NEWS: TV Makes You Stupid?

CULTURE: TV Makes You Stupid?

Turn the telly off and read a book. Three new studies show that too much TV might harm ability to learn.

Some people avoid scare mongering and make sensible recommendations.

Any struggling students can blame their parents.

This research is only mildly worrying. Things start looking a whole lot scarier when you realise how many children never see books before they go to school.

In my family, the TV is referred to as the "brain sucker".

Sometimes the internet makes TV look like Shakespeare.

In my family, Uncle Ted is referred to as the "brain sucker".

dur...

I guess these researchers watched too much TV

In other news, water is wet. Though its nice to see it officially said.

i've probably learned more facts from watching TV than any other single source.

I'm going to apply for an Arts Council grant to re-write Shakespeare in txt.

I've been summarily destroying my nephews books that I don't deem worthy.

I bought him several editions of winnie the pooh and the hobbit but his mother feeds him shit like 'Batman beyond' books and 'Alf'.

This is a worrisome trend. Vapid TV shows that have even more vapid books based on them.

At least my brother watches those baby einstien things and seseme street rather than say, baywatch and the home shopping network.



Edited to say that PeeWee's playhouse, seseme street aside, is the best childrens programming of the last 20 years.

[Edited on Jul 06, 2005 by moniker42]

Close enough?

A book-burning uncle! Hurrah!

There is such a thing as intelligent television. Parents who use their TV as a babysitter probably aren't watching informative shows.

I, however, learned a whole lot about sex as a twelve year old reading my grandma's romance novels and watching All My Children after school.

That Tad was such a jerk.

Aha, fantastic.

I remember a trip to Europe where I had no computer, watched almost no TV and read nothing but novels. It was kind of bizarre and refreshing how much clarity comes to you and how much leaves when you go back.

He really was. Ryan, however...

even better?

I don't equate the knowledge of random facts with intelligence. Intelligence involves somebody's ability to think crtically, rationalize, problem solve, etc, not regurgitate facts.

i think i've lost alot of my intellectual edge in recent times, i put that down to too much drinking and too much tv/internet.

i read so rarely these days

I'm so glad that even tho my parents let me watch a shit load of tv, they also taught me how to read by the time I was three and never let me be without a book. I know so many people who are in their twenties, or even older, who just barely know how to read and watch the shittiest, most pointless crap on tv like it's manna from heaven.

In other news, Nikita Khruschev is sending nuclear missiles to Cuba. You may panic....

...

...

now.

ya I learn most of mine from the simpsons.

As a child I always watched tv. I also grew up with a tv in my room... even with cable.
I started school at 4 years old and college at 17. I think it all comes down to each person and each household. I have never had a problem learning and I was usually in honors classes.

either way, when I was a kid, you would have found me outside climbing trees and riding bikes.

Well duh.

Passive indulgement<active enrichment

anyday of the week.

That's how I was raised and I turned out TV