An Open Letter to Educators
In early humanity only the privileged and select few were able to obtain knowledge, while most people were left in the dark with no means of access to this treasure called information. But with the invention of the internet, information has been freed to be obtained by anyone. Although this decreases the value of information because it is more commonly found, it also creates more convienent ways for peolpe to get and use it. Dan Brown uses the example of how before the internet people had to use globes and atlases to plan trips. With the internet all you have to do now is plot in your location and destination and it gives you instant directions and seconds.
The most significant fact that Dan pointed out was that we as students are programmed to come into class and memorize facts and how well we memoize these facts determines how smart we are. But in todays age, the value of being good at memorizing facts is alomst pointless because of the internet. Now everyone has instant access to facts thanks to the internet. We are wasting a lot of time teaching students this way.
I've been in college for about 3 years now and it amazes me how i can pass classes without ever having to buy the books for them. I can just google any information i need and the informations is just as accurate.