HW #14

The excerpts I read focused on the affects of TV and video games  on our intelligence. It is often said that watching a lot of TV or playing hours of video games makes you dumber, but this author argues the opposite. The author takes focus off of the criticized content, for example sexuality and graphic violence, and looks at the screens' impact on our cognitive skills. 

Playing video games is interactive. The player makes choices based on what is being presented on the screen. Even though they may be involved in what's going on on the screen, the same part of the brain are being used as they would be in making choices in real life. 

Though watching TV is not an interactive activity, it also uses the cognitive functions of the brain. Watching television shows they have multiple plot lines a complicated stories require the viewer is make inferences and analyze what they are watching. This means even though the body is not physically active, the brain is because it is constantly working out the messages it receives from the screen. 

These readings offered me a different perspective. When discussing the affects of TV and video games, I often focus on the content. Analyzing the images we see only looks at the surface of the relationship between man and screen. I understand the similarities in brain function between reading a book and watching a show like the Sopranos. In shows with many main characters, and unresolved conflicts, one episode does not offer all the answers. This kind of program hold my attention, and stays in my mind once it is over. When trying to figure out what will happen next, I look for evidence in past episodes, which is the same process as making inferences about books in school. 

I was never really into video, but in the few times I have played them I found it very difficult. Not only does it require a lot of hand-eye coordination, but the play must also find strategies to completing the game. It is like a digital puzzle. 

The author of the reading argues that the brain is actually being exercised while watching TV or playing video games. Feed is about how the brain is made practically useless because all the screen stimulation. But the authors are using evidence from two different aspects of digitalization. The author of the reading is not suggesting that TV should be the only means of becoming more intelligent. His argument is much less extreme than the one presented in Feed. Feed also focuses on what the messages do to the viewer, but the reading focus more on us, and how our brains work.