I Read a Good Book and Wondered Why

Arguments on behalf of the liberal arts are borne, more often than not, out of fear. “The liberal arts are under attack!” academicians decry, faced with budget cuts and the vagaries of student enrollment trends. People do not understand their importance, it is claimed, with a tone whose undercurrent is condescending. The most popular major…

The Burr That Keeps On Giving

The neuroscientists are hard at work. Their discoveries, hypotheses and suppositions are gaining traction, within and outside of the quad. Science is helping us gain better and deeper understanding of how humans learn. This is no slow process, either. The pace is rapid and shows no sign of abating for decades. Imagine what we will…

Playing in the Shallows – Just What is the Internet Doing to Our Brains?

I read The Shallows by Nicholas Carr in an old-fashioned format: hardcover book. It wasn’t an accident, either. Carr penned “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” for The Atlantic, and the article generated a good deal of thought and discussion around the house. We tend to be Google-philes and the “gee-whiz” factor of what emanates from…