Blog #1

Prompt:"The Judgment of Thamus" is a chapter in Neil Postman's 1992 book Technopoly: the surrender of culture to knowledge. Since we're reading this excerpt twenty-four years after it was published, I'd like you to write about what Postman gets right or wrong about technology's influence on information, knowledge, access, equity, language, etc. Your post, like all blog posts this semester, should consist of at least two solid paragraphs that make direct reference to the text.

Response:
In Postman's book, he discusses multiple influences that technology has on information. Some of the points that he makes are accurate. For example, when he talks about technology positively affecting part of the population while it negatively affects another is an accurate statement. The older generations of the current population would not have as positive an affect from technology as the younger businessmen in the world would. Different circumstances benefit from technology differently. Also, more tradition-orientated cultures would benefit less from technology than would the always changing and progressing United States.

On the other hand, some of the arguments that Postman makes are not as accurate. For example, when he discusses technology taking away from the productiveness in a classroom. Postman says that technology takes away from interactions among students and that it hinders learning ability. Technology in a classroom can positively impact the learning of students. It can connect students to outside and current information that otherwise wouldn't be in textbooks. It can also enhance the teachers' knowledge of materials that they are teaching by allowing them to have access to updated information pertaining to the subject being discussed.