4 ms·

Dark age, but we just have pocket supercomputers connected to a global network containing all knowledge in human history.

mhandley 8y ago
And yet my 18 year old son has never known a different world. The easy availability of information is just how it always was to him. He can't really conceive of how hard it was to find out something. We've around 4000 books in our home, covering all manner of topics - what would have been a small town library in times past. But still Google is easier and faster. We live in amazing times, and we don't even notice.
- Santosh83 8y ago
  Thousands of books at my home too, some dating to the mid 19th century. The immersion of books still can't be bested by handheld devices. Also despite the Internet, the local library has remained quite popular, and ironically, among the young students. Taking notes from a big textbook on a table is still easier on the hands and eyes than scrolling and squinting through the same text on a 5-inch screen.
- gbear605 8y ago
  To turn it around a bit, consider the things that you had growing up that your parent didn't have. Depending on your age - microwaves, television, computers (not the internet, but having these devices that do work for us), telephones.
InclinedPlane 8y ago
I was with you there until the last bit. The internet does not contain anything remotely like "all knowledge in human history". The closest thing to that would be all books and printed matter plus all audio and visual recordings. The internet does not contain all of that, not even a tiny fraction of all that. It probably will in the future, but it's going to be a while.
- gbear605 8y ago
  A substantial fraction of books have been digitized, even if not publicly available. Perhaps a more interesting question would be that of all significant/important knowledge in human history. Some information is more important than other; the name of a childless bachelor who lived in a small town 200 years ago is still knowledge, but it isn't helpful for very much.

mhandley 8y ago

And yet my 18 year old son has never known a different world. The easy availability of information is just how it always was to him. He can't really conceive of how hard it was to find out something. We've around 4000 books in our home, covering all manner of topics - what would have been a small town library in times past. But still Google is easier and faster. We live in amazing times, and we don't even notice.

Santosh83 8y ago
Thousands of books at my home too, some dating to the mid 19th century. The immersion of books still can't be bested by handheld devices. Also despite the Internet, the local library has remained quite popular, and ironically, among the young students. Taking notes from a big textbook on a table is still easier on the hands and eyes than scrolling and squinting through the same text on a 5-inch screen.
gbear605 8y ago
To turn it around a bit, consider the things that you had growing up that your parent didn't have. Depending on your age - microwaves, television, computers (not the internet, but having these devices that do work for us), telephones.

InclinedPlane 8y ago

I was with you there until the last bit. The internet does not contain anything remotely like "all knowledge in human history". The closest thing to that would be all books and printed matter plus all audio and visual recordings. The internet does not contain all of that, not even a tiny fraction of all that. It probably will in the future, but it's going to be a while.

gbear605 8y ago
A substantial fraction of books have been digitized, even if not publicly available. Perhaps a more interesting question would be that of all significant/important knowledge in human history. Some information is more important than other; the name of a childless bachelor who lived in a small town 200 years ago is still knowledge, but it isn't helpful for very much.