Nicholas Carr
Literally
With the discovery of neural plasticity, we can now understand how the brain evolves and repurposes neural pathways and gray matter in the brain’s most utilized areas. Like Kuhn’s concept of the Paradigm Shift, neurologists believed that the brain reached its final form in adulthood and was set in stone from then on. However, some neurologists opposed this idea which led to the discovery of neural plasticity, the brain’s ability to change throughout life through the influences of experience. This shift in scientific history allowed scientists to understand how the brain is malleable. For example, when researchers studied the London cab drivers, they found redistribution of gray matter to the hippocampus, an area of the brain dealing with spatial representations. The brain is flexible and reprograms itself based on routine behaviors.
Intellectually
New experiences can rewire our neural pathways in the same way that technology has the power to impact our writing form. The brain itself is a working mechanism that can be considered technology. The brain is not a fixed mechanism but plastic— constantly changing. The brain’s ability to repurpose and reprogram itself by altering its function is a phenomenon, but what happens when neuroplasticity keeps us locked up into routine behaviors that “we long to keep activated?” Long-lasting alterations are imposed onto the brain when particular neurotransmitters are stimulated, forming addictive behaviors like dopamine addictions to even the constant need to scroll through social media for hours a day. “The vital paths turn deadly.” When I thought about the way that the brain can have the power to rewire and strengthen neural pathways, it also can digress. With the rise of technology, we are becoming one with the digital. Our brain becomes accustomed to the use of technology. The brain, an information-processing machine, meets the computer, another information-processing device, and we become habituated to the use of technology. Digital technology may evolve our brains and how we process information changes as the use of technology becomes muscle memory.
Emotionally
I think one could tell how much I enjoyed this piece of writing from all of my annotations and highlighting. I was already familiar with neural plasticity, but this reading helped me get a more defined framework of neural plasticity and presented how closely it relates to digital technology. One thing I found stimulating and kept running in circles in my mind is how similar technology and the brain works. Do they complement each other, or are they equivalent to each other? For example, in the research where monkeys were taught how to use simple tools, researchers found that the brain had recognized the tools as a part of their physical bodies. The thought of technology becoming human nature is a concept that’s always been played with in science fiction. Though, Now, it’s becoming a new reality. The paradox of neural plasticity works against human nature as we become more settled into routine behaviors.
Connect
Descartes believed, “Our thoughts can exert a physical influence on, or at least cause a physical reaction in, our brains. So we become, neurologically, what we think.” Saul William’s immediately popped into my head when I read this quote. He speaks about the power of vibration and “how language usage is a reflection of the consciousness.” The vibration of language has the ability to manifestation in the same way that we can physically alter the way our brain works with what we think. The same thought expressed through learned language can frame neural pathways in our brains. We are what we think.
George Ulmer
Literally:
George Ulmer searches for a genre in which academic discourse could function with the use of different mediums such as voice, print, and video. He uses the term “teletheory” to explain his idea of speaking, writing, and performing as a form of academic discourse. While we might not entirely know how technology will affect academic discourse, we should understand that it is essential to consider how cognition may change with technology. For example, “People will not stop using print any more than they stopped talking when they became literate. But they will use it differently— within the frame of electronics.” Technology is simply an addition of another medium in academic discourse that we can benefit from.
Intellectually:
The future of academic discourse should adapt as technology evolves. For example, we have orality, literacy, and now electracy, which can all be used interchangeably to enhance academic discourse. Ulmer believes that using electronic mediums can serve as an intended consequence to better the pedagogy of educational institutions. Adding visual mediums to academic discourse can help as an apparatus to change cognition and allow us to understand complex language.
Emotionally:
It is common to see that the academic world expects us to write word document essays for our assignments. However, Ulmer believes that the conventional academic writing discourse will be altered by teletheory. I agree with Ulmer’s ideas because I have experienced the same patterns of academic writing discourse as a student. I didn’t quite understand that there were different mediums in which academics could be utilized until taking this class. For example, in The Exploratory Project, When we were given the opportunity to use other forms of media instead of the typical word document to display our work, it gave me a whole new element to work with. I would say that it positively affected my work as I used technology to enhance my understanding of the technology’s rhetorical function and display it in an organized fashion that was easy for the audience to read while implementing visuals to compliment my writing.
Connect:
Though Ulmer already mentions McLuhan in the reading, I would like to connect this reading to McLuhan’s “The Medium is the Message”. Ulmer expresses how technology will alter how academic discourse will function. There are some similarities between the two authors because they both mention technology’s unintended and intended consequences in some form or another. Ulmer believes that tape recordings and videos should be incorporated into academic discourse as they can express a complex language in a way writing can not. The use of recordings and videos is a form of medium that changes the way we use language. McLuhan says, “The Medium is the Message.” Therefore, we can use these mediums to change how the academic world functions. Through different mediums, we can use orality, literacy, and electracy together in a way that has never been used before—a new age of language and technology.
