What’s the internet going to teach me today?

Of course, that is silly question. It isn’t the internets job to teach us, to keep us informed, to discern fact from fiction.

And yet, that is how we treat the internet all the time.

Day in and day out, we rely on what the algorithms of Facebook spits out. Because it is impossible to consume all of the information the internet has to offer. And so Facebook intentionally designs and curates their content to keep you on the hook.

Let’s be clear, scrolling through your feed is the lowest form of information gathering. Sitting back and passively receiving what we are told to receive is great way to become more cemented in our biases, prejudices and beliefs. We start to believe that the world is more dangerous than it really is. And it makes us more anxious.

A higher form then is to become an active seeker of truth. It is much easier to cut through the cruft by making assertions and then combing through the information and data to see if you’re right. That is what testing and measuring is.

In other words, you don’t connect the dots by simply collecting them.

The bottom line: It’s much better to have a question in mind before you start surfing the internet. It is how we make it work for us.