WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.960 Welcome to the deep dive. You know, it's funny. 00:00:04.299 --> 00:00:06.719 Whenever a new piece of technology lands in a 00:00:06.719 --> 00:00:10.279 classroom, there is this almost immediate entirely 00:00:10.279 --> 00:00:12.919 predictable panic. Oh, absolutely like clockwork. 00:00:13.080 --> 00:00:14.779 Right. We hear all the time people complaining 00:00:14.779 --> 00:00:18.079 that, you know, screens are rotting brains or 00:00:18.079 --> 00:00:20.679 the calculators will just make everyone forget 00:00:20.679 --> 00:00:22.980 how to do basic math. Yeah, the classic calculator 00:00:22.980 --> 00:00:25.019 argument. Exactly. And we tend to assume this 00:00:25.019 --> 00:00:27.399 anxiety is totally unique to our modern fast 00:00:27.399 --> 00:00:31.039 paced era. But today, our mission is to explore 00:00:31.039 --> 00:00:33.799 how changing information technologies disrupt 00:00:33.799 --> 00:00:38.740 education and society. And why our current panic 00:00:38.740 --> 00:00:41.359 over computers in schools is actually just the 00:00:41.359 --> 00:00:43.619 latest chapter in a pattern that goes back, I 00:00:43.619 --> 00:00:46.219 mean... It really is. We're looking at a cycle 00:00:46.219 --> 00:00:48.340 of disruption that just repeats itself over and 00:00:48.340 --> 00:00:50.100 over throughout human history. Yeah. And to help 00:00:50.100 --> 00:00:53.060 us map that cycle today, we're drawing on a really 00:00:53.060 --> 00:00:55.439 thought -provoking essay by Dr. Gary Ackerman. 00:00:55.820 --> 00:00:58.219 It's from HackScience .Education, and it's titled 00:00:58.219 --> 00:01:00.939 On Changing Information Technologies. Such a 00:01:00.939 --> 00:01:04.019 good piece. It is. What the author does so effectively 00:01:04.019 --> 00:01:07.400 is he pulls us out of the immediate arguments 00:01:07.400 --> 00:01:09.340 we're constantly having, you know, about screen 00:01:09.340 --> 00:01:12.060 time or app usage. Right, the day -to -day stuff. 00:01:12.299 --> 00:01:15.640 Exactly. And he places those specific anxieties 00:01:15.640 --> 00:01:18.700 into a much broader structural context. Well, 00:01:18.819 --> 00:01:21.280 to kick things off, I want to tease a historical 00:01:21.280 --> 00:01:24.900 irony that honestly completely refrains how we 00:01:24.900 --> 00:01:26.659 look at educational tools. I love this part. 00:01:26.780 --> 00:01:30.500 It's wild. One of history's most revered philosophers. 00:01:31.140 --> 00:01:34.739 I mean, a thinker whose ideas literally form 00:01:34.739 --> 00:01:38.140 the bedrock of Western civilization absolutely 00:01:38.140 --> 00:01:40.500 despised the idea of students learning to read 00:01:40.500 --> 00:01:43.010 and write. Yeah, it sounds totally counterintuitive 00:01:43.010 --> 00:01:45.049 to modern ears, doesn't it? It really does. Because 00:01:45.049 --> 00:01:47.709 we treat literacy as like the ultimate hallmark 00:01:47.709 --> 00:01:50.489 of a civilized mind. But this resistance, it 00:01:50.489 --> 00:01:52.549 perfectly captures the intense friction that 00:01:52.549 --> 00:01:54.930 happens every single time the dominant tools 00:01:54.930 --> 00:01:57.329 of learning begin to shift beneath our feet. 00:01:57.590 --> 00:01:59.989 OK, let's unpack this. We need to travel all 00:01:59.989 --> 00:02:02.170 the way back to ancient Greece to really grasp 00:02:02.170 --> 00:02:05.750 that technological panic in education is not 00:02:05.750 --> 00:02:08.610 some 21st century phenomenon. Not at all. So 00:02:08.610 --> 00:02:11.340 in the essay, Ackerman brings up James Glyke's 00:02:11.340 --> 00:02:14.800 2011 book, The Information, which details Plato's 00:02:14.800 --> 00:02:17.340 incredibly harsh criticism of writing. I actually 00:02:17.340 --> 00:02:19.120 have the quote right here. Oh, read it. It's 00:02:19.120 --> 00:02:22.439 scathing. It is. Plato was commenting on teachers 00:02:22.439 --> 00:02:25.479 who were starting to introduce writing to their 00:02:25.479 --> 00:02:28.759 students. And he said, you have invented an elixir 00:02:28.759 --> 00:02:32.080 not of memory, but of reminding. And you offer 00:02:32.080 --> 00:02:35.259 your pupils the appearance of wisdom, not true 00:02:35.259 --> 00:02:37.430 wisdom. The appearance of Listem, I mean, that 00:02:37.430 --> 00:02:40.030 is a stinging indictment of a skill that we now 00:02:40.030 --> 00:02:43.150 consider just the absolute baseline of participating 00:02:43.150 --> 00:02:45.729 in society. Right. It honestly reminds me of 00:02:45.729 --> 00:02:48.770 someone today complaining that using a GPS on 00:02:48.770 --> 00:02:50.610 your phone completely ruins your natural sense 00:02:50.610 --> 00:02:52.409 of direction. Oh, that's a great comparison. 00:02:52.590 --> 00:02:55.050 Like the argument goes that if you don't internalize 00:02:55.050 --> 00:02:57.289 the route yourself, you aren't really navigating. 00:02:57.430 --> 00:02:59.409 You're just blindly following a blue line on 00:02:59.409 --> 00:03:01.370 a screen. Yeah, you're outsourcing the navigation. 00:03:01.629 --> 00:03:03.349 Exactly. And Plato was basically applying that 00:03:03.349 --> 00:03:06.979 exact same logic to the written word. He, um... 00:03:06.639 --> 00:03:10.560 He saw writing as this external crutch, an outsourcing 00:03:10.560 --> 00:03:12.620 of human cognition that would just make students 00:03:12.620 --> 00:03:15.759 lazy. That GPS analogy captures the sentiment 00:03:15.759 --> 00:03:18.860 perfectly. Because to understand why Plato felt 00:03:18.860 --> 00:03:21.340 such a deep sense of loss, you really have to 00:03:21.340 --> 00:03:23.460 look at the cognitive architecture he was trying 00:03:23.460 --> 00:03:25.539 to protect. The oral culture, right? Exactly. 00:03:25.960 --> 00:03:29.039 He lived in a largely oral culture. For centuries, 00:03:29.360 --> 00:03:32.099 human memory was the primary technology for storing 00:03:32.099 --> 00:03:35.180 and transmitting knowledge. Wow, memory as a 00:03:35.180 --> 00:03:36.830 technology. That's a cool - way to phrase it. 00:03:37.270 --> 00:03:40.409 Yeah, because Bards memorized massive epic poems 00:03:40.409 --> 00:03:43.129 and philosophers debated through these highly 00:03:43.129 --> 00:03:46.069 structured spoken dialogues. Memory wasn't just 00:03:46.069 --> 00:03:50.669 a biological function. It was an actively cultivated, 00:03:50.949 --> 00:03:53.770 highly revered technology. So when writing started 00:03:53.770 --> 00:03:56.650 to gain traction, Plato viewed it as a literal 00:03:56.650 --> 00:03:59.800 degradation of that innate human ability. He 00:03:59.800 --> 00:04:02.300 genuinely feared that relying on scrolls and 00:04:02.300 --> 00:04:05.240 text would cause our internal cognitive muscles 00:04:05.240 --> 00:04:08.560 to atrophy. He thought it replaced the true internalization 00:04:08.560 --> 00:04:11.500 of knowledge with just, like, mere reference 00:04:11.500 --> 00:04:13.360 material. Yeah. You aren't learning the concepts. 00:04:13.360 --> 00:04:15.520 You just know which scroll to check when you 00:04:15.520 --> 00:04:17.459 need the answer. Which is a critique you hear 00:04:17.459 --> 00:04:19.540 echoed in classrooms today about search engines, 00:04:19.620 --> 00:04:22.079 isn't it? Oh, all the time. Just Google it. Right. 00:04:22.480 --> 00:04:25.980 But the essay introduces a really powerful counter 00:04:25.980 --> 00:04:28.360 perspective from the 17th century philosopher 00:04:28.360 --> 00:04:32.189 Thomas Haas. Hobbes looked back at those proliterate 00:04:32.189 --> 00:04:35.579 oral cultures. The exact environment Plato was 00:04:35.579 --> 00:04:38.740 so fiercely defending and he saw a deeply flawed 00:04:38.740 --> 00:04:42.040 system. Interesting. Why? Well, Hobbes argued 00:04:42.040 --> 00:04:44.939 that without writing there was no rigorous method 00:04:44.939 --> 00:04:47.600 to knowledge. He wrote that there was no planting 00:04:47.600 --> 00:04:50.519 of knowledge by itself apart from weeds and common 00:04:50.519 --> 00:04:53.600 plants of error and conjecture. Oh, wow. So Hobbes 00:04:53.600 --> 00:04:55.339 is pointing out that human memory is actually 00:04:55.339 --> 00:04:58.500 incredibly faulty. Highly faulty and subjective. 00:04:58.699 --> 00:05:01.730 Yeah. Without a physical, immutable record, the 00:05:01.730 --> 00:05:05.329 truth just gets overgrown with rumors and myths 00:05:05.329 --> 00:05:08.110 and generational mistakes. Exactly. For Hobbes, 00:05:08.110 --> 00:05:10.290 writing wasn't a degradation of the human mind 00:05:10.290 --> 00:05:13.009 at all. It was a purification process for human 00:05:13.009 --> 00:05:15.209 knowledge. That makes a lot of sense. It allowed 00:05:15.209 --> 00:05:18.470 society to lock down facts, build upon them across 00:05:18.470 --> 00:05:21.670 centuries, and just systematically weed out the 00:05:21.670 --> 00:05:24.069 error and conjecture that's inherent in oral 00:05:24.069 --> 00:05:27.639 storytelling. And, you know, Between Plato's 00:05:27.639 --> 00:05:29.660 reverence for memory and Hobbes's reliance on 00:05:29.660 --> 00:05:33.240 the record, text decisively won the war. Definitely. 00:05:33.399 --> 00:05:36.120 The written word disrupted all the old patterns 00:05:36.120 --> 00:05:39.019 of information use and completely redefined what 00:05:39.019 --> 00:05:41.540 it meant to be an educated person. Plato lost 00:05:41.540 --> 00:05:43.899 the war and society moved on to a completely 00:05:43.899 --> 00:05:46.779 new baseline. Yeah. And that brings up a really 00:05:46.779 --> 00:05:49.439 vital question for you, the listener, as you 00:05:49.439 --> 00:05:52.060 go about your day today. Think about your own 00:05:52.060 --> 00:05:54.060 habits. Yeah, seriously, think about it. Are 00:05:54.060 --> 00:05:56.939 you currently relying on an elixir of reminding? 00:05:57.120 --> 00:05:59.360 Maybe it's your digital calendar or the notes 00:05:59.360 --> 00:06:01.420 app on your phone or, I don't know, an alert 00:06:01.420 --> 00:06:03.620 you set to take a daily medication. Oh, my whole 00:06:03.620 --> 00:06:06.259 life is in those alerts. Right. Plato would argue 00:06:06.259 --> 00:06:08.620 those tools diminish your true wisdom and memory. 00:06:09.300 --> 00:06:11.019 But you have to ask yourself if you could even 00:06:11.019 --> 00:06:12.899 function in the modern economy without them. 00:06:13.199 --> 00:06:15.480 I would be entirely lost without my calendar 00:06:15.480 --> 00:06:17.860 alerts. My entire professional life relies on 00:06:17.860 --> 00:06:20.360 that specific elixir of reminding. Same here. 00:06:20.720 --> 00:06:23.540 Because society decided Plato was wrong, text 00:06:23.540 --> 00:06:26.180 eventually became the undisputed king of information 00:06:26.180 --> 00:06:29.120 storage. And it stayed king for a very, very 00:06:29.120 --> 00:06:32.920 long time, which created this historically unprecedented 00:06:32.920 --> 00:06:35.660 era of stability and learning. That stability 00:06:35.660 --> 00:06:38.660 of the print era is crucial to examine. because 00:06:38.660 --> 00:06:41.300 it explains why our current moment feels so chaotic 00:06:41.300 --> 00:06:43.620 to so many people. Here's where it gets really 00:06:43.620 --> 00:06:46.199 interesting. The author of the essay, Gary Ackerman, 00:06:46.819 --> 00:06:49.240 shares a personal anecdote about his own grandfather 00:06:49.240 --> 00:06:51.279 to illustrate this point. I love this story. 00:06:51.500 --> 00:06:53.899 So illustrative. His grandfather graduated from 00:06:53.899 --> 00:06:57.480 the University of Vermont in 1939. Ackerman himself 00:06:57.480 --> 00:07:00.120 graduated from that exact same university 49 00:07:00.120 --> 00:07:03.279 years later in 1988. Almost half a century. Right. 00:07:03.420 --> 00:07:05.600 And they both study biology. Ackerman actually 00:07:05.600 --> 00:07:07.519 has some of his grandfather's textbooks sitting 00:07:07.519 --> 00:07:10.060 on his bookshelf right next to his own college 00:07:10.060 --> 00:07:12.060 textbooks. Yeah. Now if we just look at the field 00:07:12.060 --> 00:07:16.199 of biology between 1939 and 1988, the leaps in 00:07:16.199 --> 00:07:18.319 knowledge are staggering. Oh, I mean, you're 00:07:18.319 --> 00:07:20.459 looking at the discovery of the double helix 00:07:20.459 --> 00:07:23.279 structure of DNA. The dawn of modern genetics, 00:07:24.019 --> 00:07:27.459 massive leaps in cellular biology, entirely new 00:07:27.459 --> 00:07:30.860 ecological paradigms. It's a different world. 00:07:31.040 --> 00:07:33.600 A half century of explosive scientific advancement. 00:07:34.879 --> 00:07:37.139 So the content of those two sets of textbooks 00:07:37.139 --> 00:07:40.399 is vastly different. But Ackerman points out 00:07:40.399 --> 00:07:43.139 that the actual literacy skills required to succeed 00:07:43.139 --> 00:07:46.240 at the university remained identical. Yes. Both 00:07:46.240 --> 00:07:49.660 men relied on reading printed text linearly from 00:07:49.660 --> 00:07:52.519 top to bottom. Both shared the exact same habit 00:07:52.519 --> 00:07:55.019 of writing notes in the margins of their physical 00:07:55.019 --> 00:07:58.040 books to synthesize the information. Right. Despite 00:07:58.040 --> 00:08:01.100 a 50 -year gap in entirely new scientific realities, 00:08:01.639 --> 00:08:03.920 the mechanics of how a student interacted with 00:08:03.920 --> 00:08:06.560 knowledge hadn't shifted an inch. What's fascinating 00:08:06.560 --> 00:08:09.139 here is just how profound that structural stability 00:08:09.139 --> 00:08:11.560 really was. For centuries following the invention 00:08:11.560 --> 00:08:14.019 of the printing press, being educated simply 00:08:14.019 --> 00:08:16.160 meant mastering text. Just reading and writing. 00:08:16.399 --> 00:08:19.240 Yeah. If you could decode complex written language, 00:08:19.779 --> 00:08:21.639 sit with a dense book for hours and articulate 00:08:21.639 --> 00:08:23.699 your own thoughts on paper, you had the keys 00:08:23.699 --> 00:08:25.939 to the kingdom. You were set. The underlying 00:08:25.939 --> 00:08:28.939 scientific content evolved, sure, but the interface, 00:08:29.540 --> 00:08:32.259 the book itself, remained a constant, predictable 00:08:32.259 --> 00:08:35.480 variable. I think it is really important to highlight 00:08:35.480 --> 00:08:38.980 this for you, the listener, because this highly 00:08:38.980 --> 00:08:41.879 stable, textbook -driven environment is almost 00:08:41.879 --> 00:08:43.539 certainly the one you grew up in. Oh, totally. 00:08:44.159 --> 00:08:46.899 Highlighters, paperbacks, taking notes on a physical 00:08:46.899 --> 00:08:48.940 pad while a teacher stood at the front of the 00:08:48.940 --> 00:08:51.500 room. The universal standard. That was it. We 00:08:51.500 --> 00:08:54.440 spent generations perfecting how to teach, learn, 00:08:54.580 --> 00:08:57.580 and test within the medium of print. And because 00:08:57.580 --> 00:08:59.639 the medium didn't change for hundreds of years, 00:08:59.799 --> 00:09:02.200 we naturally started to mistake the tool for 00:09:02.200 --> 00:09:04.299 the learning itself. Oh, that's a huge point. 00:09:04.399 --> 00:09:06.600 We built our entire educational architecture 00:09:06.600 --> 00:09:09.600 around the physical book. When you do that, reading 00:09:09.600 --> 00:09:12.320 a textbook stops being seen as just one way to 00:09:12.320 --> 00:09:14.860 access education, and it actually becomes synonymous 00:09:14.860 --> 00:09:18.100 with education itself. Right. It is school. Exactly. 00:09:18.460 --> 00:09:20.460 So when that foundational tool is suddenly swapped 00:09:20.460 --> 00:09:22.919 out, it doesn't just feel like a new piece of 00:09:22.919 --> 00:09:24.620 technology is entering the room. It feels like 00:09:24.620 --> 00:09:26.940 the very concept of learning is under attack. 00:09:27.279 --> 00:09:29.600 Ackerman's grandfather writing notes in the margins 00:09:29.600 --> 00:09:32.639 is a perfect system when information is static. 00:09:33.460 --> 00:09:36.500 But that exact same habit completely breaks down 00:09:36.500 --> 00:09:38.759 when the text you're reading is connected to, 00:09:38.960 --> 00:09:42.539 like a live updating global database. It doesn't 00:09:42.539 --> 00:09:45.570 translate. No. So we need to explore why those 00:09:45.570 --> 00:09:48.889 time -tested 1939 textbook skills are suddenly 00:09:48.889 --> 00:09:52.289 starting to look obsolete. But let me play devil's 00:09:52.289 --> 00:09:54.490 advocate for a second here. Go for it. Push back 00:09:54.490 --> 00:09:56.090 on this with me. We're talking about reading 00:09:56.090 --> 00:09:59.090 a screen versus reading paper. But isn't writing 00:09:59.090 --> 00:10:02.250 a traditional research paper in 1988 a form of 00:10:02.250 --> 00:10:04.360 manipulating information? I mean, I remember 00:10:04.360 --> 00:10:06.940 pulling from physical encyclopedias, synthesizing 00:10:06.940 --> 00:10:09.480 different chapters, taking my own notes and creating 00:10:09.480 --> 00:10:11.919 something new. Why is doing that on a computer 00:10:11.919 --> 00:10:14.649 fundamentally a different cognitive act? That 00:10:14.649 --> 00:10:17.070 is the crux of the modern debate right there. 00:10:17.350 --> 00:10:19.330 The difference lies in the architecture of the 00:10:19.330 --> 00:10:21.710 information environment and really the sheer 00:10:21.710 --> 00:10:24.210 scale of the cognitive load. OK, how so? Well, 00:10:24.309 --> 00:10:26.509 we tend to think of digital media as just a new 00:10:26.509 --> 00:10:28.870 wrapper for old content. We assume reading a 00:10:28.870 --> 00:10:31.009 PDF on a tablet is like, you know, moving from 00:10:31.009 --> 00:10:33.330 a hardback book to a paperback. Right, just a 00:10:33.330 --> 00:10:35.250 different format. But Ackerman makes it clear 00:10:35.250 --> 00:10:38.090 that digital technology challenges deeply held 00:10:38.090 --> 00:10:41.570 beliefs about cognition itself. When you wrote 00:10:41.570 --> 00:10:44.710 a research paper in 1988 using encyclopedias, 00:10:45.230 --> 00:10:47.450 you were pulling from sources that were heavily 00:10:47.450 --> 00:10:51.269 curated, vetted, and structured by publishers 00:10:51.269 --> 00:10:53.149 and experts. They did a lot of the heavy lifting. 00:10:53.409 --> 00:10:55.950 Exactly. You were navigating a pre -planned garden. 00:10:56.330 --> 00:10:58.269 So the boundary of the information was already 00:10:58.269 --> 00:11:00.950 set for me. I just had to walk the path the authors 00:11:00.950 --> 00:11:03.529 laid out. Precisely. But digital information 00:11:03.529 --> 00:11:07.370 is entirely dynamic and largely uncurated. The 00:11:07.370 --> 00:11:10.029 new baseline skills required today go far beyond 00:11:10.029 --> 00:11:12.870 just decoding text and synthesizing curated chapters. 00:11:12.909 --> 00:11:15.789 It's way messier. So much messier. Students today 00:11:15.789 --> 00:11:18.669 must be able to access vast databases of raw 00:11:18.669 --> 00:11:21.490 information, manipulate that data to find hidden 00:11:21.490 --> 00:11:24.230 patterns, create new media from those insights, 00:11:24.269 --> 00:11:26.929 and then disseminate their findings across really 00:11:26.929 --> 00:11:29.580 complex networks. They're no longer navigating 00:11:29.580 --> 00:11:31.539 a pre -planned garden. They're being dropped 00:11:31.539 --> 00:11:33.960 into a dense jungle with a machete and told to 00:11:33.960 --> 00:11:36.460 find their own way out. Man, so it's the difference 00:11:36.460 --> 00:11:41.700 between reading a printed road atlas where the 00:11:41.700 --> 00:11:43.500 cartographer has already decided what the most 00:11:43.500 --> 00:11:46.639 important highways are versus using an interactive 00:11:46.639 --> 00:11:48.480 digital mapping software. That's a great way 00:11:48.480 --> 00:11:50.860 to look at it. Because with the software, I have 00:11:50.860 --> 00:11:54.679 to zoom in. overlay live traffic data, filter 00:11:54.679 --> 00:11:57.039 out toll roads, cross -reference weather patterns, 00:11:57.500 --> 00:11:59.799 and then instantly share my custom route with 00:11:59.799 --> 00:12:01.799 five different people. And the cognitive load 00:12:01.799 --> 00:12:03.940 there is entirely different. You aren't just 00:12:03.940 --> 00:12:06.740 absorbing a static map anymore. You are curating, 00:12:07.000 --> 00:12:10.500 filtering, and synthesizing multiple live data 00:12:10.500 --> 00:12:12.980 streams in real time. It's exhausting just thinking 00:12:12.980 --> 00:12:15.419 about it. Right. If we connect this to the bigger 00:12:15.419 --> 00:12:17.980 picture, a student researching biology today 00:12:17.980 --> 00:12:20.940 isn't just reading a chapter on genetics. They 00:12:20.940 --> 00:12:23.720 are interacting with digital models of DNA that 00:12:23.720 --> 00:12:26.179 they can literally spin around on their screen. 00:12:26.279 --> 00:12:29.639 Yeah. They are cross -referencing real -time 00:12:29.639 --> 00:12:32.919 global databases of genetic sequencing that update 00:12:32.919 --> 00:12:35.700 every hour. They're assessing the credibility 00:12:35.700 --> 00:12:38.139 of a source that might have been published like 00:12:38.139 --> 00:12:40.799 three minutes ago by an unverified author. Oh, 00:12:40.820 --> 00:12:42.940 the credibility part alone is a full -time job. 00:12:43.019 --> 00:12:46.279 Exactly. And they are likely doing all of this 00:12:46.279 --> 00:12:48.659 while collaborating on a shared document with 00:12:48.659 --> 00:12:51.440 peers in another state. So if you take a linearly 00:12:51.440 --> 00:12:54.419 trained brain, someone who expects information 00:12:54.419 --> 00:12:57.000 to have a neat beginning, middle, and end, just 00:12:57.000 --> 00:12:59.220 like Akram's grandfather's textbook, and you 00:12:59.220 --> 00:13:01.120 put them in that dynamic digital environment, 00:13:01.460 --> 00:13:03.440 they're just going to drown in the flood of information. 00:13:03.440 --> 00:13:05.960 Yeah, completely drown. The old skills actively 00:13:05.960 --> 00:13:07.980 work against you because you try to read the 00:13:07.980 --> 00:13:09.700 internet from top to bottom. And you just can't 00:13:09.700 --> 00:13:12.340 do that. Approaching a dynamic network with a 00:13:12.299 --> 00:13:14.899 mindset leaves you vulnerable and overwhelmed. 00:13:15.120 --> 00:13:17.580 It's not just about accessing information anymore, 00:13:17.879 --> 00:13:20.580 it is about the capacity to rapidly manipulate 00:13:20.580 --> 00:13:23.419 it. Without the ability to restructure and filter 00:13:23.419 --> 00:13:26.659 data, a student is functionally unprepared for 00:13:26.659 --> 00:13:28.799 the modern world. So what does this all mean? 00:13:29.019 --> 00:13:31.299 It means a lot. Yeah if the very definition of 00:13:31.299 --> 00:13:33.860 cognition and literacy is changing from passive 00:13:33.860 --> 00:13:37.159 absorption to active manipulation, we have to 00:13:37.159 --> 00:13:39.299 look at the stakes for society going forward. 00:13:39.399 --> 00:13:42.460 And the essay argues that if you lack these digital 00:13:42.460 --> 00:13:44.820 manipulation skills, you are functionally locked 00:13:44.820 --> 00:13:47.500 out of participating in modern life. The stakes 00:13:47.500 --> 00:13:50.399 are profoundly high across economic, political, 00:13:50.759 --> 00:13:54.139 and social spheres. It touches everything. Let's 00:13:54.139 --> 00:13:56.399 unpack how that lockout happened structurally. 00:13:57.320 --> 00:13:59.600 Because it feels very similar to someone who 00:13:59.600 --> 00:14:01.940 couldn't read in the 19th century. It's a perfect 00:14:01.940 --> 00:14:04.740 parallel. Back then, If you were illiterate, 00:14:04.879 --> 00:14:07.259 you were barred from the best jobs, you couldn't 00:14:07.259 --> 00:14:09.080 read the newspaper to understand the political 00:14:09.080 --> 00:14:11.259 landscape, and you were just at the mercy of 00:14:11.259 --> 00:14:13.340 whatever information other people chose to tell 00:14:13.340 --> 00:14:16.679 you. Ackerman is saying that in the 21st century, 00:14:16.940 --> 00:14:19.480 a lack of digital manipulation skills is the 00:14:19.480 --> 00:14:22.399 exact same kind of barrier. Applying for even 00:14:22.399 --> 00:14:25.480 a basic entry -level job today often requires 00:14:25.480 --> 00:14:28.320 navigating automated digital portals, filtering 00:14:28.320 --> 00:14:30.620 through application tracking systems, and managing 00:14:30.620 --> 00:14:32.679 online identities. Just to get an interview. 00:14:32.820 --> 00:14:35.090 Right. But the political stakes are even more 00:14:35.090 --> 00:14:37.529 severe. Understanding modern political discourse 00:14:37.529 --> 00:14:39.850 requires the cognitive ability to filter out 00:14:39.850 --> 00:14:43.169 deep fakes, recognize algorithmically generated 00:14:43.169 --> 00:14:46.710 misinformation, and identify biased data sets. 00:14:47.029 --> 00:14:50.230 Right. If I can only process information linearly. 00:14:50.559 --> 00:14:53.980 How do I participate in a democracy when my social 00:14:53.980 --> 00:14:56.700 media feed is hitting me with targeted political 00:14:56.700 --> 00:14:59.679 ads and AI -generated articles? You can't. Not 00:14:59.679 --> 00:15:01.799 effectively. If I approach a social media feed 00:15:01.799 --> 00:15:04.279 the way Ackerman's grandfather approached a biology 00:15:04.279 --> 00:15:06.879 textbook, I'm going to assume the information 00:15:06.879 --> 00:15:09.039 is being curated for my educational benefit. 00:15:09.340 --> 00:15:11.299 I'll just assume the publisher vetted it. And 00:15:11.299 --> 00:15:13.960 that is exactly how a linearly trained brain 00:15:13.960 --> 00:15:16.480 gets defeated by modern information systems. 00:15:17.080 --> 00:15:20.159 Because the algorithm curating your feed is dynamic. 00:15:20.240 --> 00:15:22.340 It adapts to your behavior. It's not a textbook. 00:15:22.700 --> 00:15:25.460 No. It isn't optimizing for your education. It 00:15:25.460 --> 00:15:28.200 is optimizing for your engagement, which often 00:15:28.200 --> 00:15:31.039 means feeding you outrage or sensationalism. 00:15:31.419 --> 00:15:33.980 If you consume that feed passively, the way you 00:15:33.980 --> 00:15:36.820 would read a printed page, you are being manipulated 00:15:36.820 --> 00:15:38.919 by the data instead of manipulating the data 00:15:38.919 --> 00:15:41.990 yourself. Wow. Which brings us to the real urgency 00:15:41.990 --> 00:15:44.909 of this deep dive. If students leave school knowing 00:15:44.909 --> 00:15:46.970 only how to read a printed book and write an 00:15:46.970 --> 00:15:49.590 essay on paper, we have fundamentally failed 00:15:49.590 --> 00:15:51.590 to prepare them for the reality of their world. 00:15:51.909 --> 00:15:54.870 We've prepared them beautifully for 1988, but 00:15:54.870 --> 00:15:58.210 we have left them entirely defenseless against 00:15:58.210 --> 00:16:00.610 the algorithms of today. The author stresses 00:16:00.610 --> 00:16:03.029 that this isn't just an IT issue for schools 00:16:03.029 --> 00:16:04.769 to figure out in the background, you know, like 00:16:04.919 --> 00:16:07.799 deciding which brand of laptops to buy, this 00:16:07.799 --> 00:16:10.279 raises an important question about the very purpose 00:16:10.279 --> 00:16:13.720 of our educational institutions. Because this 00:16:13.720 --> 00:16:16.720 shift from print to digital is still incomplete, 00:16:17.340 --> 00:16:19.799 schools are caught in this messy transitional 00:16:19.799 --> 00:16:22.980 middle ground. Ackerman argues they must actively 00:16:22.980 --> 00:16:26.340 renegotiate their strategic goals to match changing 00:16:26.340 --> 00:16:29.559 societal expectations. OK, but instead of using 00:16:29.559 --> 00:16:32.100 corporate speak like renegotiating strategic 00:16:32.100 --> 00:16:34.950 goals, what does that actually look like? on 00:16:34.950 --> 00:16:37.370 a Tuesday morning in a modern classroom? Good 00:16:37.370 --> 00:16:39.149 question. Because we aren't just swapping out 00:16:39.149 --> 00:16:41.049 chalkboards for smart boards and calling it a 00:16:41.049 --> 00:16:42.750 day, right? No, no. It looks like a fundamental 00:16:42.750 --> 00:16:45.009 shift in how we assess a student's capability. 00:16:45.570 --> 00:16:48.070 We have to move away from grading memorization 00:16:48.070 --> 00:16:51.269 and linear recall. OK. In a renegotiated classroom, 00:16:51.370 --> 00:16:53.129 a teacher might start grading the quality of 00:16:53.129 --> 00:16:55.009 the questions a student asks a search engine. 00:16:55.149 --> 00:16:58.750 Oh, that's fascinating. Right. Or we might assess 00:16:58.750 --> 00:17:01.409 their ability to take a massive, messy data set 00:17:01.409 --> 00:17:04.250 and curate it down to three actionable insights. 00:17:04.539 --> 00:17:07.519 We could test how well they identify the hidden 00:17:07.519 --> 00:17:11.220 biases in an AI -generated summary of a historical 00:17:11.220 --> 00:17:13.480 event. So the skill isn't knowing the event, 00:17:13.740 --> 00:17:15.779 it's critiquing the machine's summary of the 00:17:15.779 --> 00:17:18.519 event. Exactly. The entire assessment model changes 00:17:18.519 --> 00:17:21.940 from asking, what do you know, to asking... What 00:17:21.940 --> 00:17:25.460 can you intelligently do with this endless flood 00:17:25.460 --> 00:17:28.000 of data? It's a complete restructuring of value. 00:17:28.400 --> 00:17:30.380 We're shifting from rewarding the storage of 00:17:30.380 --> 00:17:33.160 information to rewarding the architectural management 00:17:33.160 --> 00:17:35.339 of information. Beautifully put. And honestly, 00:17:35.359 --> 00:17:37.839 that explains the intense public panic we see. 00:17:38.220 --> 00:17:40.579 When parents or politicians get upset about screens 00:17:40.579 --> 00:17:42.420 in schools, or they complain that kids don't 00:17:42.420 --> 00:17:44.579 read classic novels the same way anymore, they're 00:17:44.579 --> 00:17:46.980 feeling the friction of this massive societal 00:17:46.980 --> 00:17:49.160 renegotiation. They're feeling the exact same 00:17:49.160 --> 00:17:52.339 panic Plato felt. Yes. They recognize that the 00:17:52.339 --> 00:17:54.460 elixir of learning is changing again, and they 00:17:54.460 --> 00:17:56.859 are terrified that true wisdom is being lost 00:17:56.859 --> 00:17:59.640 in all that digital noise. But just as writing 00:17:59.640 --> 00:18:02.579 eventually expanded throughout society and redefined 00:18:02.579 --> 00:18:05.609 what it meant to be educated, Digital manipulation 00:18:05.609 --> 00:18:08.250 is doing the exact same thing right now. Yeah. 00:18:08.589 --> 00:18:11.369 The institutions that cling solely to the 1939 00:18:11.369 --> 00:18:13.970 model of literacy, hoping this is just a passing 00:18:13.970 --> 00:18:16.869 phase, will simply cease to be relevant to the 00:18:16.869 --> 00:18:19.569 lives of their students. It is a lot to process, 00:18:20.009 --> 00:18:22.029 especially if you grew up firmly in the print 00:18:22.029 --> 00:18:24.569 era. But looking at it through this historical 00:18:24.569 --> 00:18:27.210 lens really takes the sting out of the modern 00:18:27.210 --> 00:18:30.230 anxiety. Let's briefly recap the journey we just 00:18:30.230 --> 00:18:32.509 took. Sounds good. We started in ancient Greece. 00:18:32.750 --> 00:18:35.190 with Plato terrified that the written word would 00:18:35.190 --> 00:18:38.190 destroy human memory and wisdom. We then jumped 00:18:38.190 --> 00:18:40.950 to the incredible 50 -year span of textbook stability 00:18:40.950 --> 00:18:43.329 in Vermont, where the scientific facts of biology 00:18:43.329 --> 00:18:45.930 changed, but the act of reading remained perfectly 00:18:45.930 --> 00:18:48.549 identical. The golden age of print. Exactly. 00:18:48.730 --> 00:18:50.910 And finally, we arrived at our current moment, 00:18:51.269 --> 00:18:53.609 this incomplete, messy transition into a world 00:18:53.609 --> 00:18:56.450 of digital cognition, where the ability to actively 00:18:56.450 --> 00:18:59.170 manipulate dynamic information is the new baseline 00:18:59.170 --> 00:19:02.000 literacy for societal survival. It's a sweeping 00:19:02.000 --> 00:19:04.619 historical arc, but it proves that technology 00:19:04.619 --> 00:19:07.259 and education are always engaged in this complex 00:19:07.259 --> 00:19:10.700 dance. Disruption of the status quo is the historical 00:19:10.700 --> 00:19:14.339 norm, not the exception. Here is the big takeaway 00:19:14.339 --> 00:19:17.440 I want you, the listener, to hold onto as you 00:19:17.440 --> 00:19:19.839 navigate your own week. The next time you feel 00:19:19.839 --> 00:19:22.039 completely overwhelmed by information overload 00:19:22.039 --> 00:19:25.339 or you get frustrated by some new digital tool 00:19:25.339 --> 00:19:28.240 you have to learn for your job, Or you just find 00:19:28.240 --> 00:19:30.980 yourself worrying about how kids today are interacting 00:19:30.980 --> 00:19:33.359 with their screens. Which happens to all of us. 00:19:33.619 --> 00:19:36.200 Remember the historical context. You aren't just 00:19:36.200 --> 00:19:38.500 dealing with an annoying software update or some 00:19:38.500 --> 00:19:41.259 fleeting generational trend. Yeah. You are actively 00:19:41.259 --> 00:19:43.839 living through a historical transition, every 00:19:43.839 --> 00:19:46.400 bit as monumental as the invention of the alphabet 00:19:46.400 --> 00:19:48.980 or the printing press. It's huge. It is supposed 00:19:48.980 --> 00:19:51.099 to feel overwhelming. You're watching the very 00:19:51.099 --> 00:19:53.880 definition of human literacy change in real time. 00:19:54.059 --> 00:19:56.440 As we navigate this massive shift together, I 00:19:56.440 --> 00:19:58.359 want to leave you with a final thought to mull 00:19:58.359 --> 00:20:01.000 over. Let's hear it. If Plato lost the war against 00:20:01.000 --> 00:20:03.500 writing, and if traditional printed textbooks 00:20:03.500 --> 00:20:06.099 are currently losing the war to dynamic digital 00:20:06.099 --> 00:20:09.000 manipulation, it makes you wonder about the horizon. 00:20:09.900 --> 00:20:12.859 Digital tools are continuing to evolve so rapidly, 00:20:13.279 --> 00:20:15.500 they're no longer just storing information for 00:20:15.500 --> 00:20:17.420 us or even just helping us search it. Right, 00:20:17.480 --> 00:20:20.759 with AI. Exactly. With the rise of artificial 00:20:20.759 --> 00:20:23.240 intelligence, these tools are beginning to actively 00:20:23.240 --> 00:20:26.279 process, synthesize, and generate insights for 00:20:26.279 --> 00:20:31.059 us. So what deeply held sacred human skill will 00:20:31.059 --> 00:20:34.160 the next generation view as completely unnecessary? 00:20:34.200 --> 00:20:36.900 Wow. And more importantly, will they be right? 00:20:37.039 --> 00:20:39.099 What a lingering question to end on. That is 00:20:39.099 --> 00:20:40.779 definitely going to keep me up tonight just thinking 00:20:40.779 --> 00:20:43.099 about what skills I am currently treating as 00:20:43.099 --> 00:20:45.299 sacred. It's a lot to chew on. It really is. 00:20:45.640 --> 00:20:47.339 Thank you so much for joining us on this deep 00:20:47.339 --> 00:20:49.680 dive. We'll catch you next time as we keep unpacking 00:20:49.680 --> 00:20:50.920 the ideas that shape our world.