> they will trust to the external written characters and not remember of themselves. The specific which you have discovered is an aid not to memory, but to reminiscence [...]; they will be hearers of many things and will have learned nothing; they will appear to be omniscient and will generally know nothing;
Somewhat OT, but this seems to apply very well to the effect of Google on many of us too. While this originally referred simply to the 'availability' of knowledge in external sources, with Google (and the Internet as a whole) it becomes 'easy accessibility', which is perhaps even more dangerous. Dangerous unless we make conscious effort to avoid this phenomenon and use the technology for our enrichment.
Somewhat OT, but this seems to apply very well to the effect of Google on many of us too. While this originally referred simply to the 'availability' of knowledge in external sources, with Google (and the Internet as a whole) it becomes 'easy accessibility', which is perhaps even more dangerous. Dangerous unless we make conscious effort to avoid this phenomenon and use the technology for our enrichment.