The other day, I was having a very interesting conversation with an acquaintance. I was explaining that because of our fast paced world and all the ways people could get messages to us such as; texting, e-mail, social network page, telephone, etc. that everyone was so distracted they were not getting anything done, and productivity has going to zero. Worse, this technology which has made our lives more efficient, and supposedly more productive, also is now challenging our memories. After all, how many phone numbers of your friends and family do you actually remember?
Probably only a few if any, some people have a challenge remembering their own phone number, because they don’t memorize numbers very well because everyone is on speed dial. My acquaintance told me that all of this didn’t matter, and it was okay because it was freeing our brains to remember other more important things. Like what I wondered? You mean like remembering people’s names, birthdays, and other such things? The reality is that people don’t remember those things either, not anymore, not really.
So if people are not using all this cognitive ability, what are they doing with all of that extra brainpower? I would submit to you they are no longer using it, and you know if “you don’t use it, you lose it.” Let me give you a case in point, something which I recently read.
There was an interesting article in the August 2013 edition of “The Writer” titled; “Internet Brain – Suffering from Web Overload? You’re Not Alone,” and the article had an interesting subtitle; “according to researchers, the Internet is transforming the writing brain,” by Hillary Casavant. The article goes on to tell a story of a writing career nearly destroyed by wasteful Internet chatter and too much time on social networks. If you are an author or writer, perhaps you can understand how serious this issue really is?
Personally, I found the best time to do my writing is in the middle of the night, when there are no e-mails, phone calls, or text messages breaking through my concentration, or into whatever I am doing at the time. This extra cohesiveness in my schedule allows me to work uninterrupted, which brings me back to my first point:
“If all of these techno-gadgets are to make our life more efficient and more productive then how come they are preventing us from getting things done, and hurting our cognitive abilities?”
Maybe that’s why everyone appears to be so brain dead – at least that is my suspicion. What’s yours? Please consider all this and think on it.
#Brain #Dead #Sneaky #Suspicion