I read this book around the end of the year/start of the year (2020-2021). Although basically dating
from 2011, the issues it raises certainly haven't gone away, but have rather become even more prevalent.

The book's main focus is the effect of the Internet on people's memories, illustrated with background on the brain's
workings. He shows how a heavy focus on online activity is very different to the sustained concentration
involved in "deep reading". Such a heavy focus prioritises short-term memories and impinges on developing
and reinforcing long-term memories. He goes as far as to write that, "The Web is a technology of
forgetfulness." (193) In fact, it can become 'a vicious cycle', meaning that, "As our use of the Web makes
it harder for us to lock information into our biological memory, we're forced to rely more and more on
the Net's capacious and easily searchable artificial memory." (194)

As the writer indicates, fear about and criticism of the effects of technological change are nothing new.
He refers to an article by inventor, Lee de Forest, in 'Popular Mechanics' in 1952 when he wrote about
how, "A melancholy view of our national mental level is obtained from a survey of the moronic quality of
the majority of today's radio programs." (80) Further back in time, he considers the effects of, and attitudes
towards the development of writing as a method of recording thoughts and ideas and later, in turn, printing.

He particularly sees a sad decline in the escapism of fully focussing on reading. As he indicates, this can
be seen in the traditional environment for discovering books, the library. As he writes, "The predominate
sound in the modern library is the tapping of keys, not the turning of pages....at the center stands the
screen of the Internet-connected computer; the printed word has been pushed to the margins." (97-98)

Although he focusses more on reading, he also considers changes in writing. While he indicates this
as something in the future, "Writing will become a means for recording chatter." (107), we can already
see 'chat' as a kind of transcribed writing. For him, a deterioration in style has resulted, "Our indulgence
in the pleasures of informality and immediacy has led to a narrowing of expressiveness and a loss of
eloquence." (108)

In this wide-ranging work, he ranges across huge expanses of time, to make parallels and bring up interesting
references. One in particular, is a reference to an article in 1889 when futurist, Edward Bellamy, foresaw that
people, "would carry around a tiny audio player, called an "indispensable", which would contain all their
books, newspapers and magazines." (109)

However, there are points which I find difficult to agree with. Not least having lived for so long in Japan, one is
his claim that, "People born into societies that celebrate individual achievement, like the United States, tend,
for example, to be able to remember events from earlier in their lives than do people raised in societies that
stress communal achievement, such as Korea." (196)

Finally, I am more inclined to agree with Wegner and Ward, writing in 'Scientific American' in 2013, that,
"The advent of the 'information age' seems to have created a generation of people who feel they know more
than ever before, they may know ever less about the world around them." (237)

See the previous featured book