As we witnessed the events in the national and international arena from the disaster in the Gulf of Mexico, the oil still flows, to the shifting geopolitics in the Middle East, as Turkey, Russia and Iran are moving further away from the US, the issue of attention span and ability to maintain focus is critical.
This on the day that Apple has just introduced a new iphone and has released figures that there is an ipad selling every 3 seconds. The question that becomes even more important then is what is this doing for the social fabric of society and the effects that it has in democratic governance? By democratic governance the reference is to the effects on the political culture and level of subjective or participatory attitudes that develop.
I think that for the most part, the recent surge of middle-aged thinkers’ opinion pieces decrying the onset of the information age are misconceived at best. I have seen a few articles along these lines lately—what at first-glance comes off as antiquated Orwellian technological paranoia inevitably turns into an attempt at a social commentary about the attention-span of this generation and ominously far-reaching effects that will permeate all levels of society and result in the downfall of man; or something like that. This kind of desperate foretelling about the potentially apocalyptic nature of technology is reminiscent of Y2k, the Napster debacle, even the Sputnik launch. Arthur C. Clarke said that, “any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic”. It seems unlikely that the (admittedly absurd) level of technological gadgetry present and integrated into our everyday lives will have pronounced effects on our ability to focus or produce cognitive thoughts; people used to think television would turn your brain to mush. Brain processing power is strengthened with practice, like anything else in the body—if anything I think that the resulting new levels of constant brain activity will serve to make us more capable creatures of logic and reason.
ReplyDeleteIf it is a matter just of middle-age technophobes, then how is brain processing power strengthened by the constant spurts of short pieces information without practicing discipline. Even for other parts of the body it is not only a matter of exercise, but focussed, repetitive and discipline exercise that renders results. And who says that television doesn't turn our minds to mush?
ReplyDeleteThe bigger point however, is whether this type of accessing power doesn't allow us to stay focussed on an issue such as the BP disaster or the financial crisis, etc..
As of late I have seen many pieces regarding the possible negative impacts that technology can have, particularly on my generation. And to a point, I find that technological advances have made some of the population less focused on some of the issues you discussed above, but I'm not sure if this indicates an overall destruction of social fabric of society. Yes, many studies have indicated that many people have begun to watch tv and surf in internet instead of reading books and other sources of literature. These same sources of technology have also reaped many benefits for society. I picture the effect of technology more as changing the social fabrics of the past into one that better represents the social needs of our generation. This appears, at least to me, to be more of a change of the way society interacts rather than a total destruction of the fabric of society.
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