How do you use technology?

Is Google dumbing us Down? or does it free our minds? I think it all depends on how you use Google. Do you use to see what comes up when you type in your name on a daily basis? Do you use it to search for a phone number to order pizza? Do you use it to find the news for the day? Do you use it to search for a scholarly article for a research paper? The way you choose to use technology will prove whether it is making you stupid or simply enhancing your human capabilities. Every new technology comes with its advantages and disadvantages. Television was once known as a vast wasteland, numbing our minds as we watched for pure entertainment. Although it is known that while watching television, you only use a small part of your brain, television brings us information quickly in a highly visual fashion and can be advantageous. If your watching the news, PBS, or the Discovery channel, you could actually be learning alot. Video games can be seen as a menace to society, dumbing down children, teenagers, as well as adults to violent. If you play video games for hours a day, it might be making you dumber or at least taking time away from your day. But some video games can actually enhance your hand eye coordination and activate parts of your brain that other technologies cannot reach. GPS Systems and Google Maps might hinder some peoples sence of direction, they can help us to go places we've never gone before both virtually and in reality. Cell phones have been seen as taking away from our face to face contact, but they also help us keep in touch with so many more people with built in address books and speed dials. Which brings me to another controversial technology that can be both a time waster and an intelligence enhancer: Facebook. Social media, if you let it, can waste so much of your time when browsing through people's pages for no reason. However, Facebook and other social media can prove to be quite functional. If you use it to find an email address or a phone number of a colleague it can be beneficial. Today I used it to find out my friend's girlfriends name to avoid that awkward question, "What was your name again?" You can also learn alot of other things about people without actually asking them. All of these technologies and many more have been criticized, so it is definitely not a new concept that technology, like Google, can be seen as making us dumber.

Most new technology makes things more simple and gives us more time to do other things, but some technology when used the wrong way can definitely be a time waster. Coming from an optimist, I think that most technology, when used correctly, will help rather than hinder your intelligence. Yes, calculators do make it easier for us to quickly calculate simple mathematical equations, but Brain Age on the Nintendo DS encourages you to do simple math in your head to activate your pre-frontal cortex. Not all technology is bad for your brain. If you are using technology responsibly you will find that it will enhance your intelligence. If technology is in fact making you stupider, that is your own fault.

My advice: Don't use technology as a crutch, use it to your advantage. Save time. Learn More.