The first in a series of two stories

By JOHN NORTH

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Being connected 24/7 to the world via high-tech devices is changing the brains of  users, with studies showing shorter attention spans, an inability to engage in deep thinking and a number of other problems.

So said Nicholas Carr, who discussed the findings in his New York Times best-seller, “The Shallows: What the Internet Is Doing to Our Brains,” during his address Sept. 28 at A-B Tech’s Ferguson Auditorium .

Carr’s book, heralded “as the flashpoint for ongoing debate over the power and peril of technology,” has resulted in harsh attacks against him by some high-tech enthusiasts.

About 100 people attended the program hosted by Lenoir-Rhyne University’s Center for Graduate Studies of Asheville.

To the crowd’s great amusement, K. Paul Knott, center director, announced that Carr’s talk would be delayed briefly because “we’re having a little problem with the Intenet — I’m not making that up.”

The problem soon was solved by an A-B Tech computer specialist, who was called in on short notice.

With a look of much relief that the technical problems had been fixed, Knott noted that  Carr’s presentation would mark the L-RU Asheville center’s first cultural program.

Knott thanked the staff and faculty of A-B Tech for allowing the program in the auditorium, noting that LRU’s Asheville center does not have a room that large.

He also pointed out that his school’s Asheville program opened in July 2011 — about 15 months ago and “we have nine programs going in our opening year,” with one that will start in June.

The L-RU Asheville Center is located at 36 Montford Avenue in a part of a building that it owns, along with the Asheville Area Chamber of Commerce. Knott said school officials call 36 Montford Ave. “our living room.”

L-RU’s Visiting Writers Series, under which Carr was appearing, is in its 24th year at the school’s Hickory-based campus, Knott noted.

He then turned the program over to Laura Hope Gill, director of the writers program at LRU-Asheville. In introducing Carr, she said he is “a remarkable writer and a remarkable seer into our culture.”

Further, Gill said, “I’m grateful for the work of Nicholas Carr ... He reminds us we are a party of the story ... To step outside of the story to tell people what kind of story we’re writing here.”

Carr noted that “I’ve been at the Hickory campus for the last several days and it was very gratifying” to confer with the students and professors.

“Thanks for spending part of your Friday evening with me,” especially considering it is “beautiful” outside.

The program began with a picture on the screen titled “The mind in the net,” showing an E-book, a laptop computer and a smart phone. “What we’ve done is create an environment to do things all day long’ in a way that never happened before in human history, Carr said. 

His concern about information overload and high-tech addiction prompted him to write “The Shallows,” Carr said.

Prior to his extensive research for the book, the author noted that he was an “early adopter” with a fondness for “new gadgets” and a general affinity for “high-tech” gear. However, Carr said he noticed he was struggling with his attention span. “I had the feeling that my mind wanted to be distracted ... to check my e-mail” in an obsessive-compulsive way.

“I found my mind wanted to behave like when I’m looking at a screen .. It wanted to multitask, like when I’m using a computer.”

He added, “I studied what scientists have found out about how our minds’ work ... Also, if humans have had an example before in history” when people were similarly obsessed.

From a sensory view, he said “one of my favorite examples is the map ... The way people made sense of space (before maps) was purely through their senses, but once you introduce the map, suddenly you have this abstract picture.

“The arrival of the map changed the way people thought. They started to pay more attention” to the world around them “in an abstract way.”

Carr said he also found that the clock’s invention greatly changed people’s lives. Previously, there was the natural phenomenon of “time as flow.” But “we saw the same thing — first happening in the 1500s (with the invention of clocks) — when people began the taking of time in a more abstract way.”

With the advent of clocks, “suddenly time was seen as a series of units that could be measured ... It introduced a new way of thinking. It’s no coincidence that you saw the explosion of scientific thinking.”

He said the map and clock are examples of how new intellectual technologies resulted in new ways of thinking.

A changed environment leads to changed habits and eventualy to a changed brain, Carr noted, citing scientists’ findings.

“People have recognized this in a historical way ... Up until the late ‘60s or early ‘70s, it was assumed that our brains were mallable up to about age 20. Then, you were basically stuck with the neural  pathways you had” for the rest of one’s life.

However, further research showed that “that’s all wrong — the brain is mallable throughout our entire lives,” he said. “The brain is constantly changing, adapting to circumstances,” as is the body,

Carr then discussed neuroplasticity, which posits that as one’s “circumstances change, it changes your brain ... So when we think about the Internet,” one should think about what is its intellectual ethic.

“We’ve never had a tool that we’ve so integrated into the life of your mind,” Carr said. “With television, people watched it a lot, but you didn’t carry your TV around with you all day and all night.”

“With the net, as we’ve seen the spread of laptop computers, tablet devices and smart phones, you’re aways connected to the world,” Carr said.

To be continued in next month’s Daily Planet