The Study is right and wrong at the same time
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LonelyNet (Part Two)
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· Score: 1
Okay, first. The study is right. There are people who have isolated themselves via the internet. One doesn't have to be interactive to use the Internet. You can logon, browse for hours and loggoff without making one personal contact. That's not all the internet offers, but it can be done. You could call them lurkers. I've used the net in that capacity the majority of the time. And I believe that this type of person is what the study is trying to analize.
Unfortunately, its not that simple, of course. The study is wrong because of the reason Katz puts forward above. Its wrong because you have to choose to be anti-social. I think that the very people that this study is supposedly identifying are just transplants from some other "anti-social" medium. Maybe they watched TV all day before. Maybe they played video games all day. Maybe they read books all day. Most people wouldn't consider that in the same way as this study, but I don't see the difference. No human contact (e-mail, chat, phone or in person) is no human contact.
The bottom line is that technology isn't the problem. I don't think its the answer either. I believe that it hasn't been any different since the beginning. We create our own problems and we need to fix them. Technology is just another excuse for people to blame their problems on instead of themselves.
I don't agree with you that America is dumed down at all. What are you comparing it to? The Renaissance? Victorian Brittan?
My take is that as each day more "stuff" (knowledge, news, stats, etc) is released into humanity and that the sheer amount of that "stuff" seems so overwelming that we can't help but think that since there's all this that one doesn't know, how can we be as smart as the Ancients? That's a bit too nostalgic for me. Most people in the renaissance were average Joes that didn't know much more than tiling their farmland or being a seamstress or what have you. Has this changed? I don't think it has.
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Okay, first. The study is right. There are people who have isolated themselves via the internet. One doesn't have to be interactive to use the Internet. You can logon, browse for hours and loggoff without making one personal contact. That's not all the internet offers, but it can be done. You could call them lurkers. I've used the net in that capacity the majority of the time. And I believe that this type of person is what the study is trying to analize.
Unfortunately, its not that simple, of course. The study is wrong because of the reason Katz puts forward above. Its wrong because you have to choose to be anti-social. I think that the very people that this study is supposedly identifying are just transplants from some other "anti-social" medium. Maybe they watched TV all day before. Maybe they played video games all day. Maybe they read books all day. Most people wouldn't consider that in the same way as this study, but I don't see the difference. No human contact (e-mail, chat, phone or in person) is no human contact.
The bottom line is that technology isn't the problem. I don't think its the answer either. I believe that it hasn't been any different since the beginning. We create our own problems and we need to fix them. Technology is just another excuse for people to blame their problems on instead of themselves.
I don't agree with you that America is dumed down at all. What are you comparing it to? The Renaissance? Victorian Brittan?
My take is that as each day more "stuff" (knowledge, news, stats, etc) is released into humanity and that the sheer amount of that "stuff" seems so overwelming that we can't help but think that since there's all this that one doesn't know, how can we be as smart as the Ancients? That's a bit too nostalgic for me. Most people in the renaissance were average Joes that didn't know much more than tiling their farmland or being a seamstress or what have you. Has this changed? I don't think it has.