The ills of technology

I found this article very interesting. Its about how constant multitasking can rewire our brains, and gives an example of a young tech guru who has lost the ability to focus his attention on any one thing. He's constantly looking for "something else" to the detriment of his family-life and even his work.

Now, I do believe that this family represents a good example on the extreme end of things and I fully admit that heavy use of technology can rewire a person's way of thinking. I have no particular beef with the findings of this article whatsoever.

On the other hand, it seems like they got a really dysfunctional / scatterbrained married couple who just happen to be heavily into technology.

That said, some people will read an article like that and think "technology is bad". Maybe people like these parents who are upset about how an educational video game is being used in New Mexico schools. The game is successful enough that the kids actually want to play it, even though it requires the understanding and use of mathematics.

"We are feeding the addiction of these children to video games," said parent Marlene Perrotte. Indeed, we should abandon an incredibly effective tool that actually gets kids excited to learn about math. Because, as Marlene so eloquently put it, "We are feeding the addiction of these children to video games." I shudder.

And before you go, make sure to check out this test to gauge how well you can filter out distractions. Even though I would be considered a high multi-tasker, I scored perfectly. This just furthers my belief that this article took an extreme worst-case example family just to make the story sexy.