Intelligence in the Age of

Google
John Koetsier – UBC
twitter.com/johnkoetsier
sparkplug9.com

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Who said this …
"People who invent new technologies
are not the best judges of their
usefulness and value. Your invention
will not help people to get smarter and
learn more; it will in fact cause the
exact opposite … they will forget more
and learn less.
… and this?
“You have not invented a better
memory but just a way to search for
ideas. And the students who use your
invention will not in fact acquire real-
world knowledge but rather data. They
will think they know much when in fact
they are incredibly ignorant.”
An ancient king of Egypt, of
course
Thamus
… the king of a city in Egypt
… according to Socrates
… 2500 years ago
… telling the god Theuth
what he thought of Theuth’s
invention of writing
What he actually said …
Those who acquire it will cease to exercise their
memory and become forgetful; they will rely on
writing to bring things to their remembrance by
external signs instead of by their own internal
resources. What you have discovered is a receipt
for recollection, not for memory. And as for
wisdom, your pupils will have the reputation for it
without the reality: they will receive a quantity of
information without proper instruction, and in
consequence be thought very knowledgeable
when they are for the most part quite ignorant.
What is intelligence?
In ancient Greece?
In medieval times
In the 19th (and 20th)
centuries?
Today?
What is intelligence?
1800s … Francis Galton …
measured head size
1900s … Alfred Binet:
intelligence is not a single
thing; it's many
What is intelligence?
1993 – Gardner: Multiple
Intelligences
Problem solving (including the
ability to create new problems:
creativity)
1. Linguistic
2. Logical-mathematical
3. Spatial
4. Musical
5. Bodily-kinesthetic
6. Interpersonal
7. Intrapersonal
What is intelligence?
Going to settle on
problem-solving: the
ability to get stuff done.
(And dream up new stuff
to do.)
The web effect?
Nicholas Carr:
“Is Google Making Us Stupid?”
Primarily about the web in general
Immediacy, brevity, distractions
Reduces our ability to focus, to
concentrate … reduces our capacity for
“deep reading”
The Google effect?
But it’s more than just the
web
Significantly good search &
retrieval changes our
orientation to data … and
knowledge
Which may be inimical to
“deep learning”
Does Google make us think
…
Everything has an answer?
All answers are knowable
… and easily findable?
All answers should come
quickly as long as I search
with the right words?
In other words …
Does Google make us less
dependent on our own
thinking and more willing
to be dependent on the
thinking of others?
A teacher’s perspective
"Since Google, students
need an answer quickly, so
they don't know how to use
a glossary or index. They
want something right away,
and to look back to a
previous paragraph is too
much effort."
A teacher’s perspective
"At times it may end up
giving people a real quick
fix to a problem and they
may not be actually forced
to think it through."
What’s he saying?
Students are seeking quick answers
that others have created – received
wisdom, in other words
Why scan or re-read a text when you
can get a machine to do it for you?
 … this is a serious challenge to an
education system
Losing the ability to read
Bruce Friedman: pathologist,
educator
Recently confessed that he has
now “almost totally lost the
ability to read and absorb a
longish article on the web or in
print."
What’s going on?
Knowledge about vs knowledge how
(Bencze and Bowen)
Does Google privilege about?
Media are not neutral …
Also … nature of the web:
Links
Short
Abundance
Is it really all that bad?
Perhaps technology and media are
helping us to “transcend boundaries
in thinking, working, learning” by
harnessing "distributed intelligence"
(Fischer and Konomi)
Maybe blogs are more important
than formal certificates, and
immersive social games will become
the textbook (Tuomi)
And Google does help us …
Google can marked improve our
ability to get things done and
solve problems … one of the key
factors in intelligence
 … by helping us quickly find:
the one fact we need
the range of possible options
Integration is the key?
The key thing is likely the need to
integrate new capabilities with old skills
A teacher I interviewed:
"We're all tempted to take the path of
least resistance,” he said, but we need
to be able to use all kinds of resources,
including print, and be able to work from
first principles to more complex
knowledge.
Multi-literate
Researchers are talking about
"emerging multiliteracies in a
connected, web2.0 world"
(Alexander, 2009).
Not just reading anymore … but
also reading, still
And information consumption …
synthesis … creation skills:
“media literacy”
Danger of the Oracle
Even with media literacy …
Can’t uncritically rely on modern oracles …
getting the answer “for free”
Instant search and retrieval is not
intelligence; it is fuel for intelligence
That fuel can be utilized and harnessed with
21st century skills … but not at the cost of
some very basic 20th century skills.
Just one example …
Math skills: without a solid grasp of
math fundamentals, the higher
orders of mathematical thinking are
forever closed to people, regardless
of how many Google searches they
do (Lee, Stansbery, Kubina,
Wannarka, 2005).
Deep knowledge is needed to free
up short-term memory slots.
Synthesis
We need 21st century skills ...
without losing 20th century smarts
Without the 21st Century skills, we
will not be able to cope with the
never-ending datastream.
Without the 20th century smarts, we
will not be able to do more than
parrot, and sometimes rearrange,
ideas that others thought before us.
Intelligence in the Age of
Google
John Koetsier – UBC
twitter.com/johnkoetsier
sparkplug9.com

Slides available at www.sparkplug9.com