Swedes are Getting Dumber
Ξ May 16th, 2007 | → | ∇ Computers, Networks, Observations |
On a Swedish IT news site there are a few interesting headlines; one of which is that Sweden is “best” in Europe at using the Internet. (Link; beware - it’s in Swedish.) First of all, let me object to the word best. Let’s see. What constructive criticism could I conjure against that use…? Maybe…the fact that it’s complete and utter bollocks! Best is a marvellous word for quantifiable comparisons within a clearly measurable area, but in what way is Internet use a measurable area? And what exactly would “best” imply? That we’re best in Europe at finding warez? That we waste time on the Internet instead of working? That we know how to write good Google keywords? The phrase is completely ridiculous and says nothing at all.
And on the note of Google, there is another headline at the same site: Why Google is Making Us Dumber. Basically, that article insists that Googling stuff makes us dumber; for instance we no longer do conversion arithmetic by hand (or by head, rather) - instead we use Google features for those kinds of things. Well, let’s see if I remember my logic classes; I’ll try to make a modus ponens situation out of this. But I’ll leave out the predicate logic.
If P then Q, where P = “increased Google use” and Q = “getting dumber.” And I’ll introduce R = “increased Internet use” as well, and state the intuitive hypothesis that if R then P. Then we have the following:
(R -> P) AND R
-> P
(P -> Q) AND P
-> Q
Thus, Swedes are getting dumber. If you trust strange logic and strange articles you read on the ‘net, that is.
I won’t really waste any time on disputing the “Google makes you stupid” claim - it’s clearly ridiculous and a prime example of backward-thinking. The same was said when calculators were invented. “Oh no, the kids won’t learn how to do simple arithmetic anymore now that they have a machine for it.” Granted, I expect that kids today can’t do simple arithmetic, so I guess this example sucks. Still, I’m convinced that the productivity gains from automating simple tasks vastly oughtweighs the small setbacks in basic knowledge.
But wait, there’s more! I have yet another point to this little blog post. Some people might have read my little rant about coffee, in which I claimed that coffee was the cause of major wars. I received some interesting (IRL) feedback to that; most who commented on the post were confused and didn’t really see the point of it. That’s okay, ’cause I was planning on bringing up the point later - like now. In the coffee post I claimed, for example, that coffee was the cause of the War of the Golden Stool. That was complete and utter rubbish. Just as all the other coffee-related anecdotes in the post. Have you guessed the common thread through this blog entry by now? No? Okay, I’ll continue.
The post sounded confident and it was backed by enough facts to make it believable; no one really cared to question my claims since the topic was dull, but I have seen many search entries for the War of the Golden Stool that led to my site. I keep imagining that some kids have used my lies as interesting anecdotes in their schoolwork, and that a few teachers are scratching their heads in confusion right now. I hope that both those teachers and those kids have learned a valuable lesson about using things on the Internet as resources for their essays. There’s basically no guarantee that anything you read on the net is true, regardless of the imagined authenticity.
This goes for the article about Google making people dumber as well: it’s a personal opinion backed by no facts. It doesn’t matter that a major Swedish IT news portal picked it up - it’s just as much rubbish regardless of who thinks that it might be valid.
on May 16th, 2007 at 6:24 pm
Everything on the net is true!