The Algorithmic Mind: How Tech Is Rewriting Our Inner World

The brain possesses an approximate computational capacity of one exaflop — a staggering quintillion computations each second — performing these tasks consuming merely the power of a faint lightbulb. Such remarkable efficiency remains an aspiration for AI creators.

However, technological advancements also influence our cognitive output. While economists often highlight the beneficial relationship between new developments and economic expansion, neuroscientists, conversely, are revealing further insights into the detrimental effects electronic devices can exert on human thought processes, consequences that, subsequently, yield adverse economic outcomes. In this edition, I will concentrate on one particular aspect of this phenomenon.

During the last twenty years, digital instruments have multiplied rapidly, allowing us to remain knowledgeable, amused, and linked continuously. Fresh innovations, diverse formats, and swift content generation now afford us greater exposure to stimulation within any given timeframe than previously possible.

The average daily duration spent on screens — encompassing gadgets like desktop PCs, notebooks, slates, cell phones, TVs, and gaming systems — escalated by two hours from 2012 to 2019, reaching approximately eleven hours, as per a worldwide investigation. The aggregate period we dedicate to digital engagement has probably climbed further since then, owing to a surge in telecommuting, podcast listening, and novel digital interfaces.

Nevertheless, the human intellect was not configured to handle such a deluge of information simultaneously. Far from enhancing our mental efficiency, this constant influx has been associated with cognitive exhaustion, diminished recollection, heightened tension, and a wider array of psychological well-being issues.

However, within our extensively digitalized economic landscape, commercial strategies rely on engrossing and maintaining human focus. In fact, the intense corporate rivalry across numerous avenues for this finite commodity has led to an appreciation in the worth of attentiveness.

Evidence for this can be observed in studies conducted by Thales Teixeira, a distinguished professor at the University of California San Diego and the originator of the Decoupling.co consulting firm. He monitors the expense of securing one thousand views for television commercials aired during the Super Bowl and US prime-time slots, utilizing this as an indicator for the value of attention. The expenditures for both have escalated significantly, especially subsequent to the internet’s widespread adoption, as consumer concentration became dispersed across alternative media and digital venues. 

A 30-second commercial during this month’s Super Bowl commanded an average price of $8 million, marking a substantial increase from slightly over $2 million in 2022.

Given the significant value placed on our focus, companies continuously modify their approaches to maintain our involvement, as observed by Pierluigi Sacco, a professor specializing in biobehavioural economics at the University of Chieti-Pescara.

He states, “Digital platforms and media entities find that more concise, highly stimulating material garners greater user participation, leading them to refine their offerings accordingly.” He adds, “Viewers then acclimate to this pace. Consequently, subsequent content iterations must be even briefer and more potent to contend effectively.”

An illustration of this trend is the increasing prevalence of the “reel” format — brief, captivating videos that frequently auto-play. Such is its engrossing nature that I’ve heard reports of individuals downloading multiple reels at once, allowing them to browse even without an active internet connection.

A further instance originates from the film industry. During a recent interview, actor Matt Damon highlighted a simplification trend in how Netflix counsels moviemakers to suit the divided focus of its audience. He recounted that the streaming platform now requests a major action sequence within the initial five minutes and for the storyline to be restated multiple times in the script, due to viewers often being distracted by their phones during viewing.

This inclination towards concise content is similarly manifesting in academia, reporting, humor, and political discourse.

However, this is more than merely a harmless alteration in preference or an enhancement in ease; it possesses a neurological aspect, as articulated by Sacco of Chieti-Pescara. He explains, “The cerebrum adjusts to the incentive framework it experiences. Should the prevailing information ecosystem continuously furnish newness in brief, highly stimulating portions, the faculty for prolonged concentration does not simply lie dormant; it becomes progressively more arduous to employ.”

This phenomenon might contribute to the observed reduction in our focus over time, exacerbated by an excess of data, electronic diversions, and our perpetual shifting among gadgets. A poll conducted in 2022 by King’s College London revealed that nearly half (49 percent) of British adults believe their capacity for attention has diminished. Forty-seven percent lament that profound contemplation is now a relic of bygone days.

Investigations observing individuals’ concentration in their natural surroundings indicate that since 2004, the typical duration people maintain focus on one activity has fallen from approximately two-and-a-half minutes to mere 47 seconds, as per information compiled in Attention Span, a publication authored by Gloria Mark, a professor of informatics at the University of California, Irvine. She adds that wider elements, including pressure and shifts in daily routines, could also be influential.

Mark states, “Having conversed with numerous individuals, a recurring sentiment I encounter is their current difficulty in reading books, a task they found effortless in previous years.”

This detrimental pattern similarly impacts the process of acquiring knowledge. A widely shared online commentary playfully recounted an instance where an individual, after a 1,200-day uninterrupted period of studying Spanish via the Duolingo language application, found themselves barely able to construct simple sentences during a visit to Spain.

Niels Van Quaquebeke, a leadership academic at Kühne Logistics University, refers to this phenomenon as the Duolingo-ification of pedagogy. “Should technology prevail, education might gravitate toward an identical framework: minute, game-like assignments, continuous progress indicators, accolades, and perpetually concise drills. While remarkably efficient and extensively deployable, this approach could prove profoundly superficial.”

Put differently, a declining trajectory seems evident, linking the financial inducements designed to seize our focus with our actual capacity for sustained concentration.

Technology influences our mental faculties in additional manners as well. For example, the “Google effect” denotes a scholarly investigation from 2011 which discovered that individuals perceive the internet as a type of volatile memory. Consequently, we retain a diminished quantity of readily retrievable factual information. While liberating short-term memory might enhance our output, housing less data could concurrently foster less profound contemplation.

Mithu Storoni, a brain scientist and the writer of Hyperefficient, a publication focused on refining the human intellect, cautions against an analogous trend concerning artificial intelligence. “Should individuals delegate an excessive amount of mental exertion to AI, they jeopardize the fortitude of their cognitive abilities vital for integration, situational assessments, and inquisitiveness – attributes that fundamentally differentiate us from [large language models],” she states.

And as was asserted in the February 16 release of this periodical during the previous year, technological advancements are taxing our cerebral well-being, aptitude, and responsiveness.

Technological innovation is engineered to foster effectiveness. It enables us to locate, recover, and scrutinize information with greater speed, thus liberating our minds for more sophisticated contemplation.

However, humans possess an inherent, evolutionarily ingrained inclination to preserve mental effort and pursue rewarding sensations. Commercial systems are tailored to maximize this tendency. When intellectual resistance is systematically eliminated, the faculties essential for profound comprehension face the peril of deterioration. As an illustration, prolonged focus aids in bolstering attentiveness; engaging with extensive writings enhances understanding, and formulating assertions independently cultivates inventiveness.

It is advisable to practice a degree of individual self-restraint concerning our engagement with technology. As the adage posits, we fashion our instruments — and subsequently, our instruments mold us.

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Points for contemplation

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Sunday’s Free Lunch is compiled by Harvey Nriapia