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Smarter Than You Think: How Technology is Changing Our Minds for the Better
From the ‘Wired’ and ‘New York Times Magazine’ contributor, a brilliant examination into how the internet is profoundly changing the way we think.
In this groundbreaking book, Clive Thompson argues that the internet is boosting our brainpower, encouraging new ways of thinking, and making us more – not less – intelligent as is so often claimed.
Our lives have been changed irrevocably by the rise of the internet. But as we rely more and more on machines to help us think, our thinking is becoming richer and more complex. We learn more, retain it longer, write in curious new forms, and even think entirely new types of thoughts.
‘Smarter Than You Think’ is filled with stories of people who are using technology to boost their brains. Meet the ageing millionaire who is saving a digital copy of everything that happens to him, the leading artificial-intelligence researcher who is creating software that will sense your mood and many other fascinating characters who are reaching new heights with digital help.
Lucidly written and argued, ‘Smarter Than You Think’ is a breathtaking original look at our Brave New World.
In this groundbreaking book, Clive Thompson argues that the internet is boosting our brainpower, encouraging new ways of thinking, and making us more – not less – intelligent as is so often claimed.
Our lives have been changed irrevocably by the rise of the internet. But as we rely more and more on machines to help us think, our thinking is becoming richer and more complex. We learn more, retain it longer, write in curious new forms, and even think entirely new types of thoughts.
‘Smarter Than You Think’ is filled with stories of people who are using technology to boost their brains. Meet the ageing millionaire who is saving a digital copy of everything that happens to him, the leading artificial-intelligence researcher who is creating software that will sense your mood and many other fascinating characters who are reaching new heights with digital help.
Lucidly written and argued, ‘Smarter Than You Think’ is a breathtaking original look at our Brave New World.
353 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 1, 2013
227 people are currently reading
8265 people want to read
About the author
Clive Thompson
24 books127 followersClive Thompson is a Canadian freelance journalist, blogger and science and technology writer.
Thompson graduated from the University of Toronto with majors in political science and English. He previously worked for Canada's Report on Business magazine and Shift magazine, then became a freelance contributor for The New York Times Magazine, The Washington Post, Lingua Franca, Wired, Shift, Entertainment Weekly and several other publications.
Thompson writes about digital technologies and their social and cultural impact for a number of publications, including the New York Times Magazine and Wired.
In 2002, he was awarded a Knight Science Journalism Fellowship at MIT.
Thompson graduated from the University of Toronto with majors in political science and English. He previously worked for Canada's Report on Business magazine and Shift magazine, then became a freelance contributor for The New York Times Magazine, The Washington Post, Lingua Franca, Wired, Shift, Entertainment Weekly and several other publications.
Thompson writes about digital technologies and their social and cultural impact for a number of publications, including the New York Times Magazine and Wired.
In 2002, he was awarded a Knight Science Journalism Fellowship at MIT.
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August 10, 2013
Old man review. Read at your own risk.
As you get older, the illusion is that time goes by faster. The theory, I think, is that the segment that is passing --- the hour, day, or week --- is a smaller and smaller fraction of the hours, days, etc. that you have lived. Your time is being used up and you only have a smaller fraction of what you had. At the ripe old age of sixty-five, this dynamic has certainly kicked in for me.
Time seems to be passing by way too fast; I have too little of it left to assimilate everything that I need to or want to. I am like a computer you buy, utilize, fill up, and that eventually begins to be too full, inadequate in capacity and speed, freezing up, and crashing. Furthermore, keeping up with the pace of technology seems to have a similar dynamic: I can't keep up and at times I don't want to even try keeping up. Therefore, going into reading this book, SMARTER THAN YOU THINK: HOW TECHNOLOGY IS CHANGING OUR MINDS FOR THE BETTER, I thought that technology wasn't necessarily changing my mind for the better. I didn't have adequate time and, perhaps, the ability for it to do so. For example, I haven't adopted to cell phones and such e-devices as readily or as rapidly as many of my friends, neighbors and relatives, often to my detriment, but more often to my delight and my contemporaries' chagrin.
But I think Clive Thompson makes some astute observations and plausible explanations for why he believes technology changes our minds for the better. I, of course, enjoyed reading the various histories in the evolution of innovation that he tells about and about humankind's continuing reluctances through the years and now to accept change. I also enjoyed reading about new innovations, innovators, and conceptions of human intelligence, etc. What a delight! How overwhelming! I did enjoy the read, and as I perused and contemplated what I had read I did realize that I do incorporate innovation, even in old age, into my life to make things easier. For example, I'm utilizing voice dictation software in order to write this because it has become more and more painful and irritating to type things out because of arthritis.
I am not, however, convinced that we retain our learning longer than we used to. However, learning is much more accessible in our era than ever before and that is the dynamic that has been changing and seems to be continuing to change. I like it that I can have access to information now that I could never have access to so readily in earlier periods of my lifetime.
Some change, however, is quite scary. I think of the contemporary crises involving data collection by the NSA, for example. Doesn't it have a tendency to put into jeopardy all notions of privacy that we might have? Furthermore, without a clean and clear commitment of mind to the whole enterprise of technology, it is all for naught. People become addicted to mindlessness: playing perhaps entertaining games and watching and being stimulated by videos and whatnot in an addictive manner that doesn't necessarily improve the mind or the quality of living but wastes it away. So, the caveat is always it only works to better your mind if you apply yourself in a responsible way.
As you get older, the illusion is that time goes by faster. The theory, I think, is that the segment that is passing --- the hour, day, or week --- is a smaller and smaller fraction of the hours, days, etc. that you have lived. Your time is being used up and you only have a smaller fraction of what you had. At the ripe old age of sixty-five, this dynamic has certainly kicked in for me.
Time seems to be passing by way too fast; I have too little of it left to assimilate everything that I need to or want to. I am like a computer you buy, utilize, fill up, and that eventually begins to be too full, inadequate in capacity and speed, freezing up, and crashing. Furthermore, keeping up with the pace of technology seems to have a similar dynamic: I can't keep up and at times I don't want to even try keeping up. Therefore, going into reading this book, SMARTER THAN YOU THINK: HOW TECHNOLOGY IS CHANGING OUR MINDS FOR THE BETTER, I thought that technology wasn't necessarily changing my mind for the better. I didn't have adequate time and, perhaps, the ability for it to do so. For example, I haven't adopted to cell phones and such e-devices as readily or as rapidly as many of my friends, neighbors and relatives, often to my detriment, but more often to my delight and my contemporaries' chagrin.
But I think Clive Thompson makes some astute observations and plausible explanations for why he believes technology changes our minds for the better. I, of course, enjoyed reading the various histories in the evolution of innovation that he tells about and about humankind's continuing reluctances through the years and now to accept change. I also enjoyed reading about new innovations, innovators, and conceptions of human intelligence, etc. What a delight! How overwhelming! I did enjoy the read, and as I perused and contemplated what I had read I did realize that I do incorporate innovation, even in old age, into my life to make things easier. For example, I'm utilizing voice dictation software in order to write this because it has become more and more painful and irritating to type things out because of arthritis.
I am not, however, convinced that we retain our learning longer than we used to. However, learning is much more accessible in our era than ever before and that is the dynamic that has been changing and seems to be continuing to change. I like it that I can have access to information now that I could never have access to so readily in earlier periods of my lifetime.
Some change, however, is quite scary. I think of the contemporary crises involving data collection by the NSA, for example. Doesn't it have a tendency to put into jeopardy all notions of privacy that we might have? Furthermore, without a clean and clear commitment of mind to the whole enterprise of technology, it is all for naught. People become addicted to mindlessness: playing perhaps entertaining games and watching and being stimulated by videos and whatnot in an addictive manner that doesn't necessarily improve the mind or the quality of living but wastes it away. So, the caveat is always it only works to better your mind if you apply yourself in a responsible way.
December 8, 2013
Whoever came up with the title for Clive Thompson's new book Smarter Than You Think got it wrong. Thompson's book is not so much about how technology is making us smarter, as it is about how technology is enabling those you who use it in new and creative ways to think more efficiently and (sometimes) more effectively. The book would be better titled Smarter IF You Think.
As a result of the misnaming Thompson's book is, as it turns out, more interesting than I expected going in. While it's very much a book written in response to all the usual hand-wringing and doomsaying around technology, the case it makes for the benefits of technology is more cautiously optimistic than celebratory. Which makes it, to my pleasant surprise, an almost reasonable book.
Thompson's case for the cognitive benefits of technology outweighing its costs is, as I see it, two-fold. On the one hand, the negative aspects of technology generally involve the transfer of old habits to new media. So, for instance, people have always been easily distracted petty narcissists having trivial discussions and seeking confirmation for their own biases through homophily; Facebook and Twitter do not create these tendencies, at most they simply make them much more visible than they were before. On the other hand, the positive aspect of technology is that when used in creative ways that leverage the comparative advantages of both humans and machines it can enable new ways of learning, organizing and discovery that make us collectively more effective.
This is not an unreasonable argument, and the examples that Thompson provides of the ways in which technology helps improve the human experience are by and large convincing, and entirely fascinating, if seemingly cherry-picked. So, for instance, Thompson points to an example of a school program that uses video games to help pique student's curiosity about history and politics. This is a delightful idea, and makes a great deal of sense, but it does not really speak to the general impact of video games on the education of teenagers.
My own take, for what it's worth, is that a) while technology can make us 'smarter' if used creatively and intelligently, that is not generally how it is currently being used, nor is it obvious that these creative and intelligent uses will catch on (though one can, and should, hope); b) there is no inherent contradiction between technology making us smarter as a collective but dumber as individuals, and that by lowering the challenges of communication and coordination that is precisely what technology is doing and c) as a consequence of b technology may in fact make us better at some tasks and worse at others, so that the net effect may not be so much to make us better or worse but just different.
That said, I enjoyed reading Thompson's book, both because of the examples of creative use of new technologies it provides, and for its accurate criticism of the knee jerk negativity you see in too many media discussions on the effect of technology on society. But mostly, I enjoyed reading it because it made me think about how I use technology in my own life and what I could do to use it better. Whether or not technology is changing our minds for the better, I think Thompson's book certainly did, and that is reason enough to read it.
As a result of the misnaming Thompson's book is, as it turns out, more interesting than I expected going in. While it's very much a book written in response to all the usual hand-wringing and doomsaying around technology, the case it makes for the benefits of technology is more cautiously optimistic than celebratory. Which makes it, to my pleasant surprise, an almost reasonable book.
Thompson's case for the cognitive benefits of technology outweighing its costs is, as I see it, two-fold. On the one hand, the negative aspects of technology generally involve the transfer of old habits to new media. So, for instance, people have always been easily distracted petty narcissists having trivial discussions and seeking confirmation for their own biases through homophily; Facebook and Twitter do not create these tendencies, at most they simply make them much more visible than they were before. On the other hand, the positive aspect of technology is that when used in creative ways that leverage the comparative advantages of both humans and machines it can enable new ways of learning, organizing and discovery that make us collectively more effective.
This is not an unreasonable argument, and the examples that Thompson provides of the ways in which technology helps improve the human experience are by and large convincing, and entirely fascinating, if seemingly cherry-picked. So, for instance, Thompson points to an example of a school program that uses video games to help pique student's curiosity about history and politics. This is a delightful idea, and makes a great deal of sense, but it does not really speak to the general impact of video games on the education of teenagers.
My own take, for what it's worth, is that a) while technology can make us 'smarter' if used creatively and intelligently, that is not generally how it is currently being used, nor is it obvious that these creative and intelligent uses will catch on (though one can, and should, hope); b) there is no inherent contradiction between technology making us smarter as a collective but dumber as individuals, and that by lowering the challenges of communication and coordination that is precisely what technology is doing and c) as a consequence of b technology may in fact make us better at some tasks and worse at others, so that the net effect may not be so much to make us better or worse but just different.
That said, I enjoyed reading Thompson's book, both because of the examples of creative use of new technologies it provides, and for its accurate criticism of the knee jerk negativity you see in too many media discussions on the effect of technology on society. But mostly, I enjoyed reading it because it made me think about how I use technology in my own life and what I could do to use it better. Whether or not technology is changing our minds for the better, I think Thompson's book certainly did, and that is reason enough to read it.
July 3, 2015
Technology splits people into two camps; there are some who feel that the advent of the smartphone and internet means that the we are losing that extra element that makes us human similar to this:
And there are others that love it, and feel that the extra benefits that you gain are worth it.
In this book Thompson writes about the innovative and creative ways that people and organisations are using technologies for all manner of things. In it he uses lots of positive examples; there are detail of how video games are being used in education to teach pupils how societies need as many farmers as warriors to function. He covers the battles between the grand masters and the chess computers. There is a chapter on a university professor who recorded every single moment of his child’s formative years by having a series of cameras all around the home. He captured the moment his son took his first steps, and the first words he uttered, and how they have used this data in developing a deeper understanding of speech development. Politics creep in to it too, politicians are great are skewing the electoral boundaries so they are guaranteed a safe seat, but people are fighting back using electoral data and a mapping tool. With this mere amateurs could bring the districts back to a fair balance of voters and give the public back democracy.
Search is a big thing too, rather than remember things people just use Google (other search engines are available...), which is great until you have no internet connection. He considers those early adopters who have used wearable tech to record their memories and their daily events, and the methods that they use to find moments of significance. As search technology improves, locating a specific memory or event is becoming easier, but no matter how much you want it to, Google will never find your keys. Games are now much more complex than the early point and shoot ones; some modern games have layers and layers of detail and many online ones are collaborative too; to reach the end of a quest means that you have to share information and skills. Collabaration too can playa part in trawling massive amounts of data; when the parliamentary expenses scandal happened, the Guardian didn’t have enough journalists and researchers to read all 170,000 receipts, so they release them and 20,000 people went through the entire lot in four day, finding gems like the moat and the duck house.
There are many other examples too, and it is written in a similar manner to Gladwell’s books, packed full of interesting and inspirational stories of people who are using modern digital tools, and makes for a very enjoyable and readable book.
And there are others that love it, and feel that the extra benefits that you gain are worth it.
In this book Thompson writes about the innovative and creative ways that people and organisations are using technologies for all manner of things. In it he uses lots of positive examples; there are detail of how video games are being used in education to teach pupils how societies need as many farmers as warriors to function. He covers the battles between the grand masters and the chess computers. There is a chapter on a university professor who recorded every single moment of his child’s formative years by having a series of cameras all around the home. He captured the moment his son took his first steps, and the first words he uttered, and how they have used this data in developing a deeper understanding of speech development. Politics creep in to it too, politicians are great are skewing the electoral boundaries so they are guaranteed a safe seat, but people are fighting back using electoral data and a mapping tool. With this mere amateurs could bring the districts back to a fair balance of voters and give the public back democracy.
Search is a big thing too, rather than remember things people just use Google (other search engines are available...), which is great until you have no internet connection. He considers those early adopters who have used wearable tech to record their memories and their daily events, and the methods that they use to find moments of significance. As search technology improves, locating a specific memory or event is becoming easier, but no matter how much you want it to, Google will never find your keys. Games are now much more complex than the early point and shoot ones; some modern games have layers and layers of detail and many online ones are collaborative too; to reach the end of a quest means that you have to share information and skills. Collabaration too can playa part in trawling massive amounts of data; when the parliamentary expenses scandal happened, the Guardian didn’t have enough journalists and researchers to read all 170,000 receipts, so they release them and 20,000 people went through the entire lot in four day, finding gems like the moat and the duck house.
There are many other examples too, and it is written in a similar manner to Gladwell’s books, packed full of interesting and inspirational stories of people who are using modern digital tools, and makes for a very enjoyable and readable book.
December 15, 2019
There has been, since the advent of ubiquitous computing and the Internet, a pretty steady drumbeat of predictions of gloom and doom. Either it will make us stupid, or it will encourage us to abandon all control over our own lives, or it will cause us to split into like-minded groupthink bubbles, or it will erode our attention span. On the other hand, there is a (smaller, but not small) counter-current pointing out similarly dire predictions at the advent of television, radio, the newspaper, widespread literacy, or the printing press.
Clive Thompson, a columnist for Wired magazine, is obviously unlikely to think that technology is a bad thing. What makes this book more interesting than the "we've heard this before, and it was always wrong" kind of refutation, is that he goes in depth. This is the best kind of popular science book; one which grapples with ideas on a level that is not easily condensed into a single article (or a book review). When he talks about the effect of social media on our social lives, or the effect of search engines on human memory, he does not just give us his opinion. He not only backs his assertions up with studies on our actual behavior, he cites multiple studies, by different groups, coming at the issue from multiple directions.
Not that the news is all good, of course. Every technology involves tradeoffs; one might even say that every human activity whatsoever involves tradeoffs. To know more people, or to know a few people better? To have more knowledge available, or to have less available but know it more in depth? To empower anyone to speak up, or to require that you have some idea what you're talking about before you get on the soapbox? Technology gives you more options, but it doesn't make those tradeoffs go away, and Thompson does a good job of helping the reader to think more clearly about just what they consist of, and why it matters.
Of course, I read this in a paper-based, long-form medium. I doubt I would have been as interested in reading over 100,000 words in a website column. There are still topics for which a book is the best vehicle, just as there are times when walking is the best way to get there, and there are discussions which should happen in person to get the most out of them. Thompson is not averse to pointing out the problems with technoeuphoria, as well as predictions of techno-doom. But there is a more interesting middle ground between the two, where instead of the straw man positions of "it's bad" or "it's good", you can explore, "it's bad at what?" and "it's good at what?". The key to using new technologies well, is to figure out what they're naturally good at, and what they're not well suited to.
There is a saying that every new technology's impact on society tends to be overestimated in the short run, and underestimated in the long run. The mass connectivity and nearly-infinite computing power of modern technology is unlikely to be an exception. Thompson's book is a welcome voice of calm and thoughtful insight, into a topic too often met with shrieks and shouting.
Clive Thompson, a columnist for Wired magazine, is obviously unlikely to think that technology is a bad thing. What makes this book more interesting than the "we've heard this before, and it was always wrong" kind of refutation, is that he goes in depth. This is the best kind of popular science book; one which grapples with ideas on a level that is not easily condensed into a single article (or a book review). When he talks about the effect of social media on our social lives, or the effect of search engines on human memory, he does not just give us his opinion. He not only backs his assertions up with studies on our actual behavior, he cites multiple studies, by different groups, coming at the issue from multiple directions.
Not that the news is all good, of course. Every technology involves tradeoffs; one might even say that every human activity whatsoever involves tradeoffs. To know more people, or to know a few people better? To have more knowledge available, or to have less available but know it more in depth? To empower anyone to speak up, or to require that you have some idea what you're talking about before you get on the soapbox? Technology gives you more options, but it doesn't make those tradeoffs go away, and Thompson does a good job of helping the reader to think more clearly about just what they consist of, and why it matters.
Of course, I read this in a paper-based, long-form medium. I doubt I would have been as interested in reading over 100,000 words in a website column. There are still topics for which a book is the best vehicle, just as there are times when walking is the best way to get there, and there are discussions which should happen in person to get the most out of them. Thompson is not averse to pointing out the problems with technoeuphoria, as well as predictions of techno-doom. But there is a more interesting middle ground between the two, where instead of the straw man positions of "it's bad" or "it's good", you can explore, "it's bad at what?" and "it's good at what?". The key to using new technologies well, is to figure out what they're naturally good at, and what they're not well suited to.
There is a saying that every new technology's impact on society tends to be overestimated in the short run, and underestimated in the long run. The mass connectivity and nearly-infinite computing power of modern technology is unlikely to be an exception. Thompson's book is a welcome voice of calm and thoughtful insight, into a topic too often met with shrieks and shouting.
February 21, 2014
I wasn't sure what this book would be like, or how I would feel about it, but I heard several recommendations for it on my book podcasts, so I thought I'd try it. And it turned out to be really intresting and serendipitously totally related to courses I am taking in my first semester of my MLIS grad program.
My only qualm/concern about this book is how relatable it will be in a few years, some of the references are very very of the moment, and the technology obviously it. It did teach me about Snapchat, though :)
The basic concern that Thompson throws out is that everyone says that technology is making us dumber, that we can't focus on anything because all we read is 140 character tweets, and googling everything is making us lose knowledge and we don't use our brains for anything.
Turns out the opposite is true. Quick summaries of things I found interesting that were discussed in this book:
-people think kids/people in general don't write anymore(prose, not physical writing with pens). Except that copious postings in online forums, fanfiction, etc totally count as writing, and people produce tons of it every year. Writing a blog and knowing you have an audience can make you a better writer.
-there was a chapter on finding information, which is the subject of an entire class I am taking right now, and hit on the highlights of some ways of organizing info in libraries and elsewhere that I just learned about, so that was neat, and reinforcing.
-people complain about kids playing video games, like World of Warcraft, but all that chatting and strategy actually benefits their math skills. There are kids who make insane spreadsheets about which weapons or spells defeat which enemies.
-my favorite chapter was on "ambient awareness", which is what you get from following everyone's tweets and Facebook updates. you eventually gain a broad picture of someone's life once you begin following them. People meet up in person and pick up on conversations about something one posted earlier. Couples who continually text/chat all day have a closer relationship, even if they are long-distance, from the constant awareness of what the other person is doing. You realize something is up with your friend if they normally post 10 times a day on Facebook, and then suddenly stop posting. You have an extended network of information where you might find a job or apartment from a friend of a friend of a friend because something got retweeted a few times.
-there was also a chapter on the usefulness of crowd-sourcing help or disseminating info during a disaster. examples from the Haiti earthquake, the Arab Spring uprising, and a few others showed how powerful these tools are and things happened that just weren't possible years ago.
Definitely worth a read if you're interesting in social networking, current tech trends, and how it can improve your life, or just what it's doing to society in general.
My only qualm/concern about this book is how relatable it will be in a few years, some of the references are very very of the moment, and the technology obviously it. It did teach me about Snapchat, though :)
The basic concern that Thompson throws out is that everyone says that technology is making us dumber, that we can't focus on anything because all we read is 140 character tweets, and googling everything is making us lose knowledge and we don't use our brains for anything.
Turns out the opposite is true. Quick summaries of things I found interesting that were discussed in this book:
-people think kids/people in general don't write anymore(prose, not physical writing with pens). Except that copious postings in online forums, fanfiction, etc totally count as writing, and people produce tons of it every year. Writing a blog and knowing you have an audience can make you a better writer.
-there was a chapter on finding information, which is the subject of an entire class I am taking right now, and hit on the highlights of some ways of organizing info in libraries and elsewhere that I just learned about, so that was neat, and reinforcing.
-people complain about kids playing video games, like World of Warcraft, but all that chatting and strategy actually benefits their math skills. There are kids who make insane spreadsheets about which weapons or spells defeat which enemies.
-my favorite chapter was on "ambient awareness", which is what you get from following everyone's tweets and Facebook updates. you eventually gain a broad picture of someone's life once you begin following them. People meet up in person and pick up on conversations about something one posted earlier. Couples who continually text/chat all day have a closer relationship, even if they are long-distance, from the constant awareness of what the other person is doing. You realize something is up with your friend if they normally post 10 times a day on Facebook, and then suddenly stop posting. You have an extended network of information where you might find a job or apartment from a friend of a friend of a friend because something got retweeted a few times.
-there was also a chapter on the usefulness of crowd-sourcing help or disseminating info during a disaster. examples from the Haiti earthquake, the Arab Spring uprising, and a few others showed how powerful these tools are and things happened that just weren't possible years ago.
Definitely worth a read if you're interesting in social networking, current tech trends, and how it can improve your life, or just what it's doing to society in general.
November 15, 2020
Quite interesting. Recommended.
February 8, 2014
I really liked this book. I had previously read The Shallows by Nicholas Carr and found it very odd. Carr went through his book describing how every time a new technology appears everyone freaks out about how it is ruining humanity, but in the end it doesn't, and it ends up being an important tool we use, and then Carr concludes but this time it is real. The internet will make us lose our ability to think deeply and this is horrible.
Thompson on the other hand draws the more logical conclusion that the internet does cause us to think differently, but it allows us to do some powerful things that are good. He tempers this optimism with acknowledgement that the internet isn't good for everything and sometimes you need to disconnect in order to get something done, but that is how new tools work--you pick and choose how and why you use them. He then goes on to provide interesting anecdotes on what areas the internet and the power of group-think excel and where they struggle.
Overall I found that I related very well to what he said about using computers as an extra place to store memories. I often find myself storing information in my head as search terms, versus the specific facts themselves. Another example is that I am good at math, but have a very difficult time doing math in my head. I just can't seem to hold more than a couple numbers in my head at a time. If I hadn't been allowed to use a calculator throughout school I probably would not have ended up as a computer programmer.
Thompson on the other hand draws the more logical conclusion that the internet does cause us to think differently, but it allows us to do some powerful things that are good. He tempers this optimism with acknowledgement that the internet isn't good for everything and sometimes you need to disconnect in order to get something done, but that is how new tools work--you pick and choose how and why you use them. He then goes on to provide interesting anecdotes on what areas the internet and the power of group-think excel and where they struggle.
Overall I found that I related very well to what he said about using computers as an extra place to store memories. I often find myself storing information in my head as search terms, versus the specific facts themselves. Another example is that I am good at math, but have a very difficult time doing math in my head. I just can't seem to hold more than a couple numbers in my head at a time. If I hadn't been allowed to use a calculator throughout school I probably would not have ended up as a computer programmer.
April 13, 2015
Li até o fim dessa vez e achei ótimo. Começa com uma excelente perspectiva de como a tecnologia pode aumentar nossa capacidade intelectual e segue dando exemplos de quando isso acontece de fato, quando não e porquê. Me surpreendi principalmente com a explicação de memória coletiva e como pessoas em grupos (como casais) acabam dependendo uns dos outros para lembrar mais coisas. Vale também pelo recap de tecnologias que acabariam com nossa inteligência mas não acabaram. Recomendadíssimo.
June 28, 2020
As the pages of this book wore on, I began to feel a vague sense of dissatisfaction for one extremely basic reason - The title misled me into reading it.
As far as nonfiction books go, this was a first time. This book is not about how technology changes our minds for the better, but rather about how one might use technology in effective ways as well as the psychology of our behaviours online. Not that that's any less valuable to know, but I'd have had a much more comfortable time exploring it had I known the true premise.
That being said, this book does a fairly good job of examining how we operate online and that our reliance on technology does not diminish our memory as much as we fear, but is another application of transactive memory. It brought up a few concepts I was unfamiliar with like ambient awareness and homophily, and brushed up on what I had learned about pluralistic ignorance. The examples of how Facebook users played a role in the Arab Spring and other autocratic governments were interesting.
It's a shame that I can't rate it higher because I feel cheated about what I would learn. The newer editions of this book need a more accurate title ASAP.
As far as nonfiction books go, this was a first time. This book is not about how technology changes our minds for the better, but rather about how one might use technology in effective ways as well as the psychology of our behaviours online. Not that that's any less valuable to know, but I'd have had a much more comfortable time exploring it had I known the true premise.
That being said, this book does a fairly good job of examining how we operate online and that our reliance on technology does not diminish our memory as much as we fear, but is another application of transactive memory. It brought up a few concepts I was unfamiliar with like ambient awareness and homophily, and brushed up on what I had learned about pluralistic ignorance. The examples of how Facebook users played a role in the Arab Spring and other autocratic governments were interesting.
It's a shame that I can't rate it higher because I feel cheated about what I would learn. The newer editions of this book need a more accurate title ASAP.
April 19, 2025
Oeps wel pas uit na m’n tentamen, maar vond wel interessant boek! Het begon best optimistisch over technologie en gaf allemaal feitjes over de geschiedenis enzo, was op sommige punten echt best wel outdated ook, maar t eindigde beetje dark over wat er allemaal fout kan gaan (rip). Vooral t einde dat hij basically chatgpt had voorspeld creepy. Anyways shout out ijsselstein ✊
March 4, 2025
Tää jäi multa paria vikaa lukua vaille kesken vaihdossa mut bruteforcetin tän nyt loppuun. Ihan silleen hyvänmielen kirja siitä mitä kaikkea teknologia voi mahdollistaa, mutta tää on julkaistu 12 vuotta sitten joten moni tekno-optimistisesti vielä tässä kuvailtu juttu onkin osoittautunut nykymaailmassa paljon dystooppisemmaksi, esim. teknojätit.
Oisin varmaan arvostanut tätä enemmän lukiolaisena tai fuksina, mutta infolaiselle ja etenkin despin pääainelaisille tää on lähinnä sellainen tragedinen what-could-have-been muistutus siitä, että moni tässä hehkutettu teknologia osoittautui vähemmän hienoksi ja tasa-arvoistavammaksi kuin mitä ehkä aikanaan ajateltiin.
Oisin varmaan arvostanut tätä enemmän lukiolaisena tai fuksina, mutta infolaiselle ja etenkin despin pääainelaisille tää on lähinnä sellainen tragedinen what-could-have-been muistutus siitä, että moni tässä hehkutettu teknologia osoittautui vähemmän hienoksi ja tasa-arvoistavammaksi kuin mitä ehkä aikanaan ajateltiin.
October 11, 2013
Historically, as Thompson points out in "Smarter Than You Think", new media or thinking tools are met by some people as weakening the power of human thought by being used as intellectual crutches. The written word, the printing press, the coffee houses of Europe, the novel, the telegraph, the telephone, the Internet. Each of them were labeled at the time of their invention as making less human or less capabile in one sense or another.
In all those cases, the world changed, but it didn't entirely change. They became integrated into our intellectual toolboxes, enabling us to offload some of the details from our brain, to make room for all the ideas that became available through new communication media.
In this book, looks at the effect digital tools and the Internet have on way we think today, the way we solve problems, and the way we frame the world.
* What happens we can offload significant portions of our semantic memory to external sources? (and that means not only the Internet, but also other people - finding/knowing somebody who has the information you want)
* What affect does writing and creating for audiences that care have on the quality, the quality and the type of what we personally produce? And what does that audience look like, in size and in composition? (I really liked his term "public thinking" for this process).
* What happens when you have ambient awareness - micro-updates of what people are doing - of people in your social circle and outside of it? How does that change how and what we communicate?
* How does being highly connected change how we collaborate to solve large problems? Are there problems or ways of framing problems that enable them to be addressed by "the crowd?"
* What does knowing and learning mean in an era where factual knowledge is readily available, collaborators are at our fingertips, and experimenting and playing with ideas is simple and fast?
"Smarter Than You Think" looks at all of these from multiple angles, from the positive and the negative, from historical context to the "state of the art."
This book hit a sweet spot for me. While it was very readable and held my interest through out, it had enough academic references for me to follow up on and explore. In numerous cases I found myself connecting his ideas my personal experiences and observations living through the changes of our digital age. In general, his relative optimism tempered by certain cautions meshed with my own worldview pretty closely. If you are decidedly pessimistic about the role of technology in our thinking process, you might find the book doesn't match your tastes quite as well (but is still very worth reading).
The book caused me to re-examine how much and what I should be writing and communicating online, and with whom. I need to go try more stuff, but I certainly have a few more directions to try.
In the end, the idea that stuck with me most powerfully was:
"How should you respond when you get powerful new tools for finding answers?" Think of harder questions.
In all those cases, the world changed, but it didn't entirely change. They became integrated into our intellectual toolboxes, enabling us to offload some of the details from our brain, to make room for all the ideas that became available through new communication media.
In this book, looks at the effect digital tools and the Internet have on way we think today, the way we solve problems, and the way we frame the world.
* What happens we can offload significant portions of our semantic memory to external sources? (and that means not only the Internet, but also other people - finding/knowing somebody who has the information you want)
* What affect does writing and creating for audiences that care have on the quality, the quality and the type of what we personally produce? And what does that audience look like, in size and in composition? (I really liked his term "public thinking" for this process).
* What happens when you have ambient awareness - micro-updates of what people are doing - of people in your social circle and outside of it? How does that change how and what we communicate?
* How does being highly connected change how we collaborate to solve large problems? Are there problems or ways of framing problems that enable them to be addressed by "the crowd?"
* What does knowing and learning mean in an era where factual knowledge is readily available, collaborators are at our fingertips, and experimenting and playing with ideas is simple and fast?
"Smarter Than You Think" looks at all of these from multiple angles, from the positive and the negative, from historical context to the "state of the art."
This book hit a sweet spot for me. While it was very readable and held my interest through out, it had enough academic references for me to follow up on and explore. In numerous cases I found myself connecting his ideas my personal experiences and observations living through the changes of our digital age. In general, his relative optimism tempered by certain cautions meshed with my own worldview pretty closely. If you are decidedly pessimistic about the role of technology in our thinking process, you might find the book doesn't match your tastes quite as well (but is still very worth reading).
The book caused me to re-examine how much and what I should be writing and communicating online, and with whom. I need to go try more stuff, but I certainly have a few more directions to try.
In the end, the idea that stuck with me most powerfully was:
"How should you respond when you get powerful new tools for finding answers?" Think of harder questions.
December 10, 2013
I think we've all come across someone clutching their figurative pearls and proclaiming that Twitter is ruining communication, or texting is wrecking youngsters' spelling, or YouTube is stunting people's attention spans. In this book, Clive Thompson provides a nice counterpoint to all this: technology is making us better. Through several chapters Thompson explores topics like how awesome it is to have external memory banks and search tools, or how online collaboration leads us not only to provide better answers, but to tackle tougher questions than we could on our own. Or how while tweeting about what you ate for lunch seems mundane, all those status updates blend together to a kind of ambient awareness that allows us to know people better and communicate with them more frequently and effectively. Or how a camera in every cell phone and easy to use blogging software allows citizens and protesters to keep their governments in check (or vice versa, unfortunately).
What I like about the book, besides how timely it is, is how positive Thompason is without downplaying the criticisms and downsides of new technology. Yes, a lot of this seems mundane, but Thompson is skilled at peeling that away and showing you, for example, that while creating LOLCats and mashups is silly, it leads to the same kind of computer literacy and checked assumptions that allowed readers to detect digitally manipulated photos of Irania missle tests. Thompson can pick out the forest for the trees in ways that really makes you appreciate the age we live in. And the one we're heading for.
What I like about the book, besides how timely it is, is how positive Thompason is without downplaying the criticisms and downsides of new technology. Yes, a lot of this seems mundane, but Thompson is skilled at peeling that away and showing you, for example, that while creating LOLCats and mashups is silly, it leads to the same kind of computer literacy and checked assumptions that allowed readers to detect digitally manipulated photos of Irania missle tests. Thompson can pick out the forest for the trees in ways that really makes you appreciate the age we live in. And the one we're heading for.
October 29, 2016
This book was spectacular! Every time new tech makes its way on to the scene, people freak out. But why? Can we really stop tech? The answer is decidedly no. Thomson was clearly inspired by the work of Andy Clark who wrote Natural Born Cyborgs and Supersizing the Mind. Clark states, and Thompson agrees, that technology is inevitable because humans have been using tech since prehistory. From every earlier tool -- including the pen and paper we don't consider "tech -- to the smartphones that have found their way into the hands of most humans, we cannot help but develop and use tech. This kind of thinking is shared by pioneers like Kevin Kelly who wrote What Technology Wants. Since humans are going to continue making tech why not think about the best ways to use it and figure out how to minimize damage when humans use it to harm?
Our computers have become part of who we are. They hold the vast amount of information that we as humans know. We are smarter than we think because we have access to the gathered and stored information we have acquired in encyclopedias, journals, and books, and now on the vast internet as well. we are smarter than we think because we can learn to harvest the resources we have built by mining them for knowledge anytime we need.
Our computers have become part of who we are. They hold the vast amount of information that we as humans know. We are smarter than we think because we have access to the gathered and stored information we have acquired in encyclopedias, journals, and books, and now on the vast internet as well. we are smarter than we think because we can learn to harvest the resources we have built by mining them for knowledge anytime we need.
January 3, 2015
Insightful, sharp, but in the end measured, 'Smarter than you think' is a must read for everyone interested in understanding the new media age.
We live in interesting times. Technology, both offline & online, are changing the way we live & think. Information flows freely, some would say too freely. How we process this information, curate it and pass it along has become a great 'literacy challenge' for us.
This book, essentially a collection of essays on key technology themes, helps us navigate & understand this better. 'The new literacies,' 'The art of finding' & 'The connected society' are absolute must reads.
Not just worth a read, but a re-read.
We live in interesting times. Technology, both offline & online, are changing the way we live & think. Information flows freely, some would say too freely. How we process this information, curate it and pass it along has become a great 'literacy challenge' for us.
This book, essentially a collection of essays on key technology themes, helps us navigate & understand this better. 'The new literacies,' 'The art of finding' & 'The connected society' are absolute must reads.
Not just worth a read, but a re-read.
September 29, 2013
Thompson's text will and should be added to the pantheon of great tech books. A fascinating mix of research and interpretation, I believe that we will be talking about Smarter Than You Think in the same vein as Technopoly: The Surrender of Culture to Technology and other genre-defining books.
I blew through this book in a few days and my only complaint is that it ended. The number of stories and sources that Thompson integrates into a cohesive text is nothing short of mind-blowing. I had high expectations for the book, and Thompson exceeded them. Buy this book now.
I blew through this book in a few days and my only complaint is that it ended. The number of stories and sources that Thompson integrates into a cohesive text is nothing short of mind-blowing. I had high expectations for the book, and Thompson exceeded them. Buy this book now.
April 4, 2014
Thought provoking, now full of underlines ! Will make you think differently about tech & the potential abundance of our future lives
December 9, 2016
Interesting stuff although it has got a slightly manic undertone of "see! Look! It's not all terrible! It might be fine!"
December 25, 2017
Sturgeon's law
: "90% of everything(especially on the internet) is crap"
Anyone familiar with Cal Newport's Deep Work: Rules for Focused Success in a Distracted World or Nicholas Carr's The Shallows: What the Internet Is Doing to Our Brains or any book by Media theorist Douglas Rushkoff knows too well about the negative effects of Internet on our thinking. Nicolas Carr describes this as Juggler's Brain: a mind that can't learn things because it doesn't stand still long enough"
What makes Clive Thompson's book interesting is that it gives an Optimistic(Contrary to most books on the effect of Internet on Human Cognition) and insightful on how the internet is shaping our thinking positively.
The Printed World extended our cognition. It made our learning and cognition linear and abstract. This helped humans to remember less and works on more novel ideas.
However our Brain is a pattern-recognition machine and Internet is dot connecting machine. Our Brain works in non-linear, sporadic manner most of the times. So together and working side by side; these tools can make even amateurs radically smarter(not morally better) even when we are not actively connected to them.
Internet enabled us to externalise our memories, help us catalog important life events in an unlimited manner. Most importantly internet enabled Public thinking for average people. Historically reading is given precedence over writing especially if you're an average non-literary person.
"Reading maketh a full man; and writing an axact man" - Sir Francis Bacon
There is no arguing that writing crystallises you thoughts and gives clarity. And internet has given us ( average non-literary person)all a platform to write for pleasure or intellectual satisfaction (which people rarely do after graduation). Thanks to Audience effect and Generation effect we become more articulate and develop deeper thinking and understanding. Internet also help us learn new things in non-linear, self-driven pace which was not possible earlier.
But what about the bullying and abuses online? To be fair internet didn't create these behaviours. It just gave a new platform. The best way to reduce these behaviour is to follow strict social protocol as individuals and society.
"One of the greatest Challenge of Today's digital thinking tools is knowing when NOT to use them, when to rely on the powers of older and slower technologies like paper and book"
Frankly the Attention economy is eating away our attention span. Social media is a constant distraction. The author argues in order to effectively use these digital tools we should cultivate the practise of mindfulness and follow strict protocols on how we use these tools.
The Author argues we need a New Magna Carta for the Digital Age especially after Snowden revelations on NASA PRISM surveillance and take measures to guard our privacy.
Overall its an optimistic and interesting read. It has opened a new perspective to me on the effects of digital tools and gave me some ideas to play with.
Anyone familiar with Cal Newport's Deep Work: Rules for Focused Success in a Distracted World or Nicholas Carr's The Shallows: What the Internet Is Doing to Our Brains or any book by Media theorist Douglas Rushkoff knows too well about the negative effects of Internet on our thinking. Nicolas Carr describes this as Juggler's Brain: a mind that can't learn things because it doesn't stand still long enough"
What makes Clive Thompson's book interesting is that it gives an Optimistic(Contrary to most books on the effect of Internet on Human Cognition) and insightful on how the internet is shaping our thinking positively.
The Printed World extended our cognition. It made our learning and cognition linear and abstract. This helped humans to remember less and works on more novel ideas.
However our Brain is a pattern-recognition machine and Internet is dot connecting machine. Our Brain works in non-linear, sporadic manner most of the times. So together and working side by side; these tools can make even amateurs radically smarter(not morally better) even when we are not actively connected to them.
Internet enabled us to externalise our memories, help us catalog important life events in an unlimited manner. Most importantly internet enabled Public thinking for average people. Historically reading is given precedence over writing especially if you're an average non-literary person.
"Reading maketh a full man; and writing an axact man" - Sir Francis Bacon
There is no arguing that writing crystallises you thoughts and gives clarity. And internet has given us ( average non-literary person)all a platform to write for pleasure or intellectual satisfaction (which people rarely do after graduation). Thanks to Audience effect and Generation effect we become more articulate and develop deeper thinking and understanding. Internet also help us learn new things in non-linear, self-driven pace which was not possible earlier.
But what about the bullying and abuses online? To be fair internet didn't create these behaviours. It just gave a new platform. The best way to reduce these behaviour is to follow strict social protocol as individuals and society.
"One of the greatest Challenge of Today's digital thinking tools is knowing when NOT to use them, when to rely on the powers of older and slower technologies like paper and book"
Frankly the Attention economy is eating away our attention span. Social media is a constant distraction. The author argues in order to effectively use these digital tools we should cultivate the practise of mindfulness and follow strict protocols on how we use these tools.
The Author argues we need a New Magna Carta for the Digital Age especially after Snowden revelations on NASA PRISM surveillance and take measures to guard our privacy.
Overall its an optimistic and interesting read. It has opened a new perspective to me on the effects of digital tools and gave me some ideas to play with.
January 8, 2018
I read this as a Library Science graduate student as part of a program the student government does every academic year to provide a common intellectual focus for those interested in being involved. Two years ago we read Nicholas Carr's "The Shallows", which I will immediately admit colored my view of this book. Carr's work painted a picture of a dystopian fearscape wrapped in a nostalgic lament for old-fashioned things.
Thompson avoided being overly pessimistic about our prospects as a world with exponentially-growing technological capabilities. His was a warmly realistic take. Extolling the virtues and the possibilities, while noting some setbacks and some bad scenarios both real and imagined. His ultimate message was one that I myself have been really trying to formulate eloquently and push on those I interact with and teach in my own professional capacity. It's one of constant learning and flexibility. The internet and everything it brings with it is just one more in a long series of innovations that have left traditionalists bemoaning the state of the future. Granted, it has the potential for so much more than many previous innovations, but it can be treated as many others before it as well. It's all about how we use things, not the fact that we have them to use. And as he stated many times as well, it's all about developing the right mental processes, or literacies, in this new technology, that will allow us to make the most of it while still living good lives.
Thompson treated all of his interviewees with respect in his descriptions of them, and was a sympathetically neutral party in describing topics that leave the United States, among other nations, extremely polarized. As with all works of popular nonfiction, there could potentially be fallacies and half-truths that I am not equipped to sniff out due to the length of the work and my own lack of time to pore over the endnotes, but I sensed that Thompson had good intentions, and the things he claimed made good sense to me. Most importantly, he really seemed to grasp the culture of using the internet that I as a person firmly within the millennial generation bracket get frustrated by when those older than me don't seem to see it. It's a tough thing, accurately capturing the spirit and the potential of this thing that for many of us has become an intimate part of daily life, but I think he did it with grace, respect, and delight. The book is already a handful of years old, but if he were to publish a second edition, even just with an added chapter for the years since edition one, I'd buy it in a heartbeat.
I cannot recommend this book enough to anyone interested in following the criticisms and potential of the modern, linked data world.
Thompson avoided being overly pessimistic about our prospects as a world with exponentially-growing technological capabilities. His was a warmly realistic take. Extolling the virtues and the possibilities, while noting some setbacks and some bad scenarios both real and imagined. His ultimate message was one that I myself have been really trying to formulate eloquently and push on those I interact with and teach in my own professional capacity. It's one of constant learning and flexibility. The internet and everything it brings with it is just one more in a long series of innovations that have left traditionalists bemoaning the state of the future. Granted, it has the potential for so much more than many previous innovations, but it can be treated as many others before it as well. It's all about how we use things, not the fact that we have them to use. And as he stated many times as well, it's all about developing the right mental processes, or literacies, in this new technology, that will allow us to make the most of it while still living good lives.
Thompson treated all of his interviewees with respect in his descriptions of them, and was a sympathetically neutral party in describing topics that leave the United States, among other nations, extremely polarized. As with all works of popular nonfiction, there could potentially be fallacies and half-truths that I am not equipped to sniff out due to the length of the work and my own lack of time to pore over the endnotes, but I sensed that Thompson had good intentions, and the things he claimed made good sense to me. Most importantly, he really seemed to grasp the culture of using the internet that I as a person firmly within the millennial generation bracket get frustrated by when those older than me don't seem to see it. It's a tough thing, accurately capturing the spirit and the potential of this thing that for many of us has become an intimate part of daily life, but I think he did it with grace, respect, and delight. The book is already a handful of years old, but if he were to publish a second edition, even just with an added chapter for the years since edition one, I'd buy it in a heartbeat.
I cannot recommend this book enough to anyone interested in following the criticisms and potential of the modern, linked data world.
June 17, 2016
*I had to review this book for class so in lieu of a classic "Emily" review I am posting my academic book report on this novel.
Book Report: Smarter than You Think: How Technology is Changing Our Minds for the Better
Smarter Than You Think: How Technology is Changing Our Minds for the Better is a non-fiction book by Clive Thompson. Thompson clearly states that this is not a book about neuroscience or how technology is re-writing the brain so if that is what you are looking or you will be disappointed (page 13). It is a book about how humans are becoming centaurs (page 18). A centaur is a mythical creature that is part man, part horse. Thompson says that when humans use technology they are becoming hybrids, part human, part technology, and smarter than both. Humans are using technology to become smarter and augmenting themselves so that even when they aren’t actively using technology they are better information receivers and learners (page 18). The book is separated in to ten chapters. Each chapter tackles a different form of technology and discusses how these technological changes are influencing human behavior.
Thompson begins the book by declaring that machines are getting smarter, and more powerful, but he strongly argues that this isn’t hindering humans. With each new advent in technology, from the printing press to cell phones, there will be naysayers. These critics claim that all thought is going to be lost and that the human mind is deteriorating. Thompson does not believe this is the case. These smarter, better, faster, computers are actually helping humans, enabling us and expanding our creativity. Thompson states that, “[o]ur tools are everywhere, linked to our minds, working in tandem. Search engines answer our most obscure questions; status updates give us an ESP-like awareness of those around us; online collaborations let far-flung collaborators tackle problems too tangled for any individual…This transformation is rippling through every part of our cognition—how we learn, how we remember, and how we act upon that knowledge emotionally, intelligently, and politically” (page 6).
I found the chapter on memory, entitled, We, the memorious, to be the most interesting. My great-grandmother, and grandmother, both suffered from Alzheimer’s disease. I have been forced to watch as they forgot little things like where the left their keys, or what they ate for breakfast, until, eventually, my great-grandmother forgot who I was entirely. This disease terrifies me because, as Thompson states, “[m]emory is the most crucial and mysterious part of our identities; take it away, and identity goes away too” (page 23). We are our memories. This chapter, the second in the book, discussed how memories are formed, how they deteriorate over time, and technological advances that are making it so nothing is forgotten because everything can be recorded.
This chapter further discussed a case study. Parents, Deb Roy and Rupal Patel, who are both speech scientists at MIT, were interested in how children learned language. They installed cameras and microphones throughout their house in order to capture each word said to their child and document how the child learned to speak (page 19). What they found was that language was largely tied to locations and that after the initial learning of individual words (word births) which stopped approximately seven months after they began, cognitive effort shifted to two word sentences and creating novel word combinations (page 20). This is interesting because the more we know about how words are stored in the brain the more we learn about how memories are formed and how we can access them.
Another interesting chapter was chapter seven, Digital School, this section discusses how technology can improve classroom performance. It gives a case study on Matthew Carpenter, a ten year old boy. Matthew is tackling inverse trigonometry problems and acing them with the assistance of Kahn Academy (page 175). Kahn Academy is a free online site filled with thousands of instructional videos in math, science, and economics. The site allows you to watch videos and then answer practice problems. It rewards work with badges and answering streaks, turning learning in to a game (page 176). A second case study looked at a school in New Zealand that gave every student a netbook. Teachers found that students with netbooks were more engaged and that scores for these students dramatically improved, ten to thirteen times the national average (page 186).
Thompson claims that classrooms have largely gone unchanged since the 1350’s. Artist Laurentius de Voltolina painted a lecture scene at the University of Bologna that depicted a professor in the front of the classroom, at a podium, with students sitting in various states of boredom (page 178-9). While I disagree with the implication that school is boring, I do think Thompson is correct and it may be time for a change. If using technology improves scores, can make us better, faster learners, with the same retention of knowledge, we would be remiss if we didn’t use technology to our advantage. Technology should be Integrated it in to our teaching both inside and outside of the classroom.
Thompson’s non-fiction novel tackles a lot of material and demonstrates how technology is improving lives, and changing our minds for the better. In the epilogue he leaves us with an interesting query. How should we respond when we get powerful new tools for finding answers? Thompson says, we need to think of harder questions (page 288). I think that is the truth. As a new librarian I see my future not as an answer finder, which has been our historic role, but rather as a question generator. If you can ask a machine for any answer, patrons are going to need help figuring out what questions to ask.
Book Report: Smarter than You Think: How Technology is Changing Our Minds for the Better
Smarter Than You Think: How Technology is Changing Our Minds for the Better is a non-fiction book by Clive Thompson. Thompson clearly states that this is not a book about neuroscience or how technology is re-writing the brain so if that is what you are looking or you will be disappointed (page 13). It is a book about how humans are becoming centaurs (page 18). A centaur is a mythical creature that is part man, part horse. Thompson says that when humans use technology they are becoming hybrids, part human, part technology, and smarter than both. Humans are using technology to become smarter and augmenting themselves so that even when they aren’t actively using technology they are better information receivers and learners (page 18). The book is separated in to ten chapters. Each chapter tackles a different form of technology and discusses how these technological changes are influencing human behavior.
Thompson begins the book by declaring that machines are getting smarter, and more powerful, but he strongly argues that this isn’t hindering humans. With each new advent in technology, from the printing press to cell phones, there will be naysayers. These critics claim that all thought is going to be lost and that the human mind is deteriorating. Thompson does not believe this is the case. These smarter, better, faster, computers are actually helping humans, enabling us and expanding our creativity. Thompson states that, “[o]ur tools are everywhere, linked to our minds, working in tandem. Search engines answer our most obscure questions; status updates give us an ESP-like awareness of those around us; online collaborations let far-flung collaborators tackle problems too tangled for any individual…This transformation is rippling through every part of our cognition—how we learn, how we remember, and how we act upon that knowledge emotionally, intelligently, and politically” (page 6).
I found the chapter on memory, entitled, We, the memorious, to be the most interesting. My great-grandmother, and grandmother, both suffered from Alzheimer’s disease. I have been forced to watch as they forgot little things like where the left their keys, or what they ate for breakfast, until, eventually, my great-grandmother forgot who I was entirely. This disease terrifies me because, as Thompson states, “[m]emory is the most crucial and mysterious part of our identities; take it away, and identity goes away too” (page 23). We are our memories. This chapter, the second in the book, discussed how memories are formed, how they deteriorate over time, and technological advances that are making it so nothing is forgotten because everything can be recorded.
This chapter further discussed a case study. Parents, Deb Roy and Rupal Patel, who are both speech scientists at MIT, were interested in how children learned language. They installed cameras and microphones throughout their house in order to capture each word said to their child and document how the child learned to speak (page 19). What they found was that language was largely tied to locations and that after the initial learning of individual words (word births) which stopped approximately seven months after they began, cognitive effort shifted to two word sentences and creating novel word combinations (page 20). This is interesting because the more we know about how words are stored in the brain the more we learn about how memories are formed and how we can access them.
Another interesting chapter was chapter seven, Digital School, this section discusses how technology can improve classroom performance. It gives a case study on Matthew Carpenter, a ten year old boy. Matthew is tackling inverse trigonometry problems and acing them with the assistance of Kahn Academy (page 175). Kahn Academy is a free online site filled with thousands of instructional videos in math, science, and economics. The site allows you to watch videos and then answer practice problems. It rewards work with badges and answering streaks, turning learning in to a game (page 176). A second case study looked at a school in New Zealand that gave every student a netbook. Teachers found that students with netbooks were more engaged and that scores for these students dramatically improved, ten to thirteen times the national average (page 186).
Thompson claims that classrooms have largely gone unchanged since the 1350’s. Artist Laurentius de Voltolina painted a lecture scene at the University of Bologna that depicted a professor in the front of the classroom, at a podium, with students sitting in various states of boredom (page 178-9). While I disagree with the implication that school is boring, I do think Thompson is correct and it may be time for a change. If using technology improves scores, can make us better, faster learners, with the same retention of knowledge, we would be remiss if we didn’t use technology to our advantage. Technology should be Integrated it in to our teaching both inside and outside of the classroom.
Thompson’s non-fiction novel tackles a lot of material and demonstrates how technology is improving lives, and changing our minds for the better. In the epilogue he leaves us with an interesting query. How should we respond when we get powerful new tools for finding answers? Thompson says, we need to think of harder questions (page 288). I think that is the truth. As a new librarian I see my future not as an answer finder, which has been our historic role, but rather as a question generator. If you can ask a machine for any answer, patrons are going to need help figuring out what questions to ask.
March 1, 2018
I choose to read this for grad school. We were given a list of books, and this was one that I remembered seeing at the first library I worked at.
I liked how the author presents both positive, and negative, aspects of modern technology, while generally remaining upbeat about it. He points out that we've been at a lot of these crossroads before, and we've had naysayers and cheerleaders for similar leaps in technology.
My biggest problem is that there's so much presented between the pages that you have to read it slow. I often had to stop and think about what I had just read (not a bad thing). The author knows his stuff. Which is awesome. But bringing so many ideas together in a few pages really makes it a dense read.
I liked how the author presents both positive, and negative, aspects of modern technology, while generally remaining upbeat about it. He points out that we've been at a lot of these crossroads before, and we've had naysayers and cheerleaders for similar leaps in technology.
My biggest problem is that there's so much presented between the pages that you have to read it slow. I often had to stop and think about what I had just read (not a bad thing). The author knows his stuff. Which is awesome. But bringing so many ideas together in a few pages really makes it a dense read.
August 28, 2017
Through his research and detailed explanations, Clive Thompson presents convincing arguments concerning technology and its impact on society. Thompson's anecdotes skillfully captured my attention and helped to better explain larger concepts about technology that I did not understand on my own. From inquiries about memory to discussion of ambient awareness, Thompson provokes deeper thought into how technology and digital spaces influence our outlook on the world, ourselves, and the ways in which we interact with those around us.
May 30, 2019
A great, positive case for digital technology. I found many of the anecdotes new. It was a bit wordy and I couldn’t help but think how this might be different were it written in 2017. It’s a solid 3.5 stars.
June 4, 2017
Good book for millennials to feel good about themselves. Nothing too exotic.
August 6, 2022
Very interesting detailed examples used for each and every proof.
November 28, 2017
I appreciate what the author was saying. However, this wasn't one of my favorites.
January 28, 2020
I'm going to give this 3.5 stars. While this is a bit dated and some of the technologies and apps in this book have come and gone, the ideas that Mr. Thompson explains here still hold true today. Many of the technologies are being made better and are still trying to evolve. The problem doesn't come from the content that he writes but the repetitive themes that he touches on in each chapter. While I understand driving the point home and trying to get us excited for the possibility of what we might have in the future, Mr. Thompson tries to beat a dead horse by explaining everything in his chapters three or four times. This makes the chapters longer than the need to be, but also makes me lose focus quickly because after reading about the same thing over and over, I got heavy eyes that took the joy out of the reading about the future. Mr. Thompson did his homework and is very passionate about what he writes about which is great, but I think that expanding on a topic than giving 4 examples of the same thing would make this book a lot better.
October 16, 2021
[This review was written on October 15, 2014, and is being posted to GoodReads on October 15, 2021, in anticipation of my upcoming review of the book Coders by the same author.]
I begin this review by listing the 10 chapter titles along with the page numbers where they begin, as a way of summarizing the book’s contents: The Rise of the Centaurs, 1; We the Memorious, 19; Public Thinking, 45; The New Literacies, 83; The Art of Finding, 115; The Puzzle-Hungry World, 147; Digital School, 175; Ambient Awareness, 209; The Connected Society, 245; Epilogue, 279 (followed by acknowledgment, 35 pages of notes, and an index).
The author provides a resounding “yes” answer to the question of whether electronic gadgets and services, that augment our memory, are making us smarter. He notes that alarmists, who now claim that texting, e-mail, Internet searches, and so on are dumbing us down, will be proven wrong, just as the ancient Greek philosophers who thought the invention of writing will lead to a decay of knowledge and civilization were proven wrong. As another example, Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz famously worried about information explosion. He stated that the growing mass of books could lead to general oblivion and a return to barbarism.
It is quite true that we are drowning from a flood of information coming at us from electronic sources, making our lives a constant struggle to catch up with the in-flow. While there are gems among status posts, blogs, and other social-media content, one has to sift through a lot of crap to find them. American sci-fi writer Theodore Sturgeon [1918-1985] famously defended harsh criticisms of his genre by saying that while he agreed that 90% of sci-fi was crap, so was 90% of everything else; hence the geeky Sturgeon’s Law, “Ninety percent of everything is crap” [p. 48].
Alarmists impede scientific progress in other ways as well. For example, being extra careful around newborn babies, who are quite fragile, is a good thing. Scientific experiments have shown that the brain circuits of new parents exhibit activity similar to that in people suffering from OCD. Now, an alarmist would use this finding to form the scary headline, “BECOMING A PARENT ERODES YOUR BRAIN FUNCTION” [p. 15].
In digital technology, we have moved beyond chess-playing computers, demonstrating that machines can excel in domains previously thought to be outside the capabilities of artificial intelligence. We now have “collaborative chess,” aka “advanced chess,” in which a human player is allowed to consult computers before making his/her move. The player can access a wealth of information from past games and can have the computer generate candidate moves, which s/he then analyzes in detail, thereby freeing his/her mental powers to enhance creativity. In “freestyle chess,” teams consisting of any number of humans and computers compete against each other. Greater expertise in collaborating with computers has allowed average chess players to beat highly-ranked players in this latter game. In this new domain, human intelligence is amplified by machines.
Whether or not we like digital chess, one of its side effects is to help humans become grandmasters at a younger age. All the practice they get playing against computers and the immense databases of chess games available via the Internet help improve their skills. The three properties of digital tools that make them extremely powerful are near-infinite memory, dot-connecting (discovering relationships), and explosive publishing.
The author reminds us that memory isn’t a fixed store of past information to which new experiences are added. Rather, memory is malleable and changes over time to serve our new situations and conditions. In an experiment, 70% of teenagers questioned said that religion was helpful to them; in their forties, only 26% of the same group recalled having felt that way. Fully 82% of the teenagers indicated that their parents used corporal punishment; in their forties, only 1/3 recalled being hit by their parents. This is known as “hindsight bias.” The brain is constantly being rewired. “Almost everything rewires it, including this book” [p. 15].
In the domain of permanence, we are experiencing an immense transition, form a period in which most of our life details were routinely forgotten to one in which most of our experiences are captured and saved. The impact on the way we live will be immense. “Before the Internet came along, most people rarely wrote anything at all for pleasure or intellectual satisfaction after graduating from high school or college. … even in the United Kingdom’s peak letter-writing years … the average citizen received barely one letter every two weeks … today it’s the exceptional person who doesn’t write five messages a day. I think a hundred years from now scholars will be swimming in a bewildering excess of life writing.”
Writing improves our memory and ability to recall: in experiments, people who wrote words remembered them better than those who only read them. Writing is also a necessary mechanism for enhancing our understanding. Cecil Day-Lewis said of his poetic compositions, “If it were clear in my mind, I should have no incentive or need to write about it … We do not write in order to be understood; we write in order to understand” [p. 51]. Moving ideas from your head to paper forces you to defend your ideas instead of using hand-waving. According to philosopher Francis Bacon, “reading maketh a full man, conference a ready man, and writing an exact man” [p. 56]. “I’d argue that the cognitive shift in going from an audience of zero (talking to yourself) to an audience of ten people (a few friends or random strangers checking out your online posts) is so big that it’s actually huger than going from ten people to a million people” [p. 56].
Social media have broadened opportunities for participation, but such participation does not magically remove biases and antiquated social norms. Referring to the fact that women (as well as many minorities) suffer greater abuse in on-line discussion forums, Laurie Penny has quipped, “An opinion is the short skirt of the Internet” [p. 77]. There is also greater opportunity for deception and misinformation in the digital age. While photos were doctored even before the age of Photoshop (e.g., Joseph Stalin loved to order the creation of doctored photos showing his rivals in incriminating positions or to erase ministers he had killed from the historical records), it has become much easier today and everyone can do it.
The digital age has modified the notion of literacy. Images and video are now central to our interpersonal communications. This was recognized decades ago by Laszlo Moholy-Nagy, Hungarian photographer and painter (1895-1946), who said, “The illiterate of the future will be ignorant of pen and camera alike” [p. 110]. Having already spread to the video domain, literacy will soon encompass 3D printing as an extension of 2D photocopying.
We also need to develop or perfect new tools. For example, we have come to love post-it notes and use them widely on books and other hard-copy reading material. What would be the video equivalent of post-in notes? As another example, Wordle is a data analysis tool that makes a cloud with large and small words indicating their frequencies in a text that you supply. It is a great tool for writers who want to avoid using some words too many times. It can be used to analyze speeches for empahses or themes. An on-line version of this tool, that accepts your text as cut-and-paste or from sites that have RSS feed, is available at:
http://www.wordle.net/create
I used this on-line tool to create a Wordle from the text of a book review of mine on the history of Iranian Jews. The resulting image provides a visual map of the focus and key concepts in the analyzed piece.
https://twitter.com/BehroozParhami/st...
I read this book a few months ago, but given the backlog of my reviews, I just got around to writing this review. Had I wanted to write this review from memory, it would have been much shorter and less detailed. Having taken extensive notes during my reading, I approached this review much more confidently, validating one of the points of the author that writing allows better learning and greater recall. I recommend the book highly.
I begin this review by listing the 10 chapter titles along with the page numbers where they begin, as a way of summarizing the book’s contents: The Rise of the Centaurs, 1; We the Memorious, 19; Public Thinking, 45; The New Literacies, 83; The Art of Finding, 115; The Puzzle-Hungry World, 147; Digital School, 175; Ambient Awareness, 209; The Connected Society, 245; Epilogue, 279 (followed by acknowledgment, 35 pages of notes, and an index).
The author provides a resounding “yes” answer to the question of whether electronic gadgets and services, that augment our memory, are making us smarter. He notes that alarmists, who now claim that texting, e-mail, Internet searches, and so on are dumbing us down, will be proven wrong, just as the ancient Greek philosophers who thought the invention of writing will lead to a decay of knowledge and civilization were proven wrong. As another example, Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz famously worried about information explosion. He stated that the growing mass of books could lead to general oblivion and a return to barbarism.
It is quite true that we are drowning from a flood of information coming at us from electronic sources, making our lives a constant struggle to catch up with the in-flow. While there are gems among status posts, blogs, and other social-media content, one has to sift through a lot of crap to find them. American sci-fi writer Theodore Sturgeon [1918-1985] famously defended harsh criticisms of his genre by saying that while he agreed that 90% of sci-fi was crap, so was 90% of everything else; hence the geeky Sturgeon’s Law, “Ninety percent of everything is crap” [p. 48].
Alarmists impede scientific progress in other ways as well. For example, being extra careful around newborn babies, who are quite fragile, is a good thing. Scientific experiments have shown that the brain circuits of new parents exhibit activity similar to that in people suffering from OCD. Now, an alarmist would use this finding to form the scary headline, “BECOMING A PARENT ERODES YOUR BRAIN FUNCTION” [p. 15].
In digital technology, we have moved beyond chess-playing computers, demonstrating that machines can excel in domains previously thought to be outside the capabilities of artificial intelligence. We now have “collaborative chess,” aka “advanced chess,” in which a human player is allowed to consult computers before making his/her move. The player can access a wealth of information from past games and can have the computer generate candidate moves, which s/he then analyzes in detail, thereby freeing his/her mental powers to enhance creativity. In “freestyle chess,” teams consisting of any number of humans and computers compete against each other. Greater expertise in collaborating with computers has allowed average chess players to beat highly-ranked players in this latter game. In this new domain, human intelligence is amplified by machines.
Whether or not we like digital chess, one of its side effects is to help humans become grandmasters at a younger age. All the practice they get playing against computers and the immense databases of chess games available via the Internet help improve their skills. The three properties of digital tools that make them extremely powerful are near-infinite memory, dot-connecting (discovering relationships), and explosive publishing.
The author reminds us that memory isn’t a fixed store of past information to which new experiences are added. Rather, memory is malleable and changes over time to serve our new situations and conditions. In an experiment, 70% of teenagers questioned said that religion was helpful to them; in their forties, only 26% of the same group recalled having felt that way. Fully 82% of the teenagers indicated that their parents used corporal punishment; in their forties, only 1/3 recalled being hit by their parents. This is known as “hindsight bias.” The brain is constantly being rewired. “Almost everything rewires it, including this book” [p. 15].
In the domain of permanence, we are experiencing an immense transition, form a period in which most of our life details were routinely forgotten to one in which most of our experiences are captured and saved. The impact on the way we live will be immense. “Before the Internet came along, most people rarely wrote anything at all for pleasure or intellectual satisfaction after graduating from high school or college. … even in the United Kingdom’s peak letter-writing years … the average citizen received barely one letter every two weeks … today it’s the exceptional person who doesn’t write five messages a day. I think a hundred years from now scholars will be swimming in a bewildering excess of life writing.”
Writing improves our memory and ability to recall: in experiments, people who wrote words remembered them better than those who only read them. Writing is also a necessary mechanism for enhancing our understanding. Cecil Day-Lewis said of his poetic compositions, “If it were clear in my mind, I should have no incentive or need to write about it … We do not write in order to be understood; we write in order to understand” [p. 51]. Moving ideas from your head to paper forces you to defend your ideas instead of using hand-waving. According to philosopher Francis Bacon, “reading maketh a full man, conference a ready man, and writing an exact man” [p. 56]. “I’d argue that the cognitive shift in going from an audience of zero (talking to yourself) to an audience of ten people (a few friends or random strangers checking out your online posts) is so big that it’s actually huger than going from ten people to a million people” [p. 56].
Social media have broadened opportunities for participation, but such participation does not magically remove biases and antiquated social norms. Referring to the fact that women (as well as many minorities) suffer greater abuse in on-line discussion forums, Laurie Penny has quipped, “An opinion is the short skirt of the Internet” [p. 77]. There is also greater opportunity for deception and misinformation in the digital age. While photos were doctored even before the age of Photoshop (e.g., Joseph Stalin loved to order the creation of doctored photos showing his rivals in incriminating positions or to erase ministers he had killed from the historical records), it has become much easier today and everyone can do it.
The digital age has modified the notion of literacy. Images and video are now central to our interpersonal communications. This was recognized decades ago by Laszlo Moholy-Nagy, Hungarian photographer and painter (1895-1946), who said, “The illiterate of the future will be ignorant of pen and camera alike” [p. 110]. Having already spread to the video domain, literacy will soon encompass 3D printing as an extension of 2D photocopying.
We also need to develop or perfect new tools. For example, we have come to love post-it notes and use them widely on books and other hard-copy reading material. What would be the video equivalent of post-in notes? As another example, Wordle is a data analysis tool that makes a cloud with large and small words indicating their frequencies in a text that you supply. It is a great tool for writers who want to avoid using some words too many times. It can be used to analyze speeches for empahses or themes. An on-line version of this tool, that accepts your text as cut-and-paste or from sites that have RSS feed, is available at:
http://www.wordle.net/create
I used this on-line tool to create a Wordle from the text of a book review of mine on the history of Iranian Jews. The resulting image provides a visual map of the focus and key concepts in the analyzed piece.
https://twitter.com/BehroozParhami/st...
I read this book a few months ago, but given the backlog of my reviews, I just got around to writing this review. Had I wanted to write this review from memory, it would have been much shorter and less detailed. Having taken extensive notes during my reading, I approached this review much more confidently, validating one of the points of the author that writing allows better learning and greater recall. I recommend the book highly.
July 12, 2018
Excellent read. A well balanced look at the impact of Technology on us. I get so tired of the mantra that our tech is making us stupid. An early quote sets the tone for the book: "At their best, today’s digital tools help us see more, retain more, communicate more. At their worst, they leave us prey to the manipulation of the toolmakers. But on balance, I’d argue, what is happening is deeply positive." I also liked his take on Social Media "We’re becoming more conversational thinkers—a shift that has been rocky, not least because everyday public thought uncorks the incivility and prejudices that are commonly repressed in face-to-face life. But at its best (which, I’d argue, is surprisingly often), it’s a thrilling development, reigniting ancient traditions of dialogue and debate."
I also like the focus on leveraging tools for what they are good for. Too many times we stay limited by our preconceived notions. "the point isn’t to simply replicate more expensively what they’re already doing quite well with paper, pencils, and books. It’s to do new things that they currently can’t do. It’s to teach kids by using the peculiar abilities of networked devices—like public thinking, new literacies, and the powerful insights that come from not just using, but programming, the machine."
I also enjoyed the section on Ambient Awareness. "A group that’s connected in an ambient fashion can—counterintuitively—spend less time on communication, particularly the writing and reading of endless e-mail. And e-mail has indeed become one of the banes of corporate existence. Office workers spend an estimated 28 percent of the workweek writing and reading the stuff, a load that’s growing by 7 percent a year."
I also like the focus on leveraging tools for what they are good for. Too many times we stay limited by our preconceived notions. "the point isn’t to simply replicate more expensively what they’re already doing quite well with paper, pencils, and books. It’s to do new things that they currently can’t do. It’s to teach kids by using the peculiar abilities of networked devices—like public thinking, new literacies, and the powerful insights that come from not just using, but programming, the machine."
I also enjoyed the section on Ambient Awareness. "A group that’s connected in an ambient fashion can—counterintuitively—spend less time on communication, particularly the writing and reading of endless e-mail. And e-mail has indeed become one of the banes of corporate existence. Office workers spend an estimated 28 percent of the workweek writing and reading the stuff, a load that’s growing by 7 percent a year."
Displaying 1 - 30 of 349 reviews