It’s a question that’s bothered cultural critics for decades:while we know more than ever, are we getting dumber as a result of the increasing amount of technology at our disposal Reading historical debates, and hearing of the attention paid to them by a thoughtful person, certainly makes one wonder. Speaking in the 1820s of the mechanical Difference Engine he had devised for computing polynomial functions, Charles Babbage, the father of the programmable computer and our web-log’s namesake, told the House of Commons: On two occasions I have been asked [by Members of Parliament], "Pray, Mr. Babbage, if you put into the machine wrong figures, will the right answers come out" I am not able rightly to apprehend the kind of confusion of ideas that could provoke such a question. Sharp-tongued eloquence---in Latin and Greek as well as their mother tongue---was common fare among Georgians and Vic A. They tapped into American people’s sense of despair about intellectuals. B. They showed that America does better in education than other countries. C. They dug into the desperate feeling of American intellectuals on education. D. They showed that intellectuals were not satisfied with American policies.
