Very nice post! I find that today's gadgets are dumbing people down too, I see mindless drones with their faces in an iPad or iPhone, not even paying attention to their surroundings, some even getting killed because of it!
What happened to human interaction and learning from each other, socializing instead of burying yourself in a virtual world while the real world passes you by?
/rant
Cheers, @dragonanarchist!
It's not only the lack of attention to the environment, it's the delegation of everything into a phone. The phone will tell me this, it will help me remember things, it will wake me up, etc etc. It's a "helper". By being a "helper" device it is subconsciously assumed that we are worthless to do a lot of the things that the helper device does.
20 years ago I could remember half the phone book of my contacts. The other half was probably not that important to me - that's why I wasn't remembering it. Then I bought a mobile phone and its contact list did that for me and now I'm like "ohhh I can't remember 30 numbers". LOL... why "can't" I? Of course I CAN. But my continued practice has affirmed to my subconscious that I can't. I've kind of went through this in an older article: https://steemit.com/subconscious/@alexgr/the-subconscious-observer-and-its-effect-on-our-life-and-human-potential
@Alexgr. Right on!
I'm a tech-lover but I do think we would do well to keep ourselves sharp by practicing cognitive as well as physical skills.
This isn't a new phenomonon though, it's been a common part of the human story. I am excellent with maps and a general sense of direction, in part because I learned to navigate before gps was a thing, and I still reference maps. But it goes much further: I hunt and gather food at certain times of the year. Some friends and I have an annual pickling party where we can and preserve food. Many people would die if they couldn't have access to a grocery store.
The thing is, I'm not much of a hippy or prepper type, it's just that I don't want to lose skills that were difficult to accuire. It's the same reason I do mental and written long form math once in a while instead of reaching for the calc.
Use it or lose it!
The problem is what happens with a new generation that hasn't even learned the skills (and obviously won't be passing them down either)...
That's too true. It's why I stopped using GPSs...
Yeah, how did I forget navigation... we've delegated that too.
And here I am reading this on my iPhone.