Comment by Turing_Machine | Hacker News Reader

Comment by Turing_Machine | Hacker News Reader

"Now we know that computers don't help children learn"

I should have stopped reading there. We "know" nothing of the sort, and indeed this is an absurd claim on its face. I learn stuff using Google every day that would've taken hours of library research or hundreds of dollars worth of books in the past, if the information were even available. Now, sure, there have been plenty of ill-advised and poorly-implemented school technology programs, but that's not an indictment of "computers" per se. If you gave kids books without teaching them how to read, they wouldn't learn much, but that wouldn't be the book's fault.

"in the mainstream view of the academic psychologists, the brain is another pancreas, except that its function is to secrete thoughts as opposed to insulin"

Total crap.

The author, David Goldman, is a huge bigot and panders for appeasement (i.e. he says something you believe to get you to grab on to his hidden agenda). He was on the Jaime Glazov show in November viciously insulting Muslims.

http://www.blogtalkradio.com/radio-jihad/2011/11/23/the-jami...

He talks about how we (i.e. you and I) need to risk our lives to attack Iran in order to save our civilization (read: serve his agenda).

In his computer article he mentions nothing about evidence showing that computers cause people to be less intelligent save for a few coincidental anecdotes.

There's a difference between acquiring information (googling) and learning how to learn (how to apply oneself diligently and creatively)

Ah, but he said "learn", not "learn how to learn". Also, I would argue that learning how to use computers is a vital component of learning how to learn, not only for acquiring information, but for making sense of the information once you have it (think models, spreadsheets, graphs, databases, outlining tools...).

The original article is about learning how to learn. You don't need a computer to learn how to learn and computers can actually be counterproductive. Young children need to manipulate their bodies and objects in real 3D space. Doing the same thing on a computer is not helpful.

I think you are being a bit too harsh here. Sure, we can't use computers to completely replace reality, but they can be very useful when used wisely.

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