I recently had an informal debate with a colleague regarding the effect technology has on critical thinking, namely our students' ability to critically think. This conservation evolved into one about technology and research. Specifically, the effect the technologies behind entities like Amanzon.com and Wikipedia have made concerning the ability of people to conduct research. My colleagues' position was such technologies have lessened people's ability to think critically and conduct thorough research, being the contrarian I am, I took up the position that such technologies have improved people's ability to think critically and conduct research.

Their argument centered on how improvements in technology to accesses information has made people less likely to think critically as accessing information has become rather simplistic. These improvements have deceased the ability of individuals to search for information and lowered levels of intellectual curiosity, as the improvements in "searching" technologies have made the process easier. The thesis of my counterpoint was despite the improvement of searching technologies we still need to make crucial decisions about the information presented - we need to gain and teach deciphering skills. This entails that we, and our students, sharpen our deciphering skills to access reliable and valid information, and eschew erroneous information. Deciphering, rather than searching, I believe may be the most critical research skill we teach to our students. While in past epochs the ability to access information was paramount, in the nascent world of instant and overwhelming information, the ability to decipher information might be the most important skill. The more information we receive, my argument entails, the more we need to think critically about the validity of the information.

Although entities like Amazon.com and Wikipedia make searching for information easier, they are not panaceas' to the issues of garnering quality information, thus there is the need to decipher the accuracy of presented information. Granted, I think both of the abovementioned entities are useful toward making our lives-academic, personal, professional-easier, the need to use critical thinking to make wise decisions remains. For example, when we log on to Amazon.com account (provided we have one), we receive "recommendations" based on our past buying habits. This presents us with three choices, to buy, not buy, or continue shopping. We need to make a decision about these products, whether we need them or not, or if the items are of interest. As great as the logarithms used by Amazon.com might be, when we buy something not attuned to our tastes such as a gift for someone, this creates a purchase outlier that engenders spurious "recommendations". Wikipedia is an excellent entry point to access information, I believe. However, as we all know, or should know, it is an open-access site and such sites are susceptible to listing false information, regardless of Team Wikipedia efforts to delete such information. Many of the resources provided in the reference section on a Wikipedia page however are valid and trustworthy, and the crucial step we can teach in the research processes is deciphering how to gain access to validated information from Wikipedia.

Changing the access routes students use to ascertain information I believe is beyond the power of the instructor. I do believe it is within the instructors' power to teach them how to be discerners of information. Easy access to information is unlikely to abate, it is more likely to increase, and we as instructors need to inculcate our students the ability to be perceptive consumers of information. What are your thoughts on this matter of technology, research, deciphering, and critical thinking?

Thanks,

Eric Nordin