13 - Gadgets

"Life Changer"

Our life has changed drastically during 20th century. Many things that were praised and defended before are now forgotten or disregarded. Modern life is unthinkable without computers and thousands of other intricate devices that were of no use before. Contemporary generation grew up in the new informational environment and easily finds common language with all those devices. This makes their parents, who grew up without any of those gadgets, think that their children possess special abilities. But in fact playing computer games microwave oven programming require many fewer intellectual faculties than studying history.

 Here we have the general delusion of modern parents. Children are considered to be clever just because they possess some invaluable skills, their parents do not have. And lets see what are real benefits of such knowledge. What can children receive from all those countless TV-shows they watch and numerous computer-games they play? Watching TV makes children unable to grasp large amounts of complex information. In the majority of cases TV makes children master only little amounts of simple information, necessary in everyday life. Getting information in such a primitive way weakens young minds, makes them unable to withstand intellectual work. Their minds are feeble, like the muscles of a man who never did any physical exercises.

As a result children are able to grasp simple ideas, but when they have to remember anything complicated, there is a problem. Kids need a lot of time to complete their home assignments, because they are not able to concentrate on a specific subject. Children spend a lot of time doing their classes and parents start thinking that curriculum is too complicated. They see a lot of ‘unnecessary’ subjects in it, which take their children’s time. But lets see how kids are spending the time they have for homework. In the majority of cases kids are just sitting and doing nothing. The majority of kids need parent’s assistance because they can not concentrate on anything themselves.

 History and other supplementary subjects have become of no value lately. That is because people have found substitution to it. Modern people do not read books and do not go to the theatres. Everything in our life is substituted with Internet and TV. Cozy conversations at the fireplace are substituted with spontaneous and confused chat over the mobile telephones. Every day millions of people go to work to do some routine operations which repeat every day, from year to year. When they come home, they turn their computers on again and merge into their little universe, where they can be whatever they want. People grow lonely and isolated. In such a way people become similar to the machines without any spiritual life. It is extremely important to save the spiritual part of human life, to learn human culture and history. It was said that one, who doesn’t know his history is not worth any future. Modern life has made people unable to live in full, to feel. Every day people go to work and there they do the same things every day. This makes them similar to the machines that make the same operation the whole life.

 What I want to say is that education is slowly approaching to the point when only ‘necessary’ subjects are learned. But lets think what differs us from machines. Of course, it is our culture, history, philosophy and a lot of other things that we consider to be unimportant now. Studying history develops imagination and ability to analyze.