Postman's Conclusion

     In the concluding paragraph of chapter 11, Postman makes the distinction between laughing and thinking.  Postman is saying that the danger in the age of television is that people no longer know why they are laughing, and they also do not know why they have stopped thinking.  This distinction is crucial to the premice of Amusing Ourselves to Death because it reveals the ultimate result of a decline in the age of typography.  Altogether, as a result of society's ignorance to their lack of thinking, people will just continue to be mindlessly entertained by the meaningless content of their television screens, and completely lose the ability to think for themselves.

My Smoke Signal

On Friday, as we were only allowed to communicate through charades and drawing, my message I was trying to get across was extremely impacted.  For example, I was not able to tell any stories at lunch because no one could understand my drawings.  Also, during lunch, I needed to ask someone what time the Sadies Dance was, and they never understood my question. Overall, my communication was limited due to my medium. Therefore, Postman argues that communication through smoke signals is absolutely incompetent. Any complex message cannot be fully expressed through the sole medium of smoke signals.  This is very similar to the way in which my communication was limited on Friday.

Discontent with Youtube and other Technology...on Youtube

     Neil Postman begins his argument at Calvin College by very simply stating that there is no escaping from ourselves.  His assertion is primarily that the technological changes through today's society has completely made the wisdom of the ages and its sages irrelevant.  Similarly in chapter one of Amusing Ourselves to Death, Postman brings up the truth regarding the effectiveness of different mediums of communication.  More specifically, he argues that smoke signals used in ancient days were nowhere near competent in terms of delivering a clear message.  Also, he argues that the modern day news media is too complex to bring about a clear and efficacious message without political and personal bias.  Today's technology and media, however improved and nice it may be, does not lead to a better end.  As Postman argued in the video, "All our inventions are but improved means to an unimproved end." This quote was originally made by Henry David Thoreau, and is directly related to Postman's purpose in Amusing Ourselves to Death.  Therefore, the medium does affect the message.  Also, Postman argues that with today's bettered technology, the society of today is completely reliant upon technology as a means of communication and entertainment.  However, according to Postman in his book, this is only degrading the quality of society and creating a dependent and incompetent society.  Similar to this argument, Neil argues in his presentation that the worth of humans is going to decrease as society becomes "pets to their own computers."  This statement roots from his theory that the technology of cloning is going to lead to spare human parts, as every human will eventually be cloned.  As a result of society defining these clones as just objects, it is shown that these clones are mere pets, who result from technology.  Altogether, Neil proves that as a result of an increase in television and e-media, typography and other print materials are decreasing, therefore decreasing society's intelligence and concern for each other and increasing its ignorance.