The Shallows

I read The Shallows: How the Internet is doing to our Brains by Nicholas Carr over break.  It was a finalist for the 2011 Pulitzer Prize and it's good.  He goes over all of the brain research to show what the multi-tasking and information overload of the web does to our brain (it basically gets gradually rewired).  What I thought was most interesting was when he talked about longer form reading, like books.  As our brains get rewired from spending time online, it makes it more and more difficult for us to engage in reflective, critical reading.  It's sort of scary.  Jonathan Safran Foer said the book changed his life, so I decided to read it, too. 

• here is the original article he wrote, called "Is Google making us stupid?" for The Atlantic
• watch Carr on The Colbert Report here