Over the course of this semester my classmates and I have been drilled in and focused on writing about the future of technology and the effects it has on younger generations and what it’s doing to students and adults today regarding attention spans, forming relationships, and holding conversations that have meaning and emotion tied into it. My classmates have discussed in almost every class our viewpoints on technology and what we think solutions could be and what is the problem with an overuse of technology. Each day we talk about different authors with different views on technology but from the start of the semester and the first author that stuck with me was MIT professor and author of “The empathy Diaries” who expresses her negative feelings towards technology explaining that that over usage causes kids to lack social skills and limits their chances of creating relationships founded on being able to interact with meaningful interactions. A classmate of mine, Hailey Cloutier, who I have read her essays twice now agrees with Turkle and I, expressing concern for these younger generations with the amount of unlimited time and opportunities they have with technology. But there can be an argument that technology allows us to escape a harsh reality and oftentimes people use it as a safe haven. This idea was brought to me by a student named Cote Briggs, an Idea that I totally agree with.
At this point between Hailey, Turkle and I it is three against 1 but that does not mean I do not disagree with Briggs. Technology is a confusing subject, we use it everyday to do some of the easiest things just so we can get it done faster. Technology plays a huge role in our everyday life but in Cloutiers first essays she brings up a good point that I can relate with as well. She talks about growing up and going to the doctors and writes “Even doctors as a kid would tell you that it is okay to spend time on devices as long as screen time is limited”.
Technology has a place in all of our lives. We have embraced technological innovation and carry it around with us everywhere we go, in the form of our smartphones. While it is convenient to have all of this access at our fingertips, it may be more detrimental than we realize. Cote Briggs, a student at the University of New England, wrote about his concerns regarding how technology is affecting us in his work, “Technology Isn’t All Fun & Games: Here’s Why.” Another author and student at the University of New England, Hailey Cloutier, shared how technology has changed our behavior in her work, “The Balancing Act: The Good, Bad, and Problem Solving.” Sherry Turkle, a professor at MIT and author of ten books, writes about her fears of how technology has affected us in her work, “The Empathy Diaries.”
“As I began my collegiate pursuit, I found myself at first to be quite timid in real-world encounters. I initially wasn’t much of a conversation starter, and hoped others would approach me instead” (Briggs). This quote relates to Turkle beliefs that technology is changing conversation between individuals. She thinks that in person conversations are so important for society and that technology has hindered our ability to participate in these types of interactions. Briggs agrees with this point in his work, he notices a change within himself due to his access to technology. “From the early days, I saw that computers offered the illusion of companionship without the demands of friendship and then, as the programs got really good, the illusion of friendship without the demands of intimacy. Because face-to-face, people ask for things that computers never do. With people, things go best if you pay close attention and know how to put yourself in someone else’s shoes” (Turkle 346).
“There is no need to truly learn anything when you can get an answer in a shorter time googling it than going to a library and researching it. It has almost become unheard of to go past the first answer page in Google; people just click the first link skim and then find their answer. People don’t have to depend on their knowledge or schooling anymore when they can get the answer in under five minutes of googling” (Cloutier). Turkle talks about our level of distraction in her essay. She believes that technology has made it so we are distracted, and our attention span is shorter. Cloutier agrees with this idea and furthers it to how we are using the internet. She notices that we are simply skimming texts and trying to do things as quickly as possible. We are not taking the time to genuinely do things anymore because we no longer have the attention span. “We are forever elsewhere. At class or church or business meetings, we pay attention to what interests us and then when it doesn’t, we look to our devices to find something that does” (Turkle 344).
Wesley Chandler
ENG 110
Prof. Miller
April 5th, 2024
The Hypnotizing Effect of Technology
Technology has played a crucial role on how we live our lives and get work done on a day to day basis. Whether it be us sending a simple text to our friend or working on our laptops for work, the use of these devices always ends up finding time to end up in most of our days. Overtime technology has shown us that though it can be used in a very productive manner and a very negative way as well. These devices have caused us to lose our attention spans, struggle with in person conversations with our peers, and begin to affect us mentally as well. Kevin Kelley, a famous scientist who has studied people and the love they get for inanimate objects. Kelley’s concept of Technophilia sheds light on people’s continuous fascination with technology and its humongous influence on our society. While technology does offer an endless amount of opportunities for progress and innovation, it also presents challenges and complications that require careful consideration by one. Kelley believes if we begin to embrace technology mindfully and very critically, we can be able to harness and grab its potential to create a more equitable, sustainable, and inclusive future for everyone. Now I do believe in Kelley’s concept, but I also believe some of the topics he brings up are not true. I believe that our society could use technology in a better way while still being able to use these devices in a healthier manner. One of the ways that we can focus on bettering our minds so we are not always drilled on our phones is beginning to have more in person conversations with our peers.
Many people feel differently about technology. Lots of the differences appear between the different generations. The older generations that have only had digital technology at the end of their lives may be more apprehensive about it, while the younger generations who have used it for the majority of their lives cannot imagine what they would do without it. There are the rare few across different generations who are the same opinion. One of my classmates, Finley Morrison, shares the specific opinion that the amount of technology introduced to young children today is very detrimental with Sherry Turkle, renowned author of “The Empathy Diaries.” Sherry is also a clinical psychologist with a joint doctorate degree in sociology and personality psychology from Harvard, and she teaches at MIT. Another one of my classmates, Hailey Cloutier, highlights all the different personas that technology can take on: how it can be good, but also bad. All these authors accentuate the need to regulate our intake of technology while it is still manageable. I agree with these writers: technology can be so incredible, but it also can be used badly in the wrong hands.
*Not sure which part of the passage I’m using
“It takes her minutes to return to reality once she’s done playing with her technology. It’s incredibly disheartening for her to finally recognize me after disconnecting from her tablet; this child genuinely appears to be waking up from a coma after watching nothing but brain-rot inducing videos on her iPad. The warm and fuzzy feeling of her wanting to be around me is shackled to her device. I’m now often left thinking about how a device made my existence a fleeting memory for her, and how could I compete? The internet takes my little niece’s mind to places that not even I have explored, and while that doesn’t necessarily have to equate to danger, she’s floating somewhere that erases her connection to reality.” (Finley Morrison)
“People don’t have to depend on their knowledge or schooling anymore when they can get the answer in under five minutes of googling. The fast information-giving programs are creating a gap in information processing, where the brain can’t handle too much information at once and it just shuts down. No longer can people read textbooks thoroughly, now we see skimming for easy information without a clear understanding of the topic.” (Hailey Cloutier)
Digital technology is a highly-scrutinized innovation with many pros and cons. Its brilliance, and wide access to unlimited information is eye-opening. At an educational level, the vastness of the internet, especially, is very helpful for learning and keeping up with my classes. However, outside of the classroom, digital technology can be a very distracting thing that takes time away from what is most important to us. Conversations that we have with family and friends are being replaced by time on our phones or computers. Time for doing homework or assignments is drawn out, and takes longer due to the distractions of digital technology. Nicholas Carr, writer and finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in 2011, highlights these pros and cons of digital technology in his essay “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” He details how digital technology can be a distraction, and causes us to have less attention for things we used to be able to focus on. There are a lot of comparisons between Carr’s writing, and some of my classmates’ in English 110. Liv Arvidson argues that technology today is becoming an addiction, and a huge distraction. She argues that screen time for kids needs to be limited so that they don’t grow up with bad habits. Her opinions on the matter of digital technology aligns with Carr’s; it is a distraction, and we need to decrease our usage of it. Jack Thurmond, another classmate of mine, underlines the importance of technology in a working sense, while also calling attention to the dangerous, addicting side of it. Thurmond emphasizes his addiction to his phone, specifically, while talking about how it can make him less productive and efficient due to its distractions. In this essay I will attempt to demonstrate how Carr, Arvidson, and Thurmond, along with many other readers like them, believe that digital technology is distracting, and we need to decrease our usage of it. We see a theme in these three writers’ experiences and opinions that digital technology can be detrimental, due to its addicting, distracting features.
Digital technology has a negative effect on our ability to focus, and take in information. Carr worries that we have become accustomed to relying on the internet for our source of knowledge. Everything is so quick and easy on the internet, so now anything more time-consuming will feel boring and unimportant. Carr furthers this idea, by writing, “And what the Net seems to be doing is chipping away my capacity for concentration and contemplation. My mind now expects to take in information the way the Net distributes it: in a swiftly moving stream of particles. Once I was a scuba diver in the sea of words. Now I zip along the surface like a guy on a jet ski” (2).
Altirique McElveen
Professor Miller
1/23/24
English
“Is This The End?”
Are we starting to come to an end using our human values or this is just a myth? In Today’s discourse, there’s a growing concern about the erosion of our fundamental human values. Despite the ongoing discussions , we remain uncertain about the future with this problem. The impact of technology of communication and its role diminishing traditional values are main points to these discussions. The prevailing question is whether or not we’re seeing a huge fall and being stuck on if there’s hope for a turnaround. These concerts have raised the unexpected effects of technology’s widespread incorporation in our day-to-day life on interpersonal relationships and the components of human interaction. As we ponder, the need to handle this issue is becoming more urgent. However, the path remains covered by the problems of the modern day. There’s worries that go beyond here and now which clouds the future for coming generations. The dilemma intensifies while we contemplate the repercussions of a society where participation and connection have disappeared. That becomes a critical path of healing as this crisis approaches. The essence of humanity reposes on our ability to navigate this critical juncture with determination. Our job is to bewail the demise of human values but also look for the answers that will protect the integrity of our social fabric for generations to come.
The text talks about the benefits and drawbacks of technology in our lives. Cote Briggs argues and exclaims personal experience of how technology has helped them to gain knowledge, organize their work, and communicate with like-minded individuals. Briggs acknowledges that technology has its downsides, such as making people less social in real-world interactions. However, overall the author believes that technology has been a helpful tool in his life, enabling them to achieve their goals and make meaningful connections.
“Without the plethora of knowledge the internet provides, I wouldn’t have been able to sufficiently fuel my brain with the resources necessary to carry out these educational goals of mine.” (Briggs 1). I agree with this statement because technology is only part of everyday life and has been incorporated into work life daily now and only helps to improve knowledge for the fields that are more evolved each day.
The text talks about the impact of technology on people, particularly children. Liv Arvidson shares her experience of growing up without being surrounded by technology and how they believe that children who she constantly exposed to screens are being affected negatively. They argue that people need to regulate their screen time and not rely entirely on technology. Arvidson also expresses concerns about the long-term impact of growing up with screens on children’s social skills and their ability to interact with others in the future. “However, we also had enough exposure growing up that we know how to work the technology that we need to live in this world today. We are in the neutral zone; we have not had too much exposure like the younger kids, but we had enough that we are not clueless now.” (Arvidson 2). I agree with this statement because as a generation we tend to use technology at our convinces yet we also know how to use it in some ways others don’t. This is almost like a parent or grandparent asking for help on their phone.
Cote Briggs
ENG-110 (English Composition)
Professor Miller
April 5th, 2024
All Show and No Action— Technology’s Socially-Impoverished Adolescents
In life, we all require necessities to survive. Whether it is food, water, or shelter, these are the things that we have enacted our primal instincts to acquire. However, what if I were to pose the thought that technology has made its way into our words as such? Exactly in the way that we require food, water, or shelter to survive, many of our world’s adolescents require the blanket of technology to sleep at night. I’ve literally seen this—as children refuse to sleep or even function, for that matter—without the presence of their favorite show at hand. In Liv Arvidson’s _____ and Finley Morrison’s _____, they highlight such behaviors, including real-world examples that they have observed throughout the drastic transition from Y2K to the Anthropocene. On the contrary, Sam Anderson’s “In Defense of Distraction,” aims to argue against such claims, affirmatively agreeing that such cognitive plasticity is crucial for the survival of the generations to come. Simply put, it is a benefit to our society to prioritize our technologies as a necessity. While I understand the point of Anderson, I disagree with his demonstrations. While we may be shifting to a technological outlook on life, along with its many benefits for productivity, we are struggling to outweigh our primal necessities.
To put this show of words into action, we are struggling to the point in which some form of LED screen—whether it be that of an iPad or a Television—is required for our newest group of adolescents to fall asleep, or for that matter, to simply function. Morrison deftly touches on this idea, where they put into play “My niece, who just turned four back in January of 2024, is what’s known as an “iPad kid.” She gets cranky when she doesn’t have her tablet to watch mindless videos or play non-educational games no matter what the time of day is. It takes her minutes to return to reality once she’s done playing with her technology. It’s incredibly disheartening for her to finally recognize me after disconnecting from her tablet; this child genuinely appears to be waking up from a coma after watching nothing but brain-rot inducing videos on her iPad” (Morrison).
Journal #20
English Comp
Mr. Miller
4/5/24
Charles Cristoforo
Everyone uses their technology differently and it has become an integral piece in a lot of people’s lives. Personally, I find myself reliant on my phone, utilizing it for a variety of tasks ranging from scheduling meetings to staying connected with loved ones and listening to music. But there’s others in this World and they probably use their technology differently. It’s unlikely that a person in their seventies would use a phone with the same proficiency as someone from a “screen age” generation like mine. That’s an interesting thing to think about though. Why can’t my generation stay away from their phones, while other, older generations are able to look at their phones once or not at all. It could have been because we were born into it. We were born into being part of this “digital generation”. Going further with this thought about how everyone uses technology differently, I aim in my essay to talk about this. As Well as other topics when it comes to my relationship with technology, as well as others’. I will try and explore all avenues when trying to answer this pressing question. Today, technology takes many forms and has nuances between them. I will try to explore how differences in generations and preconceived notions about technology influence how we use and look at it. I will also try to think about how each person uses their technology and if I can see any trends, as well as dive into the societal constructs that we as a society have built that makes technology either a safer place, or a more dangerous, “watch your step” kind of place. My goal is in examining these areas that come up when talking about technology, is to gain a better understanding of the ways different people use technology.
Hailey Cloutier
Professor Jesse Miller
1/23/24
English Composition
We are currently living in a digital age, where the internet is a sea of vast information spread far and wide. It has transformed to become the gateway to our knowledge, connections, and entertainment; but is this sea becoming a Bermuda Triangle of fear, anxiety, and insecurity? Sherry Turkle, a professor at MIT with a doctorate in sociology and personality psychology, author of “The Empathy Diaries”, Liv Arvidson and Finley Morrison, students at the University of New England participating in the English composition class, highlight their beliefs on technology. The modern age of digital technology is creating a whirlpool of dependency, a collapse of personal conversation, and a breakdown of personal morals. Our technology has become a basis for most lives, we use it for work, school, and our personal lives, and I agree that this is creating legitimate social and emotional issues with the upbringings of our younger generation. We need to start finding a solution before life as we know it becomes swept away into a tsunami of digital feeds.
Children today are growing up in a world that is built upon technology, and they have never known anything otherwise. While technology has become a boon for life on Earth, we can start to see the mental effects it is having on our younger generations. Children have become sucked into a world of information, videos, movies, and shows. There is so much mental stimulation that the internet provides, that it is creating issues within children’s brain development.
As technology has become so frequently used in our everyday lives, some may believe we are better off without it, while others see we can benefit from it. From its vast collection of information and resources that technology provides, making our lives easier as it saves us from the hassle, we should recognize its impacts to people’s social awareness, especially those of the new generation. With all sorts of technology like phones and computers that we have become so immersed in it ultimately is playing a factor in our ability to socialize appropriately with others. Author Sherry Turkle and her work, “The Empathy Diaries” addresses technology’s effects on human conversation in regards to empathy. While two University of New England students also stress the idea of the relationship between technology and socialization. One student, Cote Brigg’s essay, “Technology Isn’t All Fun & Games: Here’s Why” shares how social media use has been beneficial to him in forming friendships based on the various platforms for forming connections with others online. Then the other student, Libby Gagnon, writes in her essay highlighting how technology is hindering our ability to communicate with others as we are losing certain skills by focusing our attention on our devices. All three writers focus on the importance of technology’s effects on human communication in a variety of ways. By consuming technology it can provide a source to connect with others, but is responsible for eating away human’s abilities to converse with others and build social skills.
Technology can be perceived as a place to meet new people but creates a missed opportunity to engage in face to face conversation with others. Through the many social media platforms or collaborative sites like online games allows people to find someone with common interests which can spark a friendship. In Brigg’s piece he shares his experience related to this idea, “The web and social media also allowed me to communicate with like-minded individuals… I was able to connect with those with like-minded goals and aspirations. Those who had shared my sense of humor. I’ve also been able to gain my own friends throughout the web over the years, typically through online games or forum discussions.”
Since the dawn of time, human beings have used communication to aid in survival and build relationships. From the drawings scribbled on cave walls by ancient homosapiens to the complex languages we speak today, the ability to converse has always been a trait of humanity. As time has trudged forth, a new medium has emerged, opening the gates of connection for everyone to partake in. I am, of course, referring to the technology with a six-inch screen sitting in your pocket (or perhaps, if you’re reading this online, in your hand): the phone. With the birth of modern technology followed swiftly by the surfacing of the internet, communication has become exponentially quicker, easier, and more wife-spread than ever before. However, whether or not this communication is efficient and translates to authentic connections is another story. Cote Briggs and Liv Arvidson, both writers from the University of New England as well as Nicholas Carr, a well known author who has been published by the Atlantic, offer their own insight in their respective papers: “Technology Isn’t All Fun & Games: Here’s Why,” “Technology & I,” and “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” While it may not seem readily apparent, our hyperconnectivity has put a heavy dent on our ability to communicate and listen.
It starts by grabbing your attention, sinking its fang-like talons into your frontal lobes. Both Liv Arvidson and Nicholas Carr have noticed the changes in not just their own but society’s cognition. Carr opens his article Is Google Making Us Stupid with the statement: “Over the past few years I’ve had an uncomfortable sense that someone, or something, has been tinkering with my brain, remapping the neural circuitry, reprogramming the memory. My mind isn’t going–so far as I can tell–but it’s changing. I’m not thinking the way I used to think” (1). Carr has noticed that his brain chemistry feels as though it’s changing. The way he processes information has changed, and the cause is the implementation of technology. Liv Arvidson observes these changes in her day-to-day life: “I see kids at restaurants and other public settings who will only “behave” when on a screen. “I have a cousin who is 8 years old, and he cannot go very long without his tablet, because his parents have always allowed him to have it whenever he wanted. Now, when they say no, he throws tantrums and acts out because he does not know life without it” (1).
Jack Thurmond
ENG 110
Jessie Miller
Apr 9, 2024
Back To The Future Essay
Throughout the semester we have worked with many pieces of writing that have all had the same similar theme of technology. We have also done plenty of writing on technology throughout the class. The first text we read in this class was MIT professor and author Sherry Turkle’s “The Empathy Diaries”. This essay shaped my view on technology and my two writings on technology at various points in our class show that it has not changed. This article formed a base idea in my mind which has only been advanced by further articles we have read in class. Class discussions with my peers also formed these views when I consistently heard the same opinion from multiple points of view. My first essay on Sherry Turkle’s “The Empathy Diaries” shows the direct impact of her writing on my views of technology. My most recent essay combining “The Empathy Diaries” with another piece on technology shows how my ideas on technology have advanced throughout the semester but are still from that original piece. My two essays are an interesting insight into the advancements in my thinking of a topic that has been our main focus of the whole course.
In reading Sherry Turkle’s “The Empathy Diaries”, I was immediately left with a lot to process. This was one of the first times I had been made aware of this issue more than an older relative complaining about my generation. After reading it I felt like I needed to self-reflect and see if any of the issues Turkle brought up was stuff that I was experiencing. Once I got these ideas in my head it was easy for me to see these small things in my everyday life. I would notice myself checking my phone a little too much or realize that I found myself bored after five or ten minutes without my phone or computer.
13 thoughts on “JOURNAL # 23-300-400 word draft”
Beckett Shanahan
Over the course of this semester my classmates and I have been drilled in and focused on writing about the future of technology and the effects it has on younger generations and what it’s doing to students and adults today regarding attention spans, forming relationships, and holding conversations that have meaning and emotion tied into it. My classmates have discussed in almost every class our viewpoints on technology and what we think solutions could be and what is the problem with an overuse of technology. Each day we talk about different authors with different views on technology but from the start of the semester and the first author that stuck with me was MIT professor and author of “The empathy Diaries” who expresses her negative feelings towards technology explaining that that over usage causes kids to lack social skills and limits their chances of creating relationships founded on being able to interact with meaningful interactions. A classmate of mine, Hailey Cloutier, who I have read her essays twice now agrees with Turkle and I, expressing concern for these younger generations with the amount of unlimited time and opportunities they have with technology. But there can be an argument that technology allows us to escape a harsh reality and oftentimes people use it as a safe haven. This idea was brought to me by a student named Cote Briggs, an Idea that I totally agree with.
At this point between Hailey, Turkle and I it is three against 1 but that does not mean I do not disagree with Briggs. Technology is a confusing subject, we use it everyday to do some of the easiest things just so we can get it done faster. Technology plays a huge role in our everyday life but in Cloutiers first essays she brings up a good point that I can relate with as well. She talks about growing up and going to the doctors and writes “Even doctors as a kid would tell you that it is okay to spend time on devices as long as screen time is limited”.
Technology has a place in all of our lives. We have embraced technological innovation and carry it around with us everywhere we go, in the form of our smartphones. While it is convenient to have all of this access at our fingertips, it may be more detrimental than we realize. Cote Briggs, a student at the University of New England, wrote about his concerns regarding how technology is affecting us in his work, “Technology Isn’t All Fun & Games: Here’s Why.” Another author and student at the University of New England, Hailey Cloutier, shared how technology has changed our behavior in her work, “The Balancing Act: The Good, Bad, and Problem Solving.” Sherry Turkle, a professor at MIT and author of ten books, writes about her fears of how technology has affected us in her work, “The Empathy Diaries.”
“As I began my collegiate pursuit, I found myself at first to be quite timid in real-world encounters. I initially wasn’t much of a conversation starter, and hoped others would approach me instead” (Briggs). This quote relates to Turkle beliefs that technology is changing conversation between individuals. She thinks that in person conversations are so important for society and that technology has hindered our ability to participate in these types of interactions. Briggs agrees with this point in his work, he notices a change within himself due to his access to technology. “From the early days, I saw that computers offered the illusion of companionship without the demands of friendship and then, as the programs got really good, the illusion of friendship without the demands of intimacy. Because face-to-face, people ask for things that computers never do. With people, things go best if you pay close attention and know how to put yourself in someone else’s shoes” (Turkle 346).
“There is no need to truly learn anything when you can get an answer in a shorter time googling it than going to a library and researching it. It has almost become unheard of to go past the first answer page in Google; people just click the first link skim and then find their answer. People don’t have to depend on their knowledge or schooling anymore when they can get the answer in under five minutes of googling” (Cloutier). Turkle talks about our level of distraction in her essay. She believes that technology has made it so we are distracted, and our attention span is shorter. Cloutier agrees with this idea and furthers it to how we are using the internet. She notices that we are simply skimming texts and trying to do things as quickly as possible. We are not taking the time to genuinely do things anymore because we no longer have the attention span. “We are forever elsewhere. At class or church or business meetings, we pay attention to what interests us and then when it doesn’t, we look to our devices to find something that does” (Turkle 344).
Wesley Chandler
ENG 110
Prof. Miller
April 5th, 2024
The Hypnotizing Effect of Technology
Technology has played a crucial role on how we live our lives and get work done on a day to day basis. Whether it be us sending a simple text to our friend or working on our laptops for work, the use of these devices always ends up finding time to end up in most of our days. Overtime technology has shown us that though it can be used in a very productive manner and a very negative way as well. These devices have caused us to lose our attention spans, struggle with in person conversations with our peers, and begin to affect us mentally as well. Kevin Kelley, a famous scientist who has studied people and the love they get for inanimate objects. Kelley’s concept of Technophilia sheds light on people’s continuous fascination with technology and its humongous influence on our society. While technology does offer an endless amount of opportunities for progress and innovation, it also presents challenges and complications that require careful consideration by one. Kelley believes if we begin to embrace technology mindfully and very critically, we can be able to harness and grab its potential to create a more equitable, sustainable, and inclusive future for everyone. Now I do believe in Kelley’s concept, but I also believe some of the topics he brings up are not true. I believe that our society could use technology in a better way while still being able to use these devices in a healthier manner. One of the ways that we can focus on bettering our minds so we are not always drilled on our phones is beginning to have more in person conversations with our peers.
Many people feel differently about technology. Lots of the differences appear between the different generations. The older generations that have only had digital technology at the end of their lives may be more apprehensive about it, while the younger generations who have used it for the majority of their lives cannot imagine what they would do without it. There are the rare few across different generations who are the same opinion. One of my classmates, Finley Morrison, shares the specific opinion that the amount of technology introduced to young children today is very detrimental with Sherry Turkle, renowned author of “The Empathy Diaries.” Sherry is also a clinical psychologist with a joint doctorate degree in sociology and personality psychology from Harvard, and she teaches at MIT. Another one of my classmates, Hailey Cloutier, highlights all the different personas that technology can take on: how it can be good, but also bad. All these authors accentuate the need to regulate our intake of technology while it is still manageable. I agree with these writers: technology can be so incredible, but it also can be used badly in the wrong hands.
*Not sure which part of the passage I’m using
“It takes her minutes to return to reality once she’s done playing with her technology. It’s incredibly disheartening for her to finally recognize me after disconnecting from her tablet; this child genuinely appears to be waking up from a coma after watching nothing but brain-rot inducing videos on her iPad. The warm and fuzzy feeling of her wanting to be around me is shackled to her device. I’m now often left thinking about how a device made my existence a fleeting memory for her, and how could I compete? The internet takes my little niece’s mind to places that not even I have explored, and while that doesn’t necessarily have to equate to danger, she’s floating somewhere that erases her connection to reality.” (Finley Morrison)
“People don’t have to depend on their knowledge or schooling anymore when they can get the answer in under five minutes of googling. The fast information-giving programs are creating a gap in information processing, where the brain can’t handle too much information at once and it just shuts down. No longer can people read textbooks thoroughly, now we see skimming for easy information without a clear understanding of the topic.” (Hailey Cloutier)
Matthew Dewhurst
Professor Miller
Eng 110
4/5/24
Digital technology is a highly-scrutinized innovation with many pros and cons. Its brilliance, and wide access to unlimited information is eye-opening. At an educational level, the vastness of the internet, especially, is very helpful for learning and keeping up with my classes. However, outside of the classroom, digital technology can be a very distracting thing that takes time away from what is most important to us. Conversations that we have with family and friends are being replaced by time on our phones or computers. Time for doing homework or assignments is drawn out, and takes longer due to the distractions of digital technology. Nicholas Carr, writer and finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in 2011, highlights these pros and cons of digital technology in his essay “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” He details how digital technology can be a distraction, and causes us to have less attention for things we used to be able to focus on. There are a lot of comparisons between Carr’s writing, and some of my classmates’ in English 110. Liv Arvidson argues that technology today is becoming an addiction, and a huge distraction. She argues that screen time for kids needs to be limited so that they don’t grow up with bad habits. Her opinions on the matter of digital technology aligns with Carr’s; it is a distraction, and we need to decrease our usage of it. Jack Thurmond, another classmate of mine, underlines the importance of technology in a working sense, while also calling attention to the dangerous, addicting side of it. Thurmond emphasizes his addiction to his phone, specifically, while talking about how it can make him less productive and efficient due to its distractions. In this essay I will attempt to demonstrate how Carr, Arvidson, and Thurmond, along with many other readers like them, believe that digital technology is distracting, and we need to decrease our usage of it. We see a theme in these three writers’ experiences and opinions that digital technology can be detrimental, due to its addicting, distracting features.
Digital technology has a negative effect on our ability to focus, and take in information. Carr worries that we have become accustomed to relying on the internet for our source of knowledge. Everything is so quick and easy on the internet, so now anything more time-consuming will feel boring and unimportant. Carr furthers this idea, by writing, “And what the Net seems to be doing is chipping away my capacity for concentration and contemplation. My mind now expects to take in information the way the Net distributes it: in a swiftly moving stream of particles. Once I was a scuba diver in the sea of words. Now I zip along the surface like a guy on a jet ski” (2).
Altirique McElveen
Professor Miller
1/23/24
English
“Is This The End?”
Are we starting to come to an end using our human values or this is just a myth? In Today’s discourse, there’s a growing concern about the erosion of our fundamental human values. Despite the ongoing discussions , we remain uncertain about the future with this problem. The impact of technology of communication and its role diminishing traditional values are main points to these discussions. The prevailing question is whether or not we’re seeing a huge fall and being stuck on if there’s hope for a turnaround. These concerts have raised the unexpected effects of technology’s widespread incorporation in our day-to-day life on interpersonal relationships and the components of human interaction. As we ponder, the need to handle this issue is becoming more urgent. However, the path remains covered by the problems of the modern day. There’s worries that go beyond here and now which clouds the future for coming generations. The dilemma intensifies while we contemplate the repercussions of a society where participation and connection have disappeared. That becomes a critical path of healing as this crisis approaches. The essence of humanity reposes on our ability to navigate this critical juncture with determination. Our job is to bewail the demise of human values but also look for the answers that will protect the integrity of our social fabric for generations to come.
The text talks about the benefits and drawbacks of technology in our lives. Cote Briggs argues and exclaims personal experience of how technology has helped them to gain knowledge, organize their work, and communicate with like-minded individuals. Briggs acknowledges that technology has its downsides, such as making people less social in real-world interactions. However, overall the author believes that technology has been a helpful tool in his life, enabling them to achieve their goals and make meaningful connections.
“Without the plethora of knowledge the internet provides, I wouldn’t have been able to sufficiently fuel my brain with the resources necessary to carry out these educational goals of mine.” (Briggs 1). I agree with this statement because technology is only part of everyday life and has been incorporated into work life daily now and only helps to improve knowledge for the fields that are more evolved each day.
The text talks about the impact of technology on people, particularly children. Liv Arvidson shares her experience of growing up without being surrounded by technology and how they believe that children who she constantly exposed to screens are being affected negatively. They argue that people need to regulate their screen time and not rely entirely on technology. Arvidson also expresses concerns about the long-term impact of growing up with screens on children’s social skills and their ability to interact with others in the future. “However, we also had enough exposure growing up that we know how to work the technology that we need to live in this world today. We are in the neutral zone; we have not had too much exposure like the younger kids, but we had enough that we are not clueless now.” (Arvidson 2). I agree with this statement because as a generation we tend to use technology at our convinces yet we also know how to use it in some ways others don’t. This is almost like a parent or grandparent asking for help on their phone.
Cote Briggs
ENG-110 (English Composition)
Professor Miller
April 5th, 2024
All Show and No Action— Technology’s Socially-Impoverished Adolescents
In life, we all require necessities to survive. Whether it is food, water, or shelter, these are the things that we have enacted our primal instincts to acquire. However, what if I were to pose the thought that technology has made its way into our words as such? Exactly in the way that we require food, water, or shelter to survive, many of our world’s adolescents require the blanket of technology to sleep at night. I’ve literally seen this—as children refuse to sleep or even function, for that matter—without the presence of their favorite show at hand. In Liv Arvidson’s _____ and Finley Morrison’s _____, they highlight such behaviors, including real-world examples that they have observed throughout the drastic transition from Y2K to the Anthropocene. On the contrary, Sam Anderson’s “In Defense of Distraction,” aims to argue against such claims, affirmatively agreeing that such cognitive plasticity is crucial for the survival of the generations to come. Simply put, it is a benefit to our society to prioritize our technologies as a necessity. While I understand the point of Anderson, I disagree with his demonstrations. While we may be shifting to a technological outlook on life, along with its many benefits for productivity, we are struggling to outweigh our primal necessities.
To put this show of words into action, we are struggling to the point in which some form of LED screen—whether it be that of an iPad or a Television—is required for our newest group of adolescents to fall asleep, or for that matter, to simply function. Morrison deftly touches on this idea, where they put into play “My niece, who just turned four back in January of 2024, is what’s known as an “iPad kid.” She gets cranky when she doesn’t have her tablet to watch mindless videos or play non-educational games no matter what the time of day is. It takes her minutes to return to reality once she’s done playing with her technology. It’s incredibly disheartening for her to finally recognize me after disconnecting from her tablet; this child genuinely appears to be waking up from a coma after watching nothing but brain-rot inducing videos on her iPad” (Morrison).
Journal #20
English Comp
Mr. Miller
4/5/24
Charles Cristoforo
Everyone uses their technology differently and it has become an integral piece in a lot of people’s lives. Personally, I find myself reliant on my phone, utilizing it for a variety of tasks ranging from scheduling meetings to staying connected with loved ones and listening to music. But there’s others in this World and they probably use their technology differently. It’s unlikely that a person in their seventies would use a phone with the same proficiency as someone from a “screen age” generation like mine. That’s an interesting thing to think about though. Why can’t my generation stay away from their phones, while other, older generations are able to look at their phones once or not at all. It could have been because we were born into it. We were born into being part of this “digital generation”. Going further with this thought about how everyone uses technology differently, I aim in my essay to talk about this. As Well as other topics when it comes to my relationship with technology, as well as others’. I will try and explore all avenues when trying to answer this pressing question. Today, technology takes many forms and has nuances between them. I will try to explore how differences in generations and preconceived notions about technology influence how we use and look at it. I will also try to think about how each person uses their technology and if I can see any trends, as well as dive into the societal constructs that we as a society have built that makes technology either a safer place, or a more dangerous, “watch your step” kind of place. My goal is in examining these areas that come up when talking about technology, is to gain a better understanding of the ways different people use technology.
Hailey Cloutier
Professor Jesse Miller
1/23/24
English Composition
We are currently living in a digital age, where the internet is a sea of vast information spread far and wide. It has transformed to become the gateway to our knowledge, connections, and entertainment; but is this sea becoming a Bermuda Triangle of fear, anxiety, and insecurity? Sherry Turkle, a professor at MIT with a doctorate in sociology and personality psychology, author of “The Empathy Diaries”, Liv Arvidson and Finley Morrison, students at the University of New England participating in the English composition class, highlight their beliefs on technology. The modern age of digital technology is creating a whirlpool of dependency, a collapse of personal conversation, and a breakdown of personal morals. Our technology has become a basis for most lives, we use it for work, school, and our personal lives, and I agree that this is creating legitimate social and emotional issues with the upbringings of our younger generation. We need to start finding a solution before life as we know it becomes swept away into a tsunami of digital feeds.
Children today are growing up in a world that is built upon technology, and they have never known anything otherwise. While technology has become a boon for life on Earth, we can start to see the mental effects it is having on our younger generations. Children have become sucked into a world of information, videos, movies, and shows. There is so much mental stimulation that the internet provides, that it is creating issues within children’s brain development.
As technology has become so frequently used in our everyday lives, some may believe we are better off without it, while others see we can benefit from it. From its vast collection of information and resources that technology provides, making our lives easier as it saves us from the hassle, we should recognize its impacts to people’s social awareness, especially those of the new generation. With all sorts of technology like phones and computers that we have become so immersed in it ultimately is playing a factor in our ability to socialize appropriately with others. Author Sherry Turkle and her work, “The Empathy Diaries” addresses technology’s effects on human conversation in regards to empathy. While two University of New England students also stress the idea of the relationship between technology and socialization. One student, Cote Brigg’s essay, “Technology Isn’t All Fun & Games: Here’s Why” shares how social media use has been beneficial to him in forming friendships based on the various platforms for forming connections with others online. Then the other student, Libby Gagnon, writes in her essay highlighting how technology is hindering our ability to communicate with others as we are losing certain skills by focusing our attention on our devices. All three writers focus on the importance of technology’s effects on human communication in a variety of ways. By consuming technology it can provide a source to connect with others, but is responsible for eating away human’s abilities to converse with others and build social skills.
Technology can be perceived as a place to meet new people but creates a missed opportunity to engage in face to face conversation with others. Through the many social media platforms or collaborative sites like online games allows people to find someone with common interests which can spark a friendship. In Brigg’s piece he shares his experience related to this idea, “The web and social media also allowed me to communicate with like-minded individuals… I was able to connect with those with like-minded goals and aspirations. Those who had shared my sense of humor. I’ve also been able to gain my own friends throughout the web over the years, typically through online games or forum discussions.”
Since the dawn of time, human beings have used communication to aid in survival and build relationships. From the drawings scribbled on cave walls by ancient homosapiens to the complex languages we speak today, the ability to converse has always been a trait of humanity. As time has trudged forth, a new medium has emerged, opening the gates of connection for everyone to partake in. I am, of course, referring to the technology with a six-inch screen sitting in your pocket (or perhaps, if you’re reading this online, in your hand): the phone. With the birth of modern technology followed swiftly by the surfacing of the internet, communication has become exponentially quicker, easier, and more wife-spread than ever before. However, whether or not this communication is efficient and translates to authentic connections is another story. Cote Briggs and Liv Arvidson, both writers from the University of New England as well as Nicholas Carr, a well known author who has been published by the Atlantic, offer their own insight in their respective papers: “Technology Isn’t All Fun & Games: Here’s Why,” “Technology & I,” and “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” While it may not seem readily apparent, our hyperconnectivity has put a heavy dent on our ability to communicate and listen.
It starts by grabbing your attention, sinking its fang-like talons into your frontal lobes. Both Liv Arvidson and Nicholas Carr have noticed the changes in not just their own but society’s cognition. Carr opens his article Is Google Making Us Stupid with the statement: “Over the past few years I’ve had an uncomfortable sense that someone, or something, has been tinkering with my brain, remapping the neural circuitry, reprogramming the memory. My mind isn’t going–so far as I can tell–but it’s changing. I’m not thinking the way I used to think” (1). Carr has noticed that his brain chemistry feels as though it’s changing. The way he processes information has changed, and the cause is the implementation of technology. Liv Arvidson observes these changes in her day-to-day life: “I see kids at restaurants and other public settings who will only “behave” when on a screen. “I have a cousin who is 8 years old, and he cannot go very long without his tablet, because his parents have always allowed him to have it whenever he wanted. Now, when they say no, he throws tantrums and acts out because he does not know life without it” (1).
Jack Thurmond
ENG 110
Jessie Miller
Apr 9, 2024
Back To The Future Essay
Throughout the semester we have worked with many pieces of writing that have all had the same similar theme of technology. We have also done plenty of writing on technology throughout the class. The first text we read in this class was MIT professor and author Sherry Turkle’s “The Empathy Diaries”. This essay shaped my view on technology and my two writings on technology at various points in our class show that it has not changed. This article formed a base idea in my mind which has only been advanced by further articles we have read in class. Class discussions with my peers also formed these views when I consistently heard the same opinion from multiple points of view. My first essay on Sherry Turkle’s “The Empathy Diaries” shows the direct impact of her writing on my views of technology. My most recent essay combining “The Empathy Diaries” with another piece on technology shows how my ideas on technology have advanced throughout the semester but are still from that original piece. My two essays are an interesting insight into the advancements in my thinking of a topic that has been our main focus of the whole course.
In reading Sherry Turkle’s “The Empathy Diaries”, I was immediately left with a lot to process. This was one of the first times I had been made aware of this issue more than an older relative complaining about my generation. After reading it I felt like I needed to self-reflect and see if any of the issues Turkle brought up was stuff that I was experiencing. Once I got these ideas in my head it was easy for me to see these small things in my everyday life. I would notice myself checking my phone a little too much or realize that I found myself bored after five or ten minutes without my phone or computer.