Internet Culture and Communication

Leaping from Deep Concentration to Mindfulness

The Web’s central role in people’s lives advances human culture. Past advances included TV, radio, and books. They brought about similar changes, but on a smaller scale. They promoted concentration. I would argue that the internet promotes mindfulness.

Once, people needed to focus on individual data streams. Preserving and sharing knowledge used to require long texts like books and scrolls. Now people channel many streams of data thanks to the Web. Self-awareness adapted from deep concentration – a step forward, not a step back.

Nicholas Carr: The Critic of Internet Thinking

Carr’s book The Shallows argues that the Web makes people lose their ability to focus. Carr writes that “the Net seizes our attention only to scatter it” (118). People online receive a constant stream of notifications. Apps, messages, and websites distract and disrupt us while we try to process other information.

"The mental functions that are losing the 'survival of the busiest' brain cell battle are those that support calm, linear thought," he writes (142). Over time, Carr fears deep though will completely lose that battle. The cost will be our ability to think deeply - a set back one might compare to the Dark Ages.

Recognizing Cognitive Evolution’s Potential: Pamela Lund

In Massively Networked, Lund argues that the children of the information age will have a bright future. For her, taking part in the “network” creates a richer inner experience (38). In a way, she believes that the connection of every part of our lives to the network provides an interface to better know ourselves.

Lund’s introduction rings like anathema to Carr’s fears. She writes that “Engaging in a perpetually changing reality successfully requires an entirely different strategy than relying on a static set of stories - it requires actively engaging the imagination” (18). For Lund, the realities of the age mean more than losing the ability to focus. The Web - the network - calls us to imagine and reflect.

Lund conveys a grand sense of enthusiasm for the Web’s effect on our lives. Unlike Carr, her vision of the future does not fear for our culture and our minds. In Lund’s future, the potential for growth grows because of the internet, not in spite of it.

Works Cited

Carr, Nicholas. The Shallows. New York: W. W. Norton & Compant, 2011. Print.