View Full Version : Do we really need to know anything anymore?
Big Dan
14-06-2010, 06:22 PM
I've been mulling something around in my head organ. With the proliferation of the internet and mobile devices do we really need to know basic things anymore? Everything is just a Google away.
For instance I used to keep the multiplier to convert inches to centimeters in my head but I don't need anymore because I just Google it. Same difference with Fahrenheit to Celsius I used to be able to do it on the fly but I've gotten lazy and if I'm out and about I just text Google.
Sure there will always be the need for subject mastery. I don't want my doctor Googling my symptoms to make a diagnosis, I can do that myself. :D Nor would I want my lawyer Googling a legal defense for me -- Could you imagine? :sqcool:
It almost seems as if we don't need to remember stuff anymore. With information about every subject in the world at our fingertips which makes it disposable. You can look something up, forget it, and if you need it again just look it up again.
Aside from the obvious you cannot trust everything you read on the internet. I dont' see many drawbacks other then less off-the-top-of-your-head knowledge.
Wuddya think?
tsdesigns
14-06-2010, 06:56 PM
I agree to a certain extent.
Saying "do we need to know anything anymore?" is a bit much though - new things are being discovered daily (mostly by people who probably don't use google all that much...).
I used to be pretty good with maths stuff in my head too, till I got lazy and mobile phones started coming out with calculators on them...
While it's easy enough to look things up (if need be), there is no substitute for having the knowledge in your head. It's quicker than looking it up.
Also, you gain an understanding from knowing things that looking them up won't give you. For example, someone without a clue could look up whether a kilometer is larger than an inch but someone with a basic understanding of measurements in standard and metric already knows that answer.
Cryren8972
14-06-2010, 07:36 PM
However, by looking things up, I've gained a basic understanding of a plethera of things. How does the saying go...Jack of all trades, master of none. Yeah...that's how I feel sometimes. I do research things that I'm really interested in, such as the birds (of course I've read books on the subject and pulled from other knowledgeable people) and have learned and retained most of what I've read.
ewomack
14-06-2010, 08:32 PM
There an infinite number of things to know, but only a small fraction of them make life worth living...
I saw that scraped onto the side of a postal kiosk once...
Muddy
14-06-2010, 08:39 PM
There an infinite number of things to know, but only a small fraction of them make life worth living...
Could you convert that to decimals please?
Cryren8972
14-06-2010, 08:42 PM
Could you convert that to decimals please?
Never satisfied are you? :sqwink:
Big Dan
14-06-2010, 08:49 PM
However, by looking things up, I've gained a basic understanding of a plethera of things. How does the saying go...Jack of all trades, master of none. Yeah...that's how I feel sometimes. I do research things that I'm really interested in, such as the birds (of course I've read books on the subject and pulled from other knowledgeable people) and have learned and retained most of what I've read.
That pretty much sums me up. I can get lost in Wikipedia for hours. While you cannot take it as gospel it definitely gives you a good idea of whatever your reading about.
@Zap: I do agree knowledge is infinitely useful. Common sense probably more useful then knowledge for everyday life. Often times I'm dumb founded by how people with no common sense get by in life. :D
Here's a for instance: Over the winter I needed to replace a wick in a friend's kerosene heater; I'm not mechanically inclined at all. I Googled the model number, pulled up the manual and did the job. I wasn't confident in myself to turn and waited until my friend got home for him to double check me.. I just didn't want to risk blowing up the house. Turns out I did the job right.
Here two things came into play: My reading comprehension, which I learned early on in life. I really don't know how people who cannot comprehend well get on in life -- I'd go nuts if I couldn't learn things on my own. And secondly my Google skills. :)
Aside from the obvious you cannot trust everything you read on the internet. I dont' see many drawbacks other then less off-the-top-of-your-head knowledge.
Wuddya think?
Question to Einstein: How many feet are there in a mile?
Answer:I don't know. Why should I fill my brain with facts I can find in two minutes in any standard reference book?
Henry Ford after being labelled an ignoramus by the Chicago Tribune, sued the paper and challenged them to prove his ignorance.
The proof was attempted in court. During the trial, Mr. Ford was asked a series of simple, general information questions, such as,
* Could you name the Presidents of the United States?
* When was the Civil War?; and so on.
Mr. Ford, who had little formal education, could answer very few. Finally, in
exasperation, he replied, "I don't know the answers to these questions, but I could
find a man in five minutes who does. I use my brain to think, not to store a lot of
useless facts."
From here (http://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&q=cache:XTRLq_sT9NMJ:www.campusbug.com/ezwriting/file.php%3Fid%3D5600+%22henry+ford%22+%22prove+it% 22+ignoramus&hl=en&gl=uk&pid=bl&srcid=ADGEESj3vWsffFNblF2zaPGcH93hUfQ5mwriKgos2j0E GSGz9hwpfixhFOrqmyYiB8_sWcHR5Lx6OlF1ntMTnGhYfZAdaW LIUVn3L687CrM5yJgh1Jnvpw4nOEqixVGjGf_YWS37yLlK&sig=AHIEtbRUXzIpnjTMvzgH6pZfTHRRcXmp1Q)
I like to be able to remember my friend's mobile phone numbers (as well as my own), well at least the one's I call on a more regular basis. Looking it up is easy, but I think it's useful to be able to store and retrieve information if you want to.
Memory is a fickle thing; :3wacko: on a bad day I can't recall anyone's number, but on a normal day it's not too bad.
Big Dan
15-06-2010, 03:55 AM
Cool quote Halo. :) Henry Ford was the father of the modern manufacturing age yet he couldn't name the presidents.. That goes to show you useless information like that isn't much help to you in real life. I know a few folks who dropped out of school young and are successful business people. They may still be 'blue collar' but successful nonetheless.
Personally I've got a very good memory. I type a credit number in to buy something online twice and I remember it forever. Off the top of my head I can tell you my immediate family's social security numbers and I never use them.
My brain is filled with useless information that I'm probably never gonna use unless I get on Jeopardy some day. :D
I think the two most important 'pillars of learning' so to speak are:
Reading Comprehension: So that you can teach yourself new things.
Critical Thinking: So you can take what you've read and form your own ideas and opinions.
Everything else is just gravy.
I'll give you another example.
Most of you know I like to work on projects around the house, which almost always entails the use of tools (I could look that up, but experience means I can use them better). I can't count the number of times where my knowledge of mathematics has helped me tremendously in construction. Many of those times, I've used Pythagorean theorem to figure out the length of a board I need to cut or my knowledge of how angles work in order to decide which cuts to make. Most of that, I would never even know how to look up. You have to know that a right angle is 90º and that is has a special relationship to the other angles in the triangle and the lengths of the sides of it. Without knowing that, you wouldn't necessarily even think to look it up. You might not realize there was even a benefit there.
Muddy
15-06-2010, 04:35 PM
I look stuff up. Usually only once.
Strong
16-06-2010, 01:16 PM
Someone said to me that I should learn skills and not facts. I guess I would add, learn how to think and learn skills, facts can be checked, so read them by all means, but there is no need to memorise them precisely. But knowledge means you can evaluate what you hear and read more readily, it adds depth to your thoughts and imagination and can spark creativity.
Zap is right, if you didn't know that the wheel existed, you might plod along behind an ox walking in it's shit for a life time. Then again with the knowledge of wheels you might have the idea of building a seat for your plough.
Someone said to me that I should learn skills and not facts. I guess I would add, learn how to think and learn skills, facts can be checked, so read them by all means, but there is no need to memorise them precisely. But knowledge means you can evaluate what you hear and read more readily, it adds depth to your thoughts and imagination and can spark creativity.
Zap is right, if you didn't know that the wheel existed, you might plod along behind an ox walking in it's shit for a life time. Then again with the knowledge of wheels you might have the idea of building a seat for your plough.
Precisely.
I think the key is in knowing what to know and what to look up later.
Strong
16-06-2010, 01:51 PM
You know, the more I know, the more I know how little I know and how much more I want to know. :sqwink:
Every hour of every day I'm learning more
The more I learn, the less I know about before
The less I know, the more I want to look around
Digging deep for clues on higher ground
u6m0rzefZ3o
Do we really need to know anything anymore? (...)Probably not, I think we've done enough damage already. lol
Strong
17-06-2010, 12:58 PM
Every hour of every day I'm learning more
The more I learn, the less I know about before
The less I know, the more I want to look around
Digging deep for clues on higher ground
u6m0rzefZ3o
My favourite band! :sqbiggrin:
Big Dan
23-01-2012, 11:10 AM
Sorry to bump such an old thread but Ars posted on this topic over the summer and I bookmarked it. I'm just now going through my saved bookmarks for the past 10 months, lol
Check it out: Study: why bother to remember when you can just use Google? (http://arstechnica.com/science/news/2011/07/study-why-bother-to-remember-when-you-can-just-use-google.ars?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=rss)
That article makes me wonder how this forum's transactive memory might be described. :sqerr:
I believe the answer lies somewhere in the tag clouds.
I haven't a clue what those damned things are for nor do I want one, I just wanna die in peace.
They are a little intriguing though, I'll give them that, but other than that, that isn't that kinda thing where that would actually be something that I might be into.
All those thats and still no that. How long must one wait?
BTWIMHO transactive memory in action;
newbie: how many post before link?
seasoned member: not too many.
It's a low number.. somewhere in the double digits.
I forget what the name of it is but there's a link somewhere in the forum that explains the whole thing, can't remember where... I'm thinking orange peels....
no wait.. circus.. cotton candy.. it's starting to come to me..
Ok I don't know but I do believe I may have been abused as an adult.
Then some other highly seasoned member steps in and swears they saw something about it at the beginning of some thread somewhere, so now, at least they've got a place to start.
I suspect that a transactive memory might develop in a marriage as well.
It's still too early to tell if it's doing any harm I think.
If everyone starts running red lights or something, then we'll know something's up.
No but think of the possible implications. If it turns out to be doing harm then there will probably be some sort of regulations put in place.
Maybe we'll be forced to feed quarters into our PC's every 5 minutes to use the internet, then only people rich enough to hire slaves to feed the machines will develop the mental deficit.
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