A rewired mind

I recently read the article We’ve always been distracted or at least worried that we are by Joe Stadolnik about how humans have always been worried that new technologies will keep us from learning. I was interested in the many citations he gives of medieval philosophers who were worried about the inventions of writing, books, and even indexes. It parallels the worry we have today that the sheer amount of information available to us is weakening our mental abilities to remember and to learn. I can’t imagine what these philosophers would say on seeing our world today.

Reading gives me the opportunity to learn more, but I am usually distracted from my present situation while doing so. Sometimes I get bored with long articles. Are these signs of my inability to remember, to focus, or to learn?

When I was young, my dad taught me how to increase my mental capacity by memorizing using specific images. I can still remember the mnemonic we used for the original thirteen colonies. Not using your memory can lower your capacity to remember.

Stadolnik also pointed out that we shouldn’t worry about new mental frameworks that come because of technology.

“New regimes of memory and attention replace the old ones. Eventually they become the old regimes and are replaced, then longed for.”

While it may seem that the more information that is available, the less our minds have to work, I think the opposite may be true. When I am solving problem at work, I write it down. Writing helps give us more precise mental maps of complex processes. Ever since the invention of writing, or the invention of books or even Google, we have been on a trajectory of more and more technology. If our minds are rewired, then I’m glad for it.