Smarter Than You Think: How Technology is
Changing Our Minds for the Better by Clive
Thompson
One benefit of reading a wide variety of books
is that you come across words that you’ve
never heard of before.
Take the name of this channel for instance.
I discovered the word Eudaimonia when learning
about Greek philosophy.
It translates loosely as human flourishing
or simply “happiness”, but it is not a
word I’d ever heard used in conversation.
As a result, if I was to talk about it with
a friend, there would have been a chance I
would have mispronounced the word.
So, what do you do to make sure you can pronounce
a word correctly?
You can consult YouTube.
By searching for the word, you’ll then get
access to any number of videos that contain
that word.
You may watch a video on a person who is an
authority in that field, or you may watch
several videos to confirm the common pronunciation
across the board.
Despite the cynics, technology is changing
the way we think for the better.
In recent years, human vs computer chess matches
that have taken place have been dominated
by the machine, even against the greatest
chess grandmasters in the world.
However, when a human and a computer work
together as a team, the best team can beat
the best individual or the best machine, even
if the human in the team is not the best chess
player.
In fact, the best team doesn’t necessarily
contain the best human chess players, even
if the computers on both teams were the same.
What matters is who is most proficient at
collaborating with a computer.
Machines can also help us with our memory.
We cannot remember everything and even the
particulars we do remember occasionally warp
over time to the point where they’re incorrect.
Artificial memory¬ can help.
Devices capture elements of our lives passively,
whether it’s text messages, status updates
or photographs on our phone.
There are obvious concerns regarding privacy,
storage and ownership that need to be dealt
with but on the positive side, being able
to search what is captured provides us with
an ever-increasing artificial memory.
These days, whether it’s tweets, Facebook
statuses, blog posts or emails, we’re writing
more than we have ever done before.
The majority of this content is not of a high
quality.
However, the fact that more writing is taking
place means that more quality material is
being produced.
All this writing helps to bring clarity to
our thinking.
By articulating your thinking process and
noting down your thoughts it allows you to
think more critically.
Any vagueness in your mind about your ideas
can be cleared by documenting them.
Having an audience for your writing, clarifies
the mind yet further.
This “audience effect” causes our performance
to change when we know people are watching,
or reading.
Digital communication has increased the amount
of writing we do and as a result has also
had an effect on our memory, as writing something
down enables you to better remember it.
One subject that computers are substantially
better at than humans is data crunching, in
particular large amounts of data.
Analysis of information has become easier
with simple tools available to the public.
School teachers can generate word clouds from
students’ essays to spot and help eradicate
bad habits such as too much repetition.
In the world of politics, the ability to record,
review and have access to what a politician
has said in previous speeches and television
programs make it easy to spot hypocrisy and
policy flaws which allow the public the opportunity
to make a more informed decision.
Online video has provided a way for people
to share their ideas with the world.
The YouTube platform allows for experimentation.
Most of these experiments will fail, but some
are innovative and successful.
The nature of the platform means that these
videos are then imitated and improved upon
quickly by others.
One of the most popular types of video that
has evolved on YouTube is the “How To”
video style, educating the viewers.
Humans are great at recalling the essence
of a conversation or subject, but bad at recalling
the details.
We have the same issue with factual knowledge.
Using Google or Wikipedia for help to remind
us of specifics is now a common occurrence.
For example, if you’re talking about a film
you’ve seen a long time ago, you will still
probably know the genre and the storyline,
but may be less likely to remember the names
of actors that appeared in the movie.
Despite search engines being often used to
help us answer questions we don’t know;
some research suggests that up to 40% of queries
are for remembering details we already previously
knew.
Mass collaboration is now easily achievable
and straightforward to engage in.
It is now simple to start a whatsapp or facebook
group conversation with friends to decide
which film to see at the weekend.
The fact that it is so easy to set up a collaboration
means that people are doing more of them.
There is wisdom in crowds.
The judgement of a crowd is often better than
an individual expert as each individual will
have an incomplete part of the picture in
his or her head.
By putting these parts together, you can establish
a near complete picture.
Whether it’s teamwork on google docs or
a worldwide conversation via a hashtag on
twitter, technology now allows us to create
more complete pictures via collective thinking.
When it comes to learning, one disadvantage
of the traditional classroom environment is
that with only one teacher and several pupils,
each pupil cannot necessarily learn at their
own pace.
Tutoring on a one-to-one basis works better
for this reason but is not always possible.
By utilising academic websites that educate
through online video, teachers can spend more
time with pupils who need help and let others
who feel more comfortable, jump ahead.
Technology, in particular communication technology
including social media can often help liberate
people that are being oppressed.
Many protests and demonstrations have been
organised and magnified in size with a speed
that was previously not possible.
There is no doubt that technology has affected
social and political change in our world.
For social change to take place, members of
society need to broadcast their thoughts and
think in public.
This will generate collective action as a
person is more likely to stand up for what
they believe in if they know other people
agree with them and are also willing to stand.
Authority has the means to monitor the population
but technology has now provided the ability
for members of society to monitor authority.
For example, many injustices that take place
are now recorded on video via smart phones,
which help to punish the perpetrators in many
cases.
There is no doubt that computers have accomplished
feats that the human mind could never achieve.
However, there are also activities that the
human mind is unique in completing.
The key is acknowledging the use of machines
and utilising them alongside our minds.
In the future, the ability for a computer
to give us near instant answers after analysing
mountains of information would prove invaluable
alongside human intuition, especially in a
time-critical situation.
This could be in the fields of law or medicine
or simply playing chess.
