Long on speculation, short on facts.

I know it's fashionable to "think of the children" but all these articles that say, essentially, that using computers is somehow crippling to youth have no data to back themselves up. That neuroplasticity study has been cited by a gajillion people but it hasn't been repeated or added to and it was published in 2008. Everybody loves to show the Youtube video of the baby that can't figure out a magazine but c'mon. There's a lot of shit babies can't figure out. Mine is terrified of Roombas. Then the author comes up with a howler like this:

They’ll grow up thinking about the internet with the same nonchalance that I hold toward my toaster and teakettle.

Dude. There is no difference between "the internet" and your "toaster and teakettle." They're tools. We're a species that manipulates tools. That's what that neuroplasticity study you mentioned (but didn't cite) is all about.

Jeron Lanier used to do VR. in his VR lab they built an avatar that was as non-human is possible - Lanier has a fondness for cephalopods so they basically built a cuttlefish for you to "play." They deliberately made the body actions necessary to cause avatar actions as esoteric as possible - extend your elbow up and left to uncurl your right tentacle, for example. And as weird and inhuman as their design was, everybody who used their digital cuttlefish could walk it, move it, pick up things and otherwise act naturally within half an hour of starting.

Which makes sense - how many game controller paradigms do you have tucked away in your head? Do your thumbs know the Konami Code? There's a three-button combo in Okami that does something I need it to do. Don't remember what it is, don't remember what the keys are, but when I'm playing my hands just do it. That's neuroplasticity. It has not impacted my ability to walk, to drive, to ride a motorcycle, to skateboard, to swim or to do anything else - it's just an unconscious connection my hand and my motor cortex made that comes into play when I see the stimulus of Okami. When I'm "walking" as a sacred wolf.

There's also this worry that kids have no attention spans. Sure - the amount of media shoved at them has gone up exponentially while their educational standards emphasize rote memorization more and more. We're overprescribing for ADD and other learning disorders and we're spending less and less time with them. That same neuroplasticity that allows you to play a cuttlefish allows them to maximize an environment of unlimited youtube videos but extraordinarily limited face time. Take away the distractions and watch them bloom.

Oh, right. "Old ways of thinking are on the verge of extinction." What? "SOME ARGUE THAT THE YOUNG ARE DEVELOPING NEW SKILLS BETTER SUITED TO THEIR OWN REALITY THAN TO AN OUTMODED PAST."

"Some argue."

Are some of those who argue among the "opinions of 1,021 critics, experts, and stakeholders, asked for their thoughts on digital natives"? Which were then "boiled down" to "young people now count on the internet as 'their external brain' and have become skillful decision makers—even while they also 'thirst for instant gratification and often make quick, shallow choices"?

So we've got a Pew opinion survey of a thousand industry wonks that we aren't even quoting correctly. It's here, by the way. It's also a push poll - of those surveyed, 55% felt that in 2020, "multitasking teens...do not suffer notable cognitive shortcomings as they multitask and cycle quickly through personal- and work-related tasks. " 42% felt that it would yield "baleful results."

When you have to misquote a push poll in order to make a point that hasn't been borne out except in one study in 2008 that you misinterpreted, you're on shaky ground intellectually speaking.

Should we worry about this stuff? Yes. Should we use empirical testing to determine what we should worry about? Yes please. When "some argue" for something that has no data behind it should we be skeptical?

I sure think so.