The Glass Cage: How Our Computers Are Changing Us - Softcover

Carr's prose is elegant, and he has an exceptional command of the facts. He serves a varied menu of the ways that technology has failed us, and in every instance he is not only persuasive but undoubtedly right.--Daniel Levitin

[A] deeply informed reflection on computer automation.--G. Pascal Zachary

Brings a much-needed humanistic perspective to the wider issues of automation.--Richard Waters

Smart, insightful...paint[s] a portrait of a world readily handing itself over to intelligent devices.--Jacob Axelrad

One of Carr's great strengths as a critic is the measured calm of his approach to his material--a rare thing in debates over technology...Carr excels at exploring these gray areas and illuminating for readers the intangible things we are losing by automating our lives.--Christine Rosen

There have been few cautionary voices like Nicholas Carr's urging us to take stock, especially, of the effects of automation on our very humanness--what makes us who we are as individuals--and on our humanity--what makes us who we are in aggregate.--Sue Halpern

In The Glass Cage, best-selling author Nicholas Carr digs behind the headlines about factory robots and self-driving cars, wearable computers and digitized medicine, as he explores the hidden costs of granting software dominion over our work and our leisure. Even as they bring ease to our lives, these programs are stealing something essential from us.Drawing on psychological and neurological studies that underscore how tightly people’s happiness and satisfaction are tied to performing hard work in the real world, Carr reveals something we already suspect: shifting our attention to computer screens can leave us disengaged and discontented.From nineteenth-century textile mills to the cockpits of modern jets, from the frozen hunting grounds of Inuit tribes to the sterile landscapes of GPS maps, The Glass Cage explores the impact of automation from a deeply human perspective, examining the personal as well as the economic consequences of our growing dependence on computers.With a characteristic blend of history and philosophy, poetry and science, Carr takes us on a journey from the work and early theory of Adam Smith and Alfred North Whitehead to the latest research into human attention, memory, and happiness, culminating in a moving meditation on how we can use technology to expand the human experience.