Think before you Laugh

During the concluding paragraph of the book, Postman discusses the distinction between thinking and laughing. He references the characters in Brave New World and how they did not know what they were laughing about and why they had stopped thinking. Yet, Postman made it very clear that the problem was not they were laughing instead of thinking. This is very true of our culture today, we tend to laugh about things that might not even be very funny, but everyone around us is laughing, so we will go along with it and laugh. Another serious problem in our culture is that we sometimes don't think at all which causes us to say things that we will later regret. This last paragraph in the book helps to prove Postman's view on technology and the effect it has on our brains which can sometimes be negative. Some television shows are mindless and do not allow any thought process. Therefore, Postman thinks that our culture expects most forms of entertainment to be mindless and should not cause us to think.

A Day with no Words....

Having a day with no talking but only drawing pictures or acting out what you want to say is very challenging. One interesting experience I had today was at lunch when all my friends and I were trying to communicate by drawing pictures. One of my friends tried to ask me a simple question which was if I am going to the dance on Saturday. She started by drawing a picture of girls with their arms up and music notes in the background and a giant question mark over the picture and I could not figure out what she was trying to tell me. She tried to give me a further explanation but I still could not understand. This caused her to dance in her seat, which was quite comical.Then it finally clicked and I shook my head to let her know that I am not going. It is very hard to convey an accurate message with only drawing pictures and acting out what you want to say. It was also very frustrating that I interpreted others' messages the wrong way and others' interpreted my messages the wrong way, and others have absolutely no idea what I was attempting to tell them using no words.

Neil Postman's Speech

In his speech at Calvin College, Neil Postman uses some of the same examples that he used in his book. He quotes the author of the book Being Digital who predicts that in the very near future we will be more comfortable talking to inanimate objects than other people. In fact, he thinks we will communicate more with technology than with humans. This parallels with how Postman views technology and communication. He said: "...when we consider the great number and variety of tools for conversation that go beyond speech." This proves that he feels that our society is moving toward or has already reached a point where we do not actually talk with people face to face, but converse with them using technology. Another example from Postman's speech that relates to his book is when the author of Being Digital says that "we need to adapt to our technological future". He states that we adapt very easily to things, so we can adapt to the way that communication will change. Indeed, our future could include communicating less and less with real people. In Chapter 1, Postman says that "our languages are our media, our media are our metaphors, and our metaphors create the content of our culture." This statement is very true because our culture revolves around media. This statements parallel with each other because our technological future includes media being the center of our culture. Society today relies on being able to find out information right away, without any delay. The future of our society is that technology will keep improving which will lead to more impatience. We adapt to new technology because it is faster and better, so he feels that it will be very easy for us to "adapt to our technological future."