Below is my first draft of project 3 that is 1000 + words. My 50 words for this assignment is all the way at the bottom.
Matthew Dewhurst
Professor Jesse Miller
English 110
19 April 2024
Why Digital Technology is a Drug
Digital technology is a highly scrutinized innovation with many pros and cons. Its brilliance and wide access to unlimited information is eye-opening. From a personal educational point of view, the vastness of the internet is extremely helpful for learning and keeping up with my classes. However, outside of the classroom, digital technology can be a very distracting thing that takes time away from what is most important to us. Conversations with my family and friends are being replaced by time on my phone or computer. The time it takes me to complete assignments is drawn out and takes longer due to the distractions of digital technology. Nicholas Carr, writer and finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in 2011, highlights these pros and cons of digital technology in his essay “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” He details how digital technology can be a distraction and causes us to have less attention for things we used to be able to focus on. There are a lot of comparisons between Carr’s writing, and some of my classmates’ writing in English 110. Liv Arvidson argues that technology today is becoming an addiction, and a huge distraction for children especially. She argues that screen time for kids needs to be limited so that they don’t grow up with unhealthy habits. Her opinions on the matter of digital technology align with Carr’s; it is a distraction, and we need to decrease our usage of it. Jack Thurmond, another classmate of mine, underlines the importance of technology in a working sense, while also calling attention to the dangerous, addicting side of it. Thurmond emphasizes his addiction to his phone, specifically, while talking about how it can make him less productive and more inefficient due to its distractions. Digital technology is detrimental to humans’ ability to focus, due to its addictive, distracting features.
Digital technology’s ease and brilliance has a negative effect on our ability to focus and take in information. Carr worries that we have become accustomed to relying on the internet for our source of knowledge. Everything is so quick and easy on the internet, so now anything more time-consuming will feel boring and unimportant. Carr furthers this idea, by writing, “And what the Net seems to be doing is chipping away my capacity for concentration and contemplation. My mind now expects to take in information the way the Net distributes it: in a swiftly moving stream of particles. Once I was a scuba diver in the sea of words. Now I zip along the surface like a guy on a jet ski” (2). The internet at times proves to be a nuisance when it comes to focusing and completing mental tasks. Its efficiency and ease cause us to lose our attention-span and patience. We have become so accustomed to the bulk of the demanding work being done by digital technology that we are now ill-prepared for doing it ourselves. Similarly to Carr, Thurmond claims that the freedom and recreational use of digital technology causes him to be distracted and spend longer amounts of time when doing his work due to unnecessary distractions. He writes, “I can think of countless times when I have sat down to do a homework assignment and ended up watching tik toks, film and spent more time than needed to complete an assignment.” Thurmond’s work, and ability to focus are compromised by his attachment to his phone. Thurmond’s phone is used as a coping mechanism to cure his boredom; because of this, he is no longer able to focus on things that don’t interest him. This demonstrates how despite all digital technology’s good aspects, it proves to be a burden when it comes to putting in hard, attention-required work. Thurmond’s writing, like Carr’s, demonstrates their agreement that digital technology poses many distractions, and causes us to be more inefficient and unproductive.
Digital technology is an addictive innovation that causes us to be more distracted and less focused. The ease and importance that technology possesses in our social and work life has caused us to rely on it and be controlled by it. Carr details technology’s chokehold on us by writing, “Even when I’m not working, I’m as likely as not to be foraging in the Web’s info-thickets’ reading and writing e-mails, scanning headlines and blog posts, watching videos and listening to it podcasts, or just tripping from link to link. (unlike footnotes, to which they’re sometimes likened, hyperlinks don’t merely point to related works; they propel you toward them)” (2). Carr describes how his life often revolves around digital technology. When not working, his entertainment comes in the form of the internet’s services. As Carr mentions, the internet and its information, ideas, and entertainment “propel you toward them.” This is an interesting choice of words, and hints at Carr’s inability to ignore them. Likewise to Carr, Arvidson has a similar idea regarding how digital technology draws us in and causes us to be addicted to it. Arvidson focuses more on how technology’s addictive ways affect kids growing up. She writes, “I see kids at restaurants and other public settings who will only “behave” when on a screen. I have a cousin who is 8 years old, and he cannot go very long without his tablet, because his parents have always allowed him to have it whenever he wanted. Now, when they say no, he throws tantrums and acts out because he does not know life without it.” Arvidson demonstrates how the attitude, and ability to behave for kids revolves around whether they have a screen around them. Their reliance on digital technology is so strong that they are not able to conduct themselves in the right way without it. Arvidson shows how the drug of digital technology causes withdrawals when taken away. When parents don’t allow kids to be around a screen they misbehave and throw a tantrum. This will prove to be detrimental later in life; this bad habit of addiction to technology will make them unable to function without it. When they grow up they won’t be able to complete the same tasks and skills that adults were once able to. They also won’t have the same level of social skills due to the amount of conversations taken away due to digital technology. I can relate the ideas of Carr and Arvidson to my own firsthand experiences. I am in agreement with the other writers that I am distracted by my phone while I work. The addiction-riddled side of digital technology is something that’s distracting humans and making us less focused and competent.
Now below is my final draft for project 3:
Matthew Dewhurst
Professor Jesse Miller
English 110
19 April 2024
Why Digital Technology is a Drug
Digital technology is a highly scrutinized innovation with many pros and cons. Its brilliance and wide access to unlimited information is eye-opening. From a personal educational point of view, the vastness of the internet is extremely helpful for learning and keeping up with my classes. However, outside of the classroom, digital technology can be a very distracting thing that takes time away from what is most important to us. Conversations with my family and friends are being replaced by time on my phone or computer. The time it takes me to complete assignments is drawn out and takes longer due to the distractions of digital technology. Nicholas Carr, writer and finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in 2011, highlights these pros and cons of digital technology in his essay “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” He details how digital technology can be a distraction and causes us to have less attention for things we used to be able to focus on. There are a lot of comparisons between Carr’s writing, and some of my classmates’ writing in English 110. Liv Arvidson argues that technology today is becoming an addiction, and a huge distraction for children especially. She argues that screen time for kids needs to be limited so that they don’t grow up with unhealthy habits. Her opinions on the matter of digital technology align with Carr’s; it is a distraction, and we need to decrease our usage of it. Jack Thurmond, another classmate of mine, underlines the importance of technology in a working sense, while also calling attention to the dangerous, addicting side of it. Thurmond emphasizes his addiction to his phone, specifically, while talking about how it can make him less productive and more inefficient due to its distractions. Through the work of the aforementioned three writers, I will demonstrate how we see a theme through their experiences and opinions that digital technology can be detrimental, due to its addictive, distracting features.
Digital technology’s ease and brilliance has a negative effect on our ability to focus and take in information. Carr worries that we have become accustomed to relying on the internet for our source of knowledge. Everything is so quick and easy on the internet, so now anything more time-consuming will feel boring and unimportant. Carr furthers this idea, by writing, “And what the Net seems to be doing is chipping away my capacity for concentration and contemplation. My mind now expects to take in information the way the Net distributes it: in a swiftly moving stream of particles. Once I was a scuba diver in the sea of words. Now I zip along the surface like a guy on a jet ski” (2). The internet at times proves to be a nuisance when it comes to focusing and completing mental tasks. Its efficiency and ease cause us to lose our attention-span and patience. We have become so accustomed to the bulk of the demanding work being done by digital technology that we are now ill-prepared for doing it ourselves. Similarly to Carr, Thurmond claims that the freedom and recreational use of digital technology causes him to be distracted and spend longer amounts of time when doing his work due to unnecessary distractions. He writes, “I can think of countless times when I have sat down to do a homework assignment and ended up watching tik toks, film and spent more time than needed to complete an assignment.” Thurmond’s work, and ability to focus are compromised by his attachment to his phone. Thurmond’s phone is used as a coping mechanism to cure his boredom; because of this, he is no longer able to focus on things that don’t interest him. This demonstrates how despite all digital technology’s good aspects, it proves to be a burden when it comes to putting in hard, attention-required work. I can relate to Thurmond’s ideas; the wide world of the internet poses many diversions when doing work. It has become so difficult to ignore the internet, and the distractions it poses, while working that I need to allocate more time to doing my work just because of it. Thurmond’s writing, like Carr’s, demonstrates their agreement that digital technology poses many distractions, and causes us to be more inefficient and unproductive.
Digital technology is an addictive innovation that causes us to be more distracted and less focused. The ease and importance that technology possesses in our social and work life has caused us to rely on it and be controlled by it. Carr details technology’s chokehold on us by writing, “Even when I’m not working, I’m as likely as not to be foraging in the Web’s info-thickets’ reading and writing e-mails, scanning headlines and blog posts, watching videos and listening to it podcasts, or just tripping from link to link. (unlike footnotes, to which they’re sometimes likened, hyperlinks don’t merely point to related works; they propel you toward them)” (2). Carr describes how his life often revolves around digital technology. When not working, his entertainment comes in the form of the internet’s services. As Carr mentions, the internet and its information, ideas, and entertainment “propel you toward them.” This is an interesting choice of words, and hints at Carr’s inability to ignore them. Likewise to Carr, Arvidson has a similar idea regarding how digital technology draws us in and causes us to be addicted to it. Arvidson focuses more on how technology’s addictive ways affect kids growing up. She writes, “I see kids at restaurants and other public settings who will only “behave” when on a screen. I have a cousin who is 8 years old, and he cannot go very long without his tablet, because his parents have always allowed him to have it whenever he wanted. Now, when they say no, he throws tantrums and acts out because he does not know life without it.” Arvidson demonstrates how the attitude, and ability to behave for kids revolves around whether they have a screen around them. Their reliance on digital technology is so strong that they are not able to conduct themselves in the right way without it. Arvidson shows how the drug of digital technology causes withdrawals when taken away. When parents don’t allow kids to be around a screen they misbehave and throw a tantrum. This will prove to be detrimental later in life; this bad habit of addiction to technology will make them unable to function without it. When they grow up they won’t be able to complete the same tasks and skills that adults were once able to. They also won’t have the same level of social skills due to the amount of conversations taken away due to digital technology. I can relate the ideas of Carr and Arvidson to my own firsthand experiences. I am in agreement with the other writers that I am distracted by my phone while I work. It causes me to look at it every few moments, interrupting my work, to see if there’s anything of importance on it. My addiction to my phone is evident through my inability to be without it for a short period of time. The addiction-riddled side of digital technology is something that’s distracting humans and making us less focused and competent.
The brilliant and multi-faceted side of digital technology is making us more distracted and less focused on things that came easy to us. Due to the efficiency and accuracy of technology, our reliance on it has grown too strong and powerful. We expect technology to do things that we were once able to do ourselves, and have now become too lazy, and impatient to do it. Not only is technology affecting adults in the way they work, but it is also negatively affecting children in the way they act in public. Their reliance on screens to behave will have long-lasting effects on them, where it will become evident in their social skills. Our reliance on technology has become an addiction; we need it to complete our everyday tasks, and without it we aren’t able to carry out our lives at the same level. There is no doubt that digital technology is vital to our lives; it makes us more efficient and effective. However, there are sides of technology that are distracting, and detrimental to our productivity. We need to limit children’s usage to these sides of technology; growing up without them will create good habits later in life where these children will not be addicted to technology.
Works Cited
- Carr, Nicholas. “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” The Atlantic. July 2008.
- Thurmond, Jack. “Journal #1.” https://miller-eng110-1.uneportfolio.org/2024/03/31/journal-20/. Accessed 9 April 2024.
- Arvidson, Liv. “Journal 20: Revised Technology Essay.” https://miller-eng110-1.uneportfolio.org/2024/03/31/journal-20/. Accessed 9 April 2024.
In project 3 my goal for the paper was to demonstrate how digital technology is an addictive distraction in our life. Its intellectual superiority causes us to be less efficient and productive than we once were. This is because of our reliance on technology to complete the difficult tasks in our lives.
