Summary of The Swallows - What the Internet is Doing to Our Brains by Nicholas Carr - Book Report/Review Example

The Shallows: What the Internet Is Doing to Our Brains Introduction The Swallows: What the Internet is Doing to Our Brains, authored by Nicholas Carr, explores the effects of the advancement in technology on the human mind. Carr presents debatable arguments in the book as he explores the consequences of the Internet, especially on the intellectual and cultural spheres. Vividly, Carr interweaves interesting account of recent discoveries in the field of neuroscience spearheaded by Eric Kandel and Michael Merzenich. Notably, the book reveals that the scientific and historical evidences indicate that the human brain tend to change according to experience. The technologies that human beings utilize to seek, store, and share information have the potential of rerouting the neural pathways in the human body. Nicholas Carr is an acclaimed and prolific author who has written different works on technology and culture. Carr has authored books such as The Glass Cage: Automation and US, The Big Switch, and Does IT Matter. Similarly, Carr has written fascinating essays for the Wall Street Journal, the Atlantic, Wired, New York Times, MIT Technology Review, and Nature among other numerous periodicals. Several anthologies such as the Best Technology Writing, the Best Spiritual Writing, and the Best American Science and Nature have collected his essays. Carr still holds a key position in writing issues that center on culture and technology. Organization The Shallows: What the Internet Is Doing to Our Brains is organized into chapters that interweave shared and different themes. Notably, the book has ten well-researched chapters that keep the readers strongly glued on them. Specifically, the scientific researches, which Carr presents in different chapters to emphasize the negative effects of the Internet in human brains, keep an avid reader strongly gripped to the book. The prologue “the Watchdog and the Thief” gives the audience a glimpse of the author’s position on the technology. By capturing a historical account of the Beatles invasion of the America’s airwaves in the prologue, the audience can predict with consistency the Carr’s arguments contained in the ten chapters. Although they have different titles, the chapters present recurring themes as the author criticizes technology for rendering humans swallow thinkers. Using language easy for an average to comprehend and including simplified scientific experiments, Carr reasons with the audience in issues capturing the media and technology. Chapters seven and eight vividly show Carr’s indictment into the digital culture that has transformed the human brains into technology dependants. People depend on technology to handle even the slightest tasks (Carr 117). Chapter ten that explores the human elements, which promote reasoning indicates that the computers have eroded the deep and creative thinking by encouraging people to become rapid samplers of the information. In effect, the simple, yet comprehensive presentation of the chapters facilitates the capturing of the main themes in the book. Themes The book has intertwined primary themes. The major themes the author presents include cultural criticism, technology and cognitive abilities, and intellectual history. The theme of technology and cognitive abilities is evident in the introductory chapters of the book. Notably, Carr sets out the book by presenting his personal experience with thinking. Carr has challenges with focusing, and his brain is unable to remember things as it used to do. Carr attributes the problem to the Internet. The Internet has rendered many people shallow thinkers (Carr 55). Carr utilizes the scientific facts, as well as, research to implicate the new media and the Internet in changing the functioning of the human brain. The Internet has crippled the cognitive abilities and made people unable to focus. Cultural criticism features prominently in the book. The prologue quotes Marshall McLuhan gives a glimpse of the primary premise that the media alters the human perception and the nervous system (Carr 2). The theme unfolds in the succeeding chapters to demonstrate how the culture of technology has affected the way the people engage with each other. Carr has shown that people have embraced the culture of the digital natives to reexamine the principles, strategies, long-term outcomes, and perceptions that centers on the acquisition of the human. The book interfaces the history of the technology and knowledge ethics with the current digital culture. The elaboration of the intellectual history is evident in the book. Carr traces the historical perspective of intelligence and compares it with the digital era. In the prolific metaphorical craft, Carr indicates, “Once I was a scuba diver in a sea of the words. Now I zip along the surface like a guy on a Jet Ski” (7). The intellectual shift to the current technological world has distracted people by pushing the linear thinking capacities aside to pave way for the mind that doles out information in disjointed manner. A reviewer at the New York Times has argued that Carr underscores the fact that “the negative side effects of the Internet outweigh its efficiencies”. The theme of the intellectual history seeks to underscore the effects of the Internet on thinking. Format Critique Carr’s book is simple for an average college educated person to read and comprehend. The simplification of the books, especially the scientific facts makes it easy for an average person to follow. However, the format of the book disadvantages the layperson. In effect, the book requires a certain level of education in order to comprehend some concepts. Specifically, it would be difficult for the layperson to understand the scientific researches that the author presents in different chapters. In essence, a layperson will have to grapple with the comprehension of the implication of the scientific researches in underscoring the negative effects of the Internet. The newness of the book makes it a preferred copy every reader should have. Notably, the newest version of the book was published in 2010. Readers tend to have interest on the new versions of information. Hence, the book fulfills the readers’ needs to access the reliable information. Similarly, the accolade that the author had amassed especially when he became a finalist for the 2011 Pulitzer Prize in General Nonfiction draws the attention of the readers to endeavor to read the content in the book. Themes Critique Largely, the themes contained in the book are relevant to the current world. Technology has become a primary tool in the contemporary world. Virtually, every facet of life embraces technology. Ranging from the media and health to academics, technology has become an indispensable tool in the daily operations. Hence, the move by the author to examine the effects of technology from different perspectives makes the book a relevant source in the wired world. A reviewer at the New York Times observes that Carr exercises bias by approaching the Internet from the dark side. Lehrer argues, “What Carr neglects to mention, however, is that the preponderance of scientific evidence suggest that the Internet and related technologies are actually good for the mind.” The author intends to warn the audience of the dangers of over-relying on the technology. Personal Reflection The book has sparked anxiety in me about the declining ability to engage comprehensively with information. Personally, the topic is worthy the discussion because technology is inherent in all facets of the contemporary world. It is true that the positive effects of the Internet have simplified operations in the current world. However, Carr’s book has stimulated my curiosity to examine the negative effects the technology may have in my intellectual capacities. I would recommend the book to anyone as it addresses a relevant topic in the current world of technological advancement. Works Cited Carr, Nicholas. The Swallows: What the Internet is Doing to Our Brains. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2010. Print. Lehrer, Jonah. “Our cluttered minds.” New York Times 3 Jun 2010. Print. Read More