The Future Research Group of the World Mind Network, a think tank of scholars from around the world, provides an interesting perspective on the impact of Web 2.0 technology on human evolution. They claim that recent advancements in technology, especially the creation of social media tools such as Facebook and instant messaging, will propel a quantum leap forward in human evolution comparable to the transformation in the species which occurred 2 million years ago with the major increase in human brain size associated with the appearance of the first tool-making humanoid, Homo Habilis.

There again, there is a school of thought which says that the ‘dumbing-down’ of communications through the limitations of only being able to use 140 characters in ‘Tweeting’, and the use of ‘online speak’ to replace ‘proper’ grammatical structures (at least IMHO), is actually making the human species less smart, and less able to communicate effectively! What do you think?

Here is the link to the full article:

http://www.send2press.com/newswire/2010-10-1019-006.shtml