Absorbing Markov Chains In Exercises 3740, determine

Is the Digital Age Helping Us Why Youth are Failing (Bauerlein)  This article is an interview with an Emory professor who wrote a book called The Dumbest Generations to  He blames the digital age for the dumbing down of the younger generation o Time spent on digital technology trades off with book reading o Digital technology means more social contact which means less focus on anything else o He says young people aren't used to working hard and assume they should get flexible time to work when they want to, so they have trouble succeeding in work environments o He claims there is now strong social pressure against reading and intelligence o He blames digital culture for making people more self-absorbed because social networking causes them to focus only on their own lives The Dumbest Generation Don't Be Dumb. (Begley)  She points out that the older generation has been panicking at the ignorance of the young for thousands of years  She also contends that if young people don't know important information it might be the fault of schools that are run by older people  She contends that there is a difference between knowing facts and being intelligent, and IQ scores are rising.  She points out that some empirical evidence suggests that digital technology can improve brain function  Her conclusion is that it's too early to say anything definitive about the current young generation The Kids are Alright (Howe)  Howe uses statistical analysis to identify the group he says is the real dumbest generation: "early X-ers," or people who were born from the late 1950's to the mid 1960's o This group performed the worst in tests got the fewetst degrees, and has the fewest professional jobs o Interestingly for this debate, Howe agrees that this generation's lack of success came from things like divorce rates, parental neglect, and lack of supervision, not technology o Howe concludes that being "the dumbest" generation hasn't meant failure for the early X-ers o Instead, the says they have learned to be practical and resilient, and they handle risk well. Bellon Comments  There are many problems with Bauerlein's arguments o They are elitist. Why are some facts, some texts, and some formats more important than others o They assume memorization is important o They assume politics and business will remain stable, so past strategies are still valid  But we are too ignorant and we don't use digital technology to teach ourselves