首页
外语
计算机
考研
公务员
职业资格
财经
工程
司法
医学
专升本
自考
实用职业技能
登录
外语
Does the Internet Make You Dumber? A) The Roman philosopher Seneca may have put it best 2,000 years ago: "To be everywhe
Does the Internet Make You Dumber? A) The Roman philosopher Seneca may have put it best 2,000 years ago: "To be everywhe
admin
2021-04-22
28
问题
Does the Internet Make You Dumber?
A) The Roman philosopher Seneca may have put it best 2,000 years ago: "To be everywhere is to be nowhere." Today, the Internet grants us easy access to unprecedented amounts of information. But a growing body of scientific evidence suggests that the Internet, with its constant distractions and interruptions, is also turning us into disrupted and superficial thinkers.
B) The picture emerging from the research is deeply troubling, at least to anyone who values the depth, rather than just the velocity (速度), of human thought. People who read text studded with links, the studies show, comprehend less than those who read traditional linear text. People who watch busy multimedia presentations remember less than those who take in information in a more sedate (镇定的) and focused manner. People who are continually distracted by e-mails, alerts and other messages understand less than those who are able to concentrate. And people who juggle (尽力同时应付) many tasks are less creative and less productive than those who do one thing at a time.
C) The common thread in these disabilities is dispersing our attention. The richness of our thoughts, our memories and even our personalities hinges on our ability to focus the mind and sustain concentration. Only when we pay deep attention to a new piece of information are we able to associate it " meaningfully and systematically with knowledge already well established in memory," writes the Nobel Prize-winning neuroscientist (神经科学家) Eric Kandel. Such associations are essential to mastering complex concepts.
D) When we’re constantly distracted and interrupted, as we tend to be online, our brains are unable to generalize the strong and expansive neural connections that give depth and distinctiveness to our contemplating. We become mere signal-processing units, quickly shepherding disjointed bits of information into and then out of short-term memory.
E) In an article published in Science last year, Patricia Greenfield, a leading developmental psychologist, reviewed dozens of studies on how different media technologies influence our cognitive abilities. Some of the studies indicated that certain computer tasks, like playing video games, can enhance "visual literacy skills" , increasing the speed at which people can shift their focus among icons and other images on screens. Other studies, however, found that such rapid shifts in focus, even if performed adeptly, result in less rigorous and " more automatic" thinking.
F) In one experiment conducted at Cornell University, for example, half a class of students was allowed to use Internet-connected laptops during a lecture, while the other had to keep their computers shut. Those who browsed the Web performed much worse on a subsequent test of how well they retained the lecture’s content. While it’s hardly surprising that Web surfing would distract students, it should be a note of caution to schools that are wiring their classrooms in hopes of improving learning.
G) Ms. Greenfield concluded that ’every medium develops some cognitive skills at the expense of others. " Our growing use of screen-based media, she said, has strengthened visual-spatial intelligence, which can improve the ability to do jobs that involve keeping track of lots of simultaneous signals, like air traffic control. But that has been accompanied by " new weaknesses in higher-order cognitive processes ", including " abstract vocabulary, mindfulness, reflection, inductive problem solving, critical thinking, and imagination." We’re becoming, in a word, shallower.
H) In another experiment, recently conducted at Stanford University’s Communication between Humans and Interactive Media Lab, a team of researchers gave various cognitive tests to 49 people who do a lot of media multitasking and 52 people who multitask much less frequently. The heavy multitaskers performed poorly on all the tests. They were more easily distracted, had less control over their attention, and were much less able to distinguish important information from trivial,
I) The researchers were surprised by the results. They had expected that the intensive multitaskers would have gained some unique mental advantages from all their on-screen juggling. But that wasn’t the case. In fact, the heavy multitaskers weren’t even good at multitasking. They were considerably less adept at switching between tasks than the more infrequent multitaskers. " Everything distracts them," observed Clifford Nass, the professor who heads the Stanford lab.
J) It would be one thing if the ill effects went away as soon as we turned off our computers and cellphones. But they don’t. The cellular structure of the human brain, scientists have discovered, adapts readily to the tools we use, including those for finding, storing and sharing information. By changing our habits of mind, each new technology strengthens certain neural pathways and weakens others. The cellular alterations continue to shape the way we think even when we’re not using the technology.
K) The pioneering neuroscientist Michael Merzenich believes our brains are being "massively remodeled" by our ever-intensifying use of the Web and related media. In the 1970s and 1980s, Mr. Merzenich, now a professor emeritus at the University of California in San Francisco, conducted a famous series of experiments on primate brains that revealed how extensively and quickly neural circuits change in response to experience. When, for example, Mr. Merzenich rearranged the nerves in a monkey’s hand, the nerve cells in the animal’s sensory cortex quickly reorganized themselves to create a new "mental map" of the hand. In a conversation late last year, he said that he was profoundly worried about the cognitive consequences of the constant distractions and interruptions the Internet bombards us with. The long-term effect on the quality of our intellectual lives, he said, could be "deadly".
L) What we seem to be sacrificing in all our surfing and searching is our capacity to engage in the quieter, attentive modes of thought that underpin contemplation, reflection and introspection. The Web never encourages us to slow down. It keeps us in a state of perpetual mental locomotion. It is revealing, and distressing, to compare the cognitive effects of the Internet with those of an earlier information technology, the printed book. Whereas the Internet scatters our attention, the book focuses it. Unlike the screen, the page promotes contemplativeness.
M) Reading a long sequence of pages helps us develop a rare kind of mental discipline. The innate bias of the human brain, after all, is to be distracted. Our predisposition is to be aware of as much of what’s going on around us as possible. Our fast-paced, reflexive shifts in focus were once crucial to our survival. They reduced the odds that a predator would take us by surprise or that we’d overlook a nearby source of food.
N) To read a book is to practice an unnatural process of thought. It requires us to place ourselves at what T. S. Eliot, in his poem Four Quartets, called "the still point of the turning world". We have to forge or strengthen the neural links needed to counter our instinctive distractedness, thereby gaining greater control over our attention and our mind.
O) It is this control, this mental discipline, which we are at risk of losing as we spend ever more time scanning and skimming online. If the slow progression of words across printed pages damped our craving to be inundated by mental stimulation, the Internet indulges it. It returns us to our native state of distractedness, while presenting us with far more distractions than our ancestors ever had to contend with. Nicholas Carr is the author, most recently, of The Shallows: What the Internet Is Doing to Our Brains.
Whereas the Internet distracts our attention, the book makes us concentrate.
选项
答案
L
解析
转载请注明原文地址:https://kaotiyun.com/show/vIJ7777K
0
大学英语六级
相关试题推荐
America’smostpopularnewspaperwebsitetodayannouncedthattheeraoffreeonlinejournalismisdrawingtoaclose.TheNewY
America’smostpopularnewspaperwebsitetodayannouncedthattheeraoffreeonlinejournalismisdrawingtoaclose.TheNewY
America’smostpopularnewspaperwebsitetodayannouncedthattheeraoffreeonlinejournalismisdrawingtoaclose.TheNewY
沿海城市
人口老龄化是指一个国家或地区老年人口增长的现象。生育率下降和人均寿命(lifeexpectancy)延长是导致人口老龄化的两大因素。根据联合国传统标准,一个国家有超过10%的人口超过60岁就被称为老龄化社会。由于计划生育政策的影响,中国大陆已于1999年
秦始皇是中国历史上杰出的政治家、军事家。公元前221年,他统一中国,建立了历史上第一个统一的、多民族的、高度中央集权的(highlycentralized)国家——秦朝,并成为中国第一个皇帝,自称“始皇帝”。为加强统治,他实施了一系列的改革,如统一文字,
郑和是明朝伟大的航海家(navigator),他完成了人类历史上伟大的壮举。1405年7月,他率领庞大的船队进行了首次远航(voyage),船队由240多艘船只、27400名船员组成。他们访问了30多个位于西太平洋和印度洋的国家和地区。他一共进行了7次远航
“互联网+”(Internet+)代表一种新的经济形态。通俗来讲,“互联网+”就是“互联网+各个传统行业”,利用信息通信技术以及互联网平台,让互联网与传统行业进行深度融合,创造新的发展生态。“互联网+”战略的核心内容有两方面:一是运用互联网促进传统产业转型
随机试题
[*]
性联低丙种球蛋白血症的特点有
关于药物制剂稳定性的叙述,正确的是
呼吸性酸中毒最先应解决的问题
下列不属于生产安全事故调查统计报告范围的是()。
我某进出口公司与德国某贸易有限公司订立了一份出口“龙口粉丝”的合同,凭样品买卖,支付方式为货到目的港验收后付款。当到货经买方验收后发现货物品质与样品不符,德商即决定退货并拒绝提货。后来,货物因保管不妥完全变质,且德国海关向我收取仓储费及变质商品处理费共3万
某企业项目要求的最低报酬率为10%,净现值为50万元,则该项目内含报酬率会()。
互质的两个数()。
在VisualFoxPro中,代码片段是指
IfachildsayshedreamsofwinningaNobelPrize,youshouldencouragehiminsteadoflaughingathim.
最新回复
(
0
)