Things That Make Us Smart: Defending Human Attributes in the Age of the Machine

It describes how we (mankind) uses external representations to assist our brains - from writing, to diagrams, to maps, to the way we build our offices.

If you want a deeper psychological understanding with which you can do your own reasoning on different types of external representation - get this book. If you want clear-cut guidelines - get another book.

If you like this book - try Normans: The Design of Everydaythings as well. You might like Donald Schoens The Reflective Practitioner also.

Last word: Norman seems to prefer easy reading to structure - which means the book is best read end-to-end.


Human-Centered, Laments Loss of Reflective Skills   April 8, 2000
 23 out of 27 found this review helpful

Technology can make us smart. Or stupid. It can liberate. Or enslave. Norman joins a select group of thinkers advocating a human-centered approach to technology. Inspired (or, more accurately, depressed) by Jerry Mander, he wrote this book to examine the differences between humans and machines, and to establish some ground rules for policy that protected the one and leveraged the other. Norman notes that when technology is not designed from a human-centered point of view, it produces accidents and more often than not the human is blamed. He focuses especially on the distinction between experiential cognition and reflective cognition, and laments that television and entertainment are swamping us with the experiential and not teaching us the reflective. He is concerned that our ever-lengthening chain of technology dependence is forcing us to deal with ever-increasing loads of information at the same time that it weakens our inherent capabilities further. People first, science second, technology as servant.


From File Cabinets to Video Games; Norman connects   March 28, 2000
 20 out of 23 found this review helpful

In this book, Donald Norman offers a thoughtful examination of the tools, toys and games that we interact with every day. According to Norman these "things that make us smart can also make us dumb." It is the way that we use and interact with these "things" that will determine their effect on our intelligence. Not only does this text offer a comprehensive history of technology tools, but it also examines the evolution of human thought and cognition.

Like Alan Cooper, Norman examines "what is wrong in the design of the technology that requires people to behave in machine-centered ways for which people are not well suited." Norman, however, does not concentrate on the negatives of software design. He presents a look at how we have evolved into our current state in order to make predictions and recommendations about how to proceed into the future.

Norman's study of experiential and reflective cognition should be required reading for any teacher. The study could help both new and veteran users of educational technologies make appropriate choices for the use of different software for different learning opportunities. The section on "optimal flow" is useful for educators, software or game designers and cognitive scientists. Doesn't everybody strive for a "continual flow of focused concentration?"

In his study of the human mind and distributed cognition, Norman examines some of the differences between humans and other species. One of the key distinctions for me was that humans can create tools to help them "overcome the limitations of brainpower." This is where he makes the connection to how things can make us smart. The philosophical nature of this section of the book was very interesting and useful for me. I believe it could help the reader better understand how social learning theory and situated cognition can have an impact on the work of educators and interactive designers.

Overall, this book could be useful for a wide audience of educators, software developers, game designers, interactive designers, cognitive scientists, and students of any of these fields of study. Norman successfully makes connections between many technologies and thought processes. Whether it be the "Wooton Desk and the file cabinet or video games and edutainment, he shows the significance of each and their place in the study of interactive design.


It's all about us!   February 14, 2000
 3 out of 4 found this review helpful

In Things That Make Us Smart, Donald Norman comes to the defense of the human being in the world of technology. He contends that technology has developed historically through mankind's desire to make up for human limitations. The problem comes about when we develop technology without taking into consideration human strengths and other qualities, the whole person.

In his book, Norman calls for us to recognize the effects of today's technologies on the way we think. Rather than our human qualities and ideas shaping technology, today's technology is actually shaping our qualities, ideas and actions. Technology has superseded the human being. He contends we can still turn this into a positive experience. We are still in charge. But more importantly, it is a call for mankind to return to the idea of technology development as a means for improving the quality of human life and thought, not as a means of replacing it.

This book was actually not at all what I thought it was going to be. I was pleasantly surprised and challenged by what I read. Norman writes in both a scholarly and pragmatic fashion. Read it. You'll never look at your television the same way again.


Machine-Centered vs. Human-Centered technology   February 14, 2000
 2 out of 3 found this review helpful

I have often heard that "computers don't make mistakes, humans do." It is around this premise that Donald Norman centers his book. He agrees with this statement - that humans make the mistakes, but it is because the computers and software are poorly designed. We make mistakes because "the machine-centered tasks imposed upon us through our technology ask us to behave in ways incompatible with our fundamental capabilities." (p. 138) If computers and software were people-centered, that is designed from the humans point of view, there would be less mistakes, or at the very least, the technology would be able to make "fuzzy" judgments for corrections.

Norman takes us through a discovery of what is "right" and what is "wrong" with many of the objects we use everyday. He points out both good design (such as the genius of the filing cabinet) and bad design, while also wishing for a new and better way. The interesting part is to note that many of these wishes he made in 1994 have actually become reality. He wished for "computerized scheduling" that can be updated and shared (p. 216) - many of us have Palm Pilots from which we can down/upload calendar updates to and from our desktop computer or share our calendar to another Palm Pilot via "beaming." He also warns us that technologies take a long time to be accepted... and asks us to consider the present to ten years prior - that there isn't that much difference. (p. 192) In 1994, there wasn't much difference in the world from 10 years before, but in the six years since 1994 the world has undergone tremendous change, mostly due to the increased use of the Internet. I am very interested in reading his latest book to see how he addresses this.