Introduction to Now You See It

Summary:
In the introduction to Now You See It, by Cathy N. Davidson, she talks about an experiment she participated in with a philosopher. The philosopher had them watch a video of people tossing basketballs back and forth and to only keep track of how many times they tossed the ball back and forth. Davidson, was one of the few to notice a gorilla in the middle of the players. Most of the people didn't notice this because they were so focused on the task of counting. The whole point of the introduction to her book is to get you to realize that when we are so focused on something, we miss a lot of other things going on. This is called attention blindness. Davidson's opinion on distractions is that they are a good thing.

Critical Commentary:
I think that the author makes a very good point about attention blindness. It really made me think about all the times I would focus on just one thing, I was missing out on other things happening. The gorilla experiment was really interesting. It's crazy that most of the people didn't even notice the gorilla even though it was right in the middle of the screen. I also thought it was interesting when she mentioned the card trick where while everyone was focusing on something else, the magician puts the chosen card into a stack of different colored cards so he could easily find the chosen card and no one even noticed. I never really thought about how many things I miss because of trying to focus on a specific thing, until I read this. Also, when she talks about the digital revolution and how some people think that the internet is bad and that its a distraction, but she thinks that its a good thing. I agree with this. I don't think the internet is making us dumb. I think that it is causing us to read more and to learn more than we ever have been able to before.