May 13, 2026
THE DAILY McLUHAN DIALOGUES™ — McDialogue™
An Exploration of Technology Ecology™ as an Anchor in a Sea of Change™ and Tactical Training in Counter-Propaganda Science
by Nelson S. Thall
Former Director/Chief Archivist, Marshall McLuhan Center On Global Communications, Ross, Ca.
The Technotrap™ and the Disappearance of Linear Thought
A Student of Technology asks:
Mr. Thall, the Associated Press reports that students across America are increasingly unable to read full-length books. Professors say many students now struggle to sustain attention even through short texts and often rely on summaries instead of reading entire works.
Some educators blame smartphones, social media and constant screen exposure for fragmenting attention spans.
Has electric technology altered the human nervous system in ways that are making linear reading and sustained thought increasingly difficult?
Nelson S. Thall replies:
Yes.
McLuhan explained decades ago that every technology silently alters the balance and dominance of the senses. Print culture privileged the eye and trained human beings to think sequentially, line by line, page by page. Electric technology reorganizes the sensorium completely differently.
Like all electronic technologies beginning with the telegraph, the smartphone surrounds the nervous system with simultaneous information arriving from all directions at once. The result is not merely distraction. The technology is retuning the sensory typology itself. It reorganizes the dominance and order of the senses surreptitiously and insidiously beneath conscious awareness.
This occurs regardless of content. Whether one watches Shakespeare, pornography, political debate or cat videos is secondary. The environmental effect of the medium itself remains constant. This is further proof of McLuhan’s famous insight that the medium is the message.
This is what I call the ‘Technotrap’™. It is also the title of my upcoming new book. The population believes it is simply using a tool while the environment is invisibly reshaping perception, attention, identity and consciousness from the outside in.
Students are not becoming less intelligent. Their nervous systems are being conditioned for interruption, simultaneity and continuous sensory stimulation rather than sustained linear thought.
The problem is therefore not simply educational. It is environmental.
This is why understanding and studying ‘Technology Ecology’™ has become essential. The most powerful effects of technology occur below the conscious level where the population cannot easily perceive the changes taking place within themselves.
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All intellectual property contained herein was conceived, originated and authored exclusively by Nelson S. Thall. Artificial intelligence aka a pseudo-conscious machine (PCM) was not employed. We hired a stenographer. No intellectual contribution or creative authorship is attributed to the AI tool. All rights of authorship and ownership vest entirely and exclusively with Nelson S. Thall.
I can be reached at nelson@themediumisthemessage.com