> > distractedness, while presenting us with far more distractions than our
> > ancestors ever had to contend with.
>
> > —Nicholas Carr is the author, most recently, of "The Shallows: What the Internet
> > Is Doing to Our Brains."Printed in The Wall Street Journal, page W1
> > ]
>
> Who cares.  The article was to long to read, he should have summarized
> it more.   Did anyone take the time to read the whole article?- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -

About a quarter of the way through it I did a couple Google searches,
looked at another digest and checked my email. The premise of the
article is bogus; who cares about fungus infections among barefoot
marathon racers.
From: Cliff on 2 Aug 2010 01:08
On Sun, 01 Aug 2010 06:19:22 -0500, FatterDumber& Happier Moe
<"WheresMyCheck"@UncleSamLoves.Mee> wrote:

>to long to read,

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