Sunday, April 3, 2016

IS TECHNOLOGY MAKING US STUPID?

The title and the contents of this blog entry are inspired by a recent funny video posted by Lilly Singh (aka Superwoman) on YouTube but on a serious note I seem to quite agree with her. Though, I am no luddite and a true lover of technology but lately tech seems to be having dangerous and alarming effects on all of us. Let me delve and elaborate into some of the reasons causing stupidity in all of us and turning us into dolts.

1. Numbers: Yes, we all have become so bad and dumb with numbers be it remembering any telephone number (even our instant family's or best friends nos. for that matter as all are stored on the phone so why remember), important birthdays/anniversaries (FB will send us a notification so don't need to) or performing simple daily calculations involving addition and multiplication. We have truly become lazy in exerting our brains to memorise the important daily stuff and overdependence on mobile phones, computers and calculators seems to be the main culprit. Also the reason why kids detest math these days. If we do not have our phone/tablet on us we just tend to loose the plot.

2. Directions:  Over reliance on GPS (read Google Maps) has made us so weak with directions that we cannot reach a destination even two blocks away without GPS. We get lost easily and rather purposely as we seem to have online help in hand at all times. And if by any chance we donot have access to GPS then we are totally directionless and are bound to reach the dead end. In the video she humorously mentions that she always and easily gets lost inside a Hotel she is staying in. A day is not far when we might get lost inside our own homes:)

3. Brain Dead & Memory: We have stopped using our brains completely so much so that for every little bit of information we just "Google it" maybe countless times during the day. As an after effect our long term memory is getting poor since we have actually stopped remembering what we read during our school and college days as Google help is always at hand. Ours is a population that has grown up multitasking using technology, often compounded by lack of sleep, all of which results in high levels of forgetfulness. We have outsourced our memory to the Internet to remember things for us.

4. Spellings:  Too much dependence on auto correct/spellcheck has ruined our basic spellings. Instant messaging services like iMessage, What's App, Messenger, Hike etc. have also taken a toll on our spellings and basic grammar where brevity seems to be in fashion. Result: The current generation doesn't have any problem with incorrect spellings.

5. Reading Habits & Social Media:  Also the current generation seems to have very poor reading habits as technology and social media has reduced their attention span. When their crop has become so used to reading fewer characters a'la Twitter (where the character limit is only 140), What's App and even Facebook where stories, thoughts etc. are expressed in as many fewer words as possible, then who is going to read a good book or novel running into several hundreds of pages. People are becoming diametrically opposite in real life to the inspiring messages they post on social media. Just carrying a false facade. Blindly forwarding posts to wrong groups and brainlessly copying/pasting stuff on What's App resulting in repetitive boring posts proves that we are turning into morons. Nope, reading on Kindle or the iPad has hardly caught on in India atleast. And who reads newspapers these days, they are just passé. Result: Stupid and faulty English with a defeated and crabbed mindset.

6. Outdoor Activities: We all by now know that the addiction to video/mobile games has taken a toll on the physical as well mental health of our younger generation. They no more want to exert themselves physically as our kids are more comfortable in the living rooms sitting on the couch and shooting endless Zombies (with endless rounds of pizza and Coke) than playing a physical sport outside in the park. They are perfect in racing cars on the screen than in reality on the road. Result: Indolence, obesity and orthopaedic problems. 

7. Sleep & Distraction : Tech and Social media have really screwed up with our sleep. Studies have shown that the blue-enriched light, which is emitted by gadgets like smartphones, tablets and laptops, can suppress the body’s release of melatonin at night. Melatonin is a key hormone that helps regulate your internal clock, telling your body when it is nighttime and when to feel sleepy. If you’re not logging atleast seven hours of sleep each night, you might suffer from increasingly bad moods, decreased focus at work and problems with memory, not to mention a loss of actual brain tissue. Technology makes it much easier to get distracted, whether that’s stepping away from an important project to check your smartphone or flipping between multiple browser tabs without really focusing on any one. It has been proven that juggling between multiple tasks at once doesn’t actually work — in fact, you just wind up performing all your duties even worse.

8. The Future: They say technological advancements are always good for mankind in general but the advent of technology in certain areas could be harmful for us. First and foremost is driverless cars. Technology has already afforded us automatic transmission and no doubt it's a boon. However, driverless cars though could be a blessing for the physically challenged but what about the rest of us. If the comfort of a chauffeur was not already hampering our overall mental alertness perhaps an automatic car with no driver would render the poor chauffeur jobless and also lead us to more laziness and lesser alertness. Result: Brain and Body dead. Second could be VR (read Virtual Reality) headsets through which the upper portion of our bodies (read above our necks) would be virtually able to travel to anywhere in the world but our lower bodies would remain static in our living rooms. Since this tech is still in its fancy, so will have to wait for its stupid after effects...maybe to be touched upon some other time.
At the moment I don't seem to have much answers on how these tech effects can be reversed so that we stop turning into dolts and dumbwitted. If you do, then please write back to me or comment below.

2 comments:

Shabs said...

Very valid for these times Sumit! But nobody seems to want to stop n think as it makes life so much easier n simpler for them... The repercussions r forgotten or ignored !!

Sumit Suri aka Tinks said...

Yup Shabnam, tech making things and life simpler for all of us is the only reason we hold on to every new technology but its pitfalls on the human race in the long run could be disastrous which our generation may not be even alive to witness.