Thursday, March 17, 2016

Download This



"Facts" have been under attack for awhile now and it's getting more relentless every day.  Some of it is motivated by evil intention:  "If you tell a lie long enough . . .".  Some of it comes from the allure of relativity:  "my observation creates reality."  It's getting to the point where I cling to  2+2 = 4 like Tom Cruise hangs on to the edge of the skyscraper.

The Internet of Us is a new book by Michael Lynch which gets into other ways to topple the facts.  He takes us into a world where we "rarely discover facts, we download or upload them".  (I love it when my companion whips out a smartphone to settle a question. )   Lynch considers that we may actually google ourselves out of our capacity to reason.

Every once in awhile I make myself do the multiplication tables in my head.  Up to 10.  The rest of the time?  Of course, it's the calculator.

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