Tonight's google search history: "baby elephant yawning", "do elephants have tongues", "do whales have tongues", "do wales have tongues", "do lobsters have tongues" and "what is the point of a tongue". This all started with me wondering aloud whether elephants have tongues.
In seriousness though, our technologically-enabled ready access to data means we spend far less time pondering on things (as touched upon in HIMYM). I think this is not as good a thing as it seems at first.
First, it means that we are losing our ability to reason in the absence of data. If we didn't have a computer, Jessi and I could have started thinking about whether elephants' evolution would mean they have tongues. What factors would lead to an animal growing a tongue? What function does a tongue serve? &c. Tech enthusiasts argue that with so much data at our fingertips, we can devote our considerable brain power to thinking - but thinking is all about making inferences and deductions, and if you no longer need to deduce anything because you can just look it up, how will you train yourself to think?
Second and sadder, this ability to just look up the answer to any question is killing off imagination. What would happen if I didn't kill off the stream of consciousness that began by my wondering whether elephants have tongues by looking up the answer? (to be more precise, Jessi suggested we look it up. I was perfectly happy to just wonder). It could have led to all sorts of interesting thoughts - for example, if I were interested in writing fiction (which I am), I could have come up with a story about an elephant who has a tongue, but doesn't know that all elephants have tongues because elephants's mouths are hidden by their trunks and so spends his life thinking he is a freak. This would be a surreal enough premise to amuse a potential reader while also functioning as an allegory for people being tormented by insecurities that they believe are unique to them - hence making the point that society might be better off if we were all a bit more open about our vulnerabilities, that these vulnerabilities are only debilitating because they are hidden.
Maybe you think this premise isn't all that great. Well, it's a great deal greater than, say, the ugly duckling, whose whole moral isn't "looks don't matter" (which is a bad moral itself, but it's at least more defensible than its actual moral which is) but that "looks do matter, but some people might be late bloomers, so don't reject that geek's invite to the prom because he might one day become Tony Stark". But anyway, even if that particular premise isn't good, I am sure lots of people who would be more capable than me of coming up with a good story are slowly poisoning their imagination with their smartphones and tablets.
And if you think I am going to reveal the answers to the questions above, you have totally missed my point. I will say though that google doesn't appreciate my sense of humour in finding that whales sounds like Wales amusing.
In seriousness though, our technologically-enabled ready access to data means we spend far less time pondering on things (as touched upon in HIMYM). I think this is not as good a thing as it seems at first.
First, it means that we are losing our ability to reason in the absence of data. If we didn't have a computer, Jessi and I could have started thinking about whether elephants' evolution would mean they have tongues. What factors would lead to an animal growing a tongue? What function does a tongue serve? &c. Tech enthusiasts argue that with so much data at our fingertips, we can devote our considerable brain power to thinking - but thinking is all about making inferences and deductions, and if you no longer need to deduce anything because you can just look it up, how will you train yourself to think?
Second and sadder, this ability to just look up the answer to any question is killing off imagination. What would happen if I didn't kill off the stream of consciousness that began by my wondering whether elephants have tongues by looking up the answer? (to be more precise, Jessi suggested we look it up. I was perfectly happy to just wonder). It could have led to all sorts of interesting thoughts - for example, if I were interested in writing fiction (which I am), I could have come up with a story about an elephant who has a tongue, but doesn't know that all elephants have tongues because elephants's mouths are hidden by their trunks and so spends his life thinking he is a freak. This would be a surreal enough premise to amuse a potential reader while also functioning as an allegory for people being tormented by insecurities that they believe are unique to them - hence making the point that society might be better off if we were all a bit more open about our vulnerabilities, that these vulnerabilities are only debilitating because they are hidden.
Maybe you think this premise isn't all that great. Well, it's a great deal greater than, say, the ugly duckling, whose whole moral isn't "looks don't matter" (which is a bad moral itself, but it's at least more defensible than its actual moral which is) but that "looks do matter, but some people might be late bloomers, so don't reject that geek's invite to the prom because he might one day become Tony Stark". But anyway, even if that particular premise isn't good, I am sure lots of people who would be more capable than me of coming up with a good story are slowly poisoning their imagination with their smartphones and tablets.
And if you think I am going to reveal the answers to the questions above, you have totally missed my point. I will say though that google doesn't appreciate my sense of humour in finding that whales sounds like Wales amusing.
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