| Describe your overall ability to pay attention when it comes to school work (<100 words) On a scale of 1 – 10, indicate how addicted you are to you phones |
| I would say my overall ability to pay attention to school work would be a 9. It usually depends there are days where it very easy for me to focus but when I actually start focusing there a really good chance I won’t take my eyes off of it until I finished completing the work. However that doesn’t mean I don’t get distracted even when I’m focus unless I’m too focus on the work. On a scale of 1-10 when it comes to my phone I would have to say a ten I can’t stop using it everyday. |
| While reading “My Distraction Sickness” please note how long it takes you to get through the piece (Google says it’s a 45 min read); also, count the number of times you get distracted (for whatever reason) and tally them at the end. |
| 12 |
| Describe the tone of all three articles, how do they differ? (<100 words) |
| What’s different in these three articles is in My distraction sickness the author talks about how phone is a issue he’s using a argumentative tone saying how phone took away every aspect of our lives we’re slowly losing ourselves.While defense of distraction had a more defensive tone he explained distraction can be a bad thing but that doesn’t mean there isn’t a good side to it. He explained kids are becoming knowledge of things grandparents wouldn’t know thanks to technology. While the third tone is more of a informative tone it not positive or negative just states the effects distractions have on us |
| What are Sam Anderson’s primary arguments in defense of distraction? (see part III of In Defense of Distraction) Do you find them convincing? Why or why not (<150 words) |
| His main argument for defense against distraction would be there’s positive sides of being distracted for example people with ADHD can see things we never noticed. Not to mention he also stated the fact our brain can’t stay focus on one thing for long periods of time we will get distracted no matter what. In his argument he also stated despite the fact technology is rapidly growing and can be distracting but that doesn’t mean the kids in this day and age aren’t smart there are several things we knew that the elders don’t. I do find them convincing because he’s right no matter what we are doing we will get distracted let say I’m copying notes even if I am paying attention to what I’m copying there is no doubt I may think of something else in the process and for the technology part I agree just because technology is distracting that doesn’t mean there isn’t a advantage towards this |
| After reading all three articles, what are your thoughts on this “epidemic of distraction”? (<50 words) |
| I agree on the fact technology can make our minds more distracting then it has to be however that doesn’t mean it doesn’t have benefits of it own. Distraction might not always be a bad thing our mind gets distracted because it can’t handle being concentrated on a activity for too long the brain needs a break from it. |
| Please annotate “My Distraction Sickness” – highlight at least three instances for each of the following rhetoric concepts: InventionStyle Memory Pathos Ethos |
| Invention “” You are where your attention is. If you’re watching a football game with your son while also texting a friend” Truly being with another person means being experientially with them, picking up countless tiny signals from the eyes and voice and body language and context, and reacting, often unconsciously, to every nuance” “s. For the subtle snare of this new technology is that it lulls us into the belief that there are no downsides” Style “When we enter a coffee shop in which everyone is engrossed in their private online worlds, we respond by creating one of our own” “You need to build an ability to just be yourself and not be doing something. That’s what the phones are taking away,” “I suspect it has simply made us less unhappy, or rather less aware of our unhappiness, and that our phones are merely new and powerful antidepressants of a non-pharmaceutical variety”Memory ” I arrived at the meditation retreat center a few months after I’d quit the web, throwing my life and career up in the air. I figured it would be the ultimate detox. And I wasn’t wrong. After a few hours of silence, you tend to expect some kind of disturbance, some flurry to catch your interest. And then it never comes.” I’d spent the previous nine months honing my meditation practice, but, in this crowd, I was a novice and a tourist. (Everyone around me was attending six-week or three-month sessions.) The silence, it became apparent, was an integral part of these people’s lives — and their simple manner of movement, the way they glided rather than walked, the open expressions on their faces, all fascinated me.” “, unexpectedly, on the third day, as I was walking through the forest, I became overwhelmed. I’m still not sure what triggered it, but my best guess is that the shady, quiet woodlands, with brooks trickling their way down hillsides and birds flitting through the moist air, summoned memories of my childhood.”Pathos “We hide our vulnerabilities, airbrushing our flaws and quirks; we project our fantasies onto the images before us. Rejection still stings — but less when a new virtual match beckons on the horizon.” “You never feel completely sad or completely happy, you just feel … kinda satisfied with your products. And then you die. So that’s why I don’t want to get a phone for my kids” “Yes, online and automated life is more efficient, it makes more economic sense, it ends monotony and “wasted” time in the achievement of practical goals. But it denies us the deep satisfaction and pride of workmanship that comes with accomplishing daily tasks well, a denial perhaps felt most acutely by those for whom such tasks are also a livelihood — and an identity.” |
| Ethos “This changes us. It slowly removes — without our even noticing it — the very spaces where we can gain a footing in our minds and souls that is not captive to constant pressures or desires or duties. And the smartphone has all but banished them.” ” imagine if more secular places responded in kind: restaurants where smartphones must be surrendered upon entering, or coffee shops that marketed their non-Wi-Fi safe space?” “yet our need for quiet has never fully gone away, because our practical achievements, however spectacular, never quite fulfill us. They are always giving way to new wants and needs, always requiring updating or repairing, always falling short.” |