Is Google Making Us Smart?

"Are you using Google to challenge your thinking? Or is the tool just shrinking your attention span and dumbing you down?"

Diane Coutu at the Harvard Business Review editor's blog wants to rebel against the common stereotype or fear that Google is dumbing us down. Google seems to be synonymous and eye-catching enough (because we all use it) to serve as the fall guy for most modern technological distractions. The search engine capable of putting the most remote and obscure information imaginable within the click of a misspelled search or random browsing is at once scrutinized and praised.

From proposing The End of Theory to suggesting that Google Makes Us Stupid, writers know they have a rapt audience when contemplating the ways the Google affects our lives.

Her point is not so much unique as a revisiting of the initial amazement of the useful and productive capabilities of the internet. Isn't the internet wonderful? Isn't it terrifying? Well, yes, both.

As all things, it has the capacity to enhance and cripple our minds depending on how we use it. Her article, though, speaks to more than just Google and the internet. It speaks to the mindset with which we approach our life.

Her suggestions to never be afraid of looking dumb, never stop questioning, and expose yourself to lots of different experiences, sounds a lot like advice you'd hear at a commencement speech or from a freshmen adviser. (Not to say it isn't overwhelmingly TRUE)

The Google Debate, if I can call it that, is really no different than the way people looked at radio or tv when they became easily accessible. The argument and its evolution sounds a lot like the way we view video games, initially with amazement, then horror, and then as possible ways to increase mental agility in the eldery or promote math for children.

The ever present question of whether and how people actually think is what really underlies this discussion. And, of course, some people will, some people won't. Kinda makes you wonder if it isn't just a whole lot of fuss about nothing.