Submission + - Is it just us, or are kids getting really stupid? (phillymag.com)
krou writes: A feature at phillymag.com asks whether or not our kids are getting really stupid, arguing that the large cognitive load of constant data is making it harder to process information to any depth. 'Technology was supposed to set us free, to liberate us from mundane, time-consuming tasks so we could do great things, think great thoughts, solve humanity’s most pressing problems. Instead, our kids have been liberated to perform even more mundane, time-consuming tasks'. However, Elliot Weinbaum, a professor at Penn’s Graduate School of Education, and others argue that people are worrying unduly about illiteracy, or that kids don't know the days of the week. They also argue that computer activities such as gaming are providing valuable business skills: 'Over so many hours, [gamers have] learned how to master an incredibly complex system. These multi-person games that involve intra-functional teams — "guilds," they call them — organize their entrants the way some workplaces do. These are skills that corporate employers are very interested in.' The article is fairly long (nine pages in total) and ultimately concludes with the author's concern that 'we’re not just failing to engage with one another; we’re less and less willing to engage the world at large' and, ultimately, losing opportunities to develop '"our inwardness, our self-reflectiveness, our orientation to the unknown." In other words: a soul.'
