Earlier today, neuroscientist Baroness Greenfield used her seat in the Lords to mount an attack on “our culture in screen technologies”, claiming that such creations are responsible for a considerable number of social evils, from the risk in Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder to cancer. It’s tempting to simply dismiss such a view as those of a luddite, but it’s tricky to find a balance to avoid manifesting the supposed faults Greenfield cites.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/7907766.stm

Amongst the Baroness’s statement were allegations that Facebook and the like damage social cooperation and that the linear reversibility of video games could give rise to an unconscious minimising of consequences in the mind. Despite the Institute of Child Health dismissing Greenfield’s analysis as confusing cause and effect, it’s virtually impossible to ridicule Greenfield’s claims without adding to the online mentality she attacks. Some of her analogies do seem to be rather ill founded, however; video games are no more “repeatable” than any other narrative medium, and considerably more interactive…