Curse You, Google!: Using The Internet Has Changed The Way We Think (For The Worse)
Thinking man: he shits on computers.
According to a recent study, internet use has basically caused our brains to not even bother trying to think or problem-solve anymore and we now rely entirely on the internet to answer questions for us. What in the-- *Googling to find out if that's true*
When participants knew that facts would be available on a computer later, they had poor recall of answers but enhanced recall of where they were stored.
The researchers say the internet acts as a "transactive memory" that we depend upon to remember for us.Lead author Betsy Sparrow of Columbia University said that transactive memory "is an idea that there are external memory sources - really storage places that exist in other people".
"There are people who are experts in certain things and we allow them to be, [to] make them responsible for certain kinds of information," she explained to BBC News.
Certain kinds of information? More like ALL the kinds of information. As a matter fact, I don't store anything but old commercial jingles in my noggin anymore. Everything else I just access from my "transactive memory" (read: Safari on my iPhone). PLOP PLOP FIZZ FIZZ, SON! Know what I'm sayin'? I'm sayin' "oh what a relief it is".
Internet's memory effects quantified in computer study [bbcnews]
Thanks to Staticwolf, second only to Staticboobs on a scrambled porn channel.
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