We have the world’s knowledge at our fingertips, but empty minds.

When was the last time you memorized a phone number? Or the route to a new destination? Or a historical date?

Likely, you haven’t. Why would you? The cloud remembers for you.

We have undergone a massive shift from internalizing knowledge to accessing knowledge. We no longer treat our brains as storage hard drives; we treat them as processors. We are becoming like internet routers—information passes through us, but very little of it stays.

Proponents of this shift argue that this frees up our brain power for “higher thinking.” But there is a flaw in that logic. Critical thinking requires raw material. You cannot connect dots that aren’t there. You cannot have a deep insight about history or philosophy if you have to Google the basic facts every time you want to construct a thought.

Wisdom comes from the synthesis of knowledge stored deep within the mind. If all our knowledge is external—stored on servers in California—then our wisdom becomes external, too. We become dependent on the connection.

If the internet went down tomorrow, how much of “you” would still be left?