Synthesis on Smart Phones
Hr. 2
College English
Synthesis Nearly 80% of Americans have access to the internet at home, school or work, and almost 50% of Americans have smart phones with internet at all times. The articles “How Computers Change the Way We Think” by Sherry Turkle, “Lazy Eyes” by Michael Agger and “Americans and Their Smartphones” by John C. Dvorak, all talk about how technology is changing the world. Easy access and constant use of the internet is changing the way people learn and think in their everyday lives.
Before people had access to the internet so commonly finding answers for things was more difficult. When people needed an answer to something they would have to go to the library or look it up in a textbook. Now they simply have to google the question on a computer or phone giving them an easy one line answer in less than a minute. This seems like a good thing, but it has changed how people learn and take in information. For example, if a student needs to answer a question at school, he needs to use a textbook to dig for the answer hidden in a huge wall of text. This is hard because they are accustomed to one line answers provided from the internet. The article “Lazy Eyes” explains that the internet’s various distractions make people skim or skip reading big blocks of text. Doing this on the internet has carried over to the way we read everything. It makes reading long sections of a book for a single answer much more difficult because we are unintentionally skipping or skimming long paragraphs. This is not the first time our ability to learn has changed. According to Sherry Turkle, in the late 1970’s “Professors in engineering complained that the transition from slide rules to calculators had affected their students’ ability to deal with issues of scale.” The internet is making it harder to learn in some cases, but just like the professors being able to teach scale while using calculators, they will be able to teach while using the internet. In the end,
College English
Synthesis Nearly 80% of Americans have access to the internet at home, school or work, and almost 50% of Americans have smart phones with internet at all times. The articles “How Computers Change the Way We Think” by Sherry Turkle, “Lazy Eyes” by Michael Agger and “Americans and Their Smartphones” by John C. Dvorak, all talk about how technology is changing the world. Easy access and constant use of the internet is changing the way people learn and think in their everyday lives.
Before people had access to the internet so commonly finding answers for things was more difficult. When people needed an answer to something they would have to go to the library or look it up in a textbook. Now they simply have to google the question on a computer or phone giving them an easy one line answer in less than a minute. This seems like a good thing, but it has changed how people learn and take in information. For example, if a student needs to answer a question at school, he needs to use a textbook to dig for the answer hidden in a huge wall of text. This is hard because they are accustomed to one line answers provided from the internet. The article “Lazy Eyes” explains that the internet’s various distractions make people skim or skip reading big blocks of text. Doing this on the internet has carried over to the way we read everything. It makes reading long sections of a book for a single answer much more difficult because we are unintentionally skipping or skimming long paragraphs. This is not the first time our ability to learn has changed. According to Sherry Turkle, in the late 1970’s “Professors in engineering complained that the transition from slide rules to calculators had affected their students’ ability to deal with issues of scale.” The internet is making it harder to learn in some cases, but just like the professors being able to teach scale while using calculators, they will be able to teach while using the internet. In the end,
Cited: Agger, Michael. “Lazy Eyes” 9th ed. N.p. The Bedford Guide for College Writers 2011 print. Dvorak, John. “Americans and Their Smartphones” PC Magazine Online 16 Aug. 2011 Turkle, Sherry. “ How Computers Change the Way we Think” 9th ed. N.p. The Bedford Guide for College Writers 2011 print.