Saturday 22 October 2011

Recent article about "Social Networking"

This next blog is just a quick few words about an article that I found in The Daily Telegraph on October 19th written by Susan Greenfield about Social Networking. I think these words relate very much to my last blog so I hope you will find it interesting. These are just a few paragraphs from her article.
"The reason that mankind is so successful is that our brains have evolved to adapt to our environment. So it follows that if you use a computer for many hours a day and develop an obsessional cyber- life, then the brain will obligingly adapt, too".

"Evidence of a link between spending too much time staring at computer screens and physical changes in the brain that lead to attention and behaviour problems is accumulating. As with cancer and smoking in the 1950s, you start off by seeing a trend, and that is what makes you suspect that there might be a casual link".

The thing is, harmful evidence is growing of prolonged computer use causing behaviour problems which can't be concluded yet, as just one study is not enough to end this problem. However can we wait 10, or even 20 years?

Baroness Greenfield is professor of synaptic pharmacology at Lincoln College, Oxford.


I'd find it very interesting to hear any of your comments.

2 comments:

  1. We are in an interesting time for technology - and the effects of technology on human anatomy is as yet unknown. Interesting article.

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  2. I feel we are being pulled more and more into using the computer and new technology. I am wanting to use it less and less and have asked myself why. I basically want to commune more with nature and basic way of living. Technology is turning me off! But I need some of it at the moment. I was reading Paula's post on her blog about Tim Berners-Lee the inventor of the world wide web and his recent interview to coincide with the 20th anniversay of the launch. Tim gave away this invention for free. Why? Didn't he want the responsibility of how this invention would turn out? It's a bit like conception and giving birth to a child and not wanting the responsibility of how it would develop and what it would grow to become and giving the rest of the world the responsibility for it's development. But, it is a tool and not a human. Has he developed a monster or will it save the world? I'm amazed at how strong his faith is?

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