Intelligence in the Internet Age

I regularly read Internet user groups filled with messages from people trying to solve software incompatibility problems that,
in terms of complexity, make the US Tax Code look like Dr Seuss.

- Dave Barry
 

by Stefanie Olsen

It's a question older than the Parthenon: Do innovations and new technologies make us more intelligent?

A few thousand years ago, a Greek philosopher, as he snacked on dates on a bench in downtown Athens, may have wondered if the written language folks were starting to use was allowing them to avoid thinking for themselves.  Today, terabytes of easily accessed data, always-on Internet connectivity, and lightning-fast search engines are profoundly changing the way people gather information.  But the age-old question remains: Is technology making us smarter?  Or are we lazily reliant on computers, and, well, dumber than we used to be?

"Our environment, because of technology, is changing, and therefore the abilities we need in order to navigate these highly information-laden environments and succeed are changing," said Susana Urbina, a professor of psychology at the University of North Florida who has studied the roots of intelligence.  If there is a good answer to the question, it probably starts with a contradiction: What makes us intelligent - the ability to reason and learn - is staying the same and will never fundamentally change because of technology.  On the other hand, technology, from pocket calculators to the Internet, is radically changing the notion of the intelligence necessary to function in the modern world.

Take Diego Valderrama, an economist with the Federal Reserve Bank in San Francisco.  If he were an economist 40 years ago, he may have used a paper, pencil and slide rule to figure out and chart by hand how the local economy might change with a 1% boost in taxes.  But because he's a thoroughly modern guy, he uses knowledge of the C++ programming language to create mathematical algorithms to compute answers and produce elaborate projections on the impact of macroeconomic changes to work forces or consumer consumption.  Does that mean he's not as bright as an economist from the 1950s?  Is he smarter?  The answer is probably "no" on both counts.  He traded one skill for another.  Computer skills make him far more efficient and allow him to present more accurate - more intelligent - information.  And without them, he'd have a tough time doing his job.  But drop him into the Federal Reserve 40 years ago, and a lack of skill with the slide rule could put an equal crimp on his career.

Intelligence, as it impacts the economist Valderrama, is our capacity to adapt and thrive in our own environment.  In a Darwinian sense, it's as true now as it was millions of years ago, when man's aptitude for hearing the way branches broke or smelling a spore affected his power to avoid predators, eat and survive.  But what makes someone smart can vary in different cultures and situations.  A successful Wall Street banker who has dropped into the Australian Outback likely couldn't pull off a great Crocodile Dundee impression.  A mathematical genius like Isaac Newton could be - in fact, he was - socially inept and a borderline hermit.  A master painter?  Probably not so good at balancing a chequebook.

What's undeniable is the Internet's democratization of information.  It's providing instant access to information and, in a sense, improving the practical application of intelligence for everyone.  Nearly a century ago, Henry Ford didn't have the Internet, but he did have a bunch of smart guys.  The auto industry pioneer, as a parlor trick, liked to claim he could answer any question in 30 minutes.  In fact, he had organised a research staff he could call at any time to get him the answer.  Today, you don't have to be an auto baron to feign that kind of knowledge.  You just have to be able to type G-O-O-G-L-E.  People can in a matter of minutes find sources of information like court documents, scientific papers or corporate securities filings.

"The notion that the world's knowledge is literally at your fingertips is very compelling and is very beguiling," said Vint Cerf, who co-created the underlying architecture of the Internet and who is widely considered one of its "fathers."  What's exciting "is the Internet's ability to absorb such a large amount of information and for it to be accessible to other people, even if they don't know it exists or don't know who you are."  Indeed, Doug Engelbart, one of the pioneers of personal computing technology in the 1960s, envisioned in the early '60s that the PC would augment human intelligence.  He believes that society's ability to gain insight from information has evolved with the help of computers.  "The key thing about all the world's big problems is that they have to be dealt with collectively," he said.  "If we don't get collectively smarter, we're doomed."

According to at least one definition, intelligence is the "ability to reason, plan, solve problems, think abstractly, comprehend ideas and language, and learn."  Yet intelligence is not just about book learning or test scores; it also reflects a deeper understanding of the world.  On average, people with high IQs are thought to live longer, earn more money, process information faster and have larger working memories.  Yet could all this information provided by the Internet and gadgets dampen our motivation to remember anything?

Working with the Treo handheld computing device he helped create, Jeff Hawkins can easily recount exactly what he did three years ago, factor 9,982 and Pi, or describe a weather system over the Pacific Ocean.  But without his "smart" phone, he can't recall his daughter's telephone number offhand.  It's a familiar circumstance for people living in the hyper-connected Internet age, when it has become easier to program a cell phone or computer - instead of your brain - to recall facts or other essential information.  In some sense, our digital devices do the thinking for us now, helping us with everything from calendar scheduling and local directions to in-depth research and "Jeopardy"-like trivia.

"It's true we don't remember anything anymore, but we don't need to," said Hawkins, the co-founder of Palm Computing and author of a book called On Intelligence.  "We might one day sit around and reminisce about having to remember phone numbers, but it's not a bad thing.  It frees us up to think about other things.  The brain has a limited capacity, if you give it high-level tools, it will work on high-level problems," he said.

Only 600 years ago, people relied on memory as a primary means of communication and tradition.  Before the printed word, memory was essential to lawyers, doctors, priests and poets, and those with particular talents for memory were revered.  Seneca, a famous teacher of rhetoric around 37AD, was said to be able to repeat long passages of speeches he had heard years before.  "Memory," said Greek playwright Aeschylus, "is the mother of all wisdom."  People feared the invention of the printing press because it would cause people to rely on books for their memory.  Today, memory is more irrelevant than ever, argue some academics.

"What's important is your ability to use what you know well.  There are people who are walking encyclopædias, but they make a mess of their lives.  Getting a 100% on a written driving test doesn't mean you can drive," said Robert Sternberg, dean of Arts and Sciences at Tufts University and a professor of psychology.

Source: www.nytimes.com/cnet 19 September 2005

Virtual Degree Course

A university has launched the first "virtual" degree course where students attend all their seminars and lectures online.  Undergraduates will be able to study business studies at Essex University without ever leaving home, reports the Daily Mail.  They will log onto the Internet to hear their tutors delivering lectures in real-time before taking part in seminars with fellow students.  A special icon on their computer screens will allow them to click to put their hands up and contribute to the discussion.  Other icons even allow them to laugh at jokes or clap.

It ties in with a Government plan to boost the numbers at university by "widening access" and giving workers alternatives ways of studying.  Students will never have to leave home - not even to take exams.  Instead the course will assessed entirely by essays and projects which are emailed to tutors for marking.

Online degrees firm Kaplan has been allowed to set up a college affiliated to Essex University to deliver the courses.  Alan Jenkins, managing director of Kaplan Open Learning, said the course was the first to be offered "entirely online".  He added: "It is purely online and there is no classroom attendance at all, so a person from Penzance does not have to travel into Birmingham or London to attend a tutorial.  It includes online real-time lectures.  It replicates everything that is the classroom but in an online environment, for example students discussing, students asking questions and students handing in work."

Source: www.ananova.com 9 May 2007

Web Cam to Validate Test-Takers

Software Secure demonstrates fingerprint recognition with Securexam Remote Proctor -
hardware used to monitor distance learning test-takers at remote locations.
The new technology would allow cameras to be placed inside students' homes,
solving a problem for the growing field of online education:
how to make sure students aren't cheating on their exams. (AP Photo/Lisa Poole)

Having taken a few online courses recently, I can appreciate the problem.  But it seems to me this is overkill.  If the online test is timed, why care if the taker references his books, his notes, or even the internet?  On the job, if an employee gets the job done by the deadline, do you really care that he had to look in a book to do it?  (Okay - maybe something like open heart surgery would be an exception.)  Certainly, if someone has to look up each answer - or even many of them, then the time will run out and it will be clear that this student doesn't really know his stuff.  (But, then, I feel timed tests that allow the use of books and notes would be a good philosophy for tests taken in a classroom as well.)  Otherwise, it seems to me the only thing you want to be certain of is that it is indeed the student (and only the student) who is taking the test.  A thumbprint keypad could make sure this is the right student - and the test could randomly call for re-verification.

If it's okay to use books and notes, is it okay to use another person as a quick reference?  Not really.  You can't own that person, or have him in a file where you know you can always access him, nor do you really understand his mental filing system and know just where to go to find the information you seek.  So, I'm afraid I reluctantly will have to come down on the side of a proctor after all.  Anything that encourages online classes and their acceptance as valid must be a good thing.  My biggest concern is that often requirements for online courses are even more onerous than for those taken in a classroom.  Professors vary far too widely in attention and quality.  Perhaps classroom tests should be electronically proctored as well to level the playing field...

Literacy Falls for Graduates from College, Testing Finds

by Sam Dillon

The average American college graduate's literacy in English declined significantly over the past decade, according to results of a nationwide test released yesterday.  The National Assessment of Adult Literacy, given in 2003 by the Department of Education, is the nation's most important test of how well adult Americans can read.  The test also found steep declines in the English literacy of Hispanics in the US, and significant increases among blacks and Asians.

When the test was last administered, in 1992, 40% of the nation's college graduates scored at the proficient level, meaning that they were able to read lengthy, complex English texts and draw complicated inferences.  But on the 2003 test, only 31% of the graduates demonstrated those high-level skills.  There were 26.4 million college graduates.  The college graduates who in 2003 failed to demonstrate proficiency included 53% who scored at the intermediate level and 14% who scored at the basic level, meaning they could read and understand short, commonplace prose texts; 3% of college graduates who took the test in 2003, representing some 800,000 Americans, demonstrated "below basic" literacy, meaning that they could not perform more than the simplest skills, like locating easily identifiable information in short prose.

Grover J Whitehurst, director of an institute within the Department of Education that helped to oversee the test, said he believed that the literacy of college graduates had dropped because a rising number of young Americans in recent years had spent their free time watching television and surfing the Internet.  "We're seeing substantial declines in reading for pleasure, and it's showing up in our literacy levels," he said.

Percentage of Adults in Each Prose, Document, and Quantitative Literacy Level, by Educational Attainment: 1992 and 2003