Submitted 6 months ago by faizalr@fedia.io to technology@lemmy.world
The vast majority of students rely on laptops – and increasingly AI – to help with their university work. But a small number are going analogue and eschewing tech almost entirely in a bid to re-engage their brains
I just have a hard time picturing things being so different from when I left academia only a couple of years ago. Everybody still had pen and paper notebooks
We must stop using devices that use Abominable Intelligence.
They will be our doom
While browsing Insta and Tiktok on a cellphone in class. That word does not mean what you think it means.
I hate how the term Luddite has been co-opted as a blanket term for someone who rejects technology for any reason. The original Luddites were a labor movement who were angry that technology was taking people’s livelihoods while society was doing nothing to prevent those people from becoming destitute.
Kinda exactly how AI is going to fuck over a lot of people while primarily benefiting the rich people who own it.
Indeed. The Luddites the high-skilled technology workers of their time! And were the first bloody chapter of the labour movement, nearly erased from that history by their oppressors. “Blood in the machine” by Brian Merchant is a great history of this.
Was gonna bring up the same point about Luddites. They were absolutely pro-automation.
They saw greedy corporations using automation, and getting ready to fuck their society into the dirt, so they started petitioning their local governments, tried to negotiate and drew up the plans for a social security program ~150 years before one was actually implemented, smashed a bunch of expensive corporate equipment when the government wouldn’t respond, then the government sided with corporate, used the military to drag all the men, women, and children into public squares and executed every last one of them. Even relatives and companions that weren’t in the group and didn’t participate. So thoroughly annihilated that it left an informational pinhole in the history books, and the name was co-opted into an insult. Now we’re really not sure if John Ludd even existed, maybe the name was just a mythical legend already, and was used as a rally point to boost morale.
And here we are, barely 200 years in the future, about to repeat the fuzzy spots again and rediscover why we brought citrus fruits with us on the ships, with the general population completely oblivious to the brutality the owner class is ready and able to deploy.
What happens if the tech bros are right, and the machine doesn’t need 9/10ths of the human population any more?
Luddite was a derogatory term anyway. One might have legit reasons to be against personally using certain technologies
Is now a good time to complain about that one guy who brings a $3000 gaming laptop to the computer science lectures because expensive stuff makes him a good programmer and proceeds to distract people accross the room by the sheer volume of his fan spinning?
Don’t complain about my Lenovo Jetpad. The jet engine helped me think by drowning out other sounds.
I’m deaf now, but that was a sacrifice.
I did that in uni, too. Everyone brought their laptops to the lectures while I took notes on paper. Writing by hand makes your brain absorb the information better I think
Me too, but that’s because my parents bought me a laptop with like a 19 inch screen thinking it would be helpful. That fucker was heavy.
Same for me. Also I sat in front, becouse in the back I would be disturbed by all the not-lecture related stuff people had open on their laptops.
It does, but in my experience, it’s way worse for recollection.
Electronic devices are superior when it comes to storing and organizing data, which makes it a better tool if you prefer to use active recall as a memorisation method.
I had literal books worth of notes until switching to a tablet (a stylus keeps the benefits of writing, btw). And going over them when preparing for exams was an absolute nightmare.
Not just what you think. Hand writing is scientifically better for memory retention and more pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC11943480/
It does. I vastly prefer writing notes by hand than typing em. But my handwriting sucks when I have to write quickly, and I also don’t like lugging around giant stacks of paper. And so I settled on a digital writing pad, and just do the work to type my notes later. Acts as revision too.
so I settled on a digital writing pad
Which hardware/OS?
Is taking notes by hand really that exceptional? When I went to college ages ago I only typed essays on a desktop computer, studying was done with textbook + lecture notes, maaybe with a handful of online resources.
I can kind of see this right now. I’m in a first year course and almost everyone has a laptop in front of them. I’m in a fourth year course and most people use paper notes. It could be survivorship or a result of differences in the desks, or it could be generational.
I graduated college a few years back and can count on one hand (with fingers to spare) how many times I saw someone hand writing notes in class
Imagine choosing suffering voluntarily in 2025. What a privileged fuck.
I’m pretty sure that “not using a laptop is suffering” is actually the privileged take here.
Let me guess. They don’t use a laptop, but brag about it endlessly on tiktok with a holier-than-thou attitude?
I did something insane: I actually read the article.
The students interviewed used pen and paper because they lack the tempting distractions a laptop/tablet/phone has. One states they feel they “use their brain more” when using a pen and paper. They also mention using a computer to write the final version of an essay for submission, but do most of the work on pen and paper for the aforementioned reasons.
Have you seen people on TikTok bragging about this or are you just coming up with hypotheticals for funsies?
There were trends to switch to dumbphones last year, retro media like vinyl, they always came with a wave of content. Pretty sure video essays about someone using a dumbphone while carrying a camera around town are just doing it for content. This one wouldn’t be any different.
I really like being able to Ctrl+F through my book.
But there just seems to be some kind of feel to flipping a page that makes me feel more focussed.
Your book does one single thing, you cannot be distracted by other functions.
Plus the tactile feel and responsiveness of a book us unmatched, it’s lightweight and portable, you will never run out of battery, and flipping back and forth through pages is much more intuitive that jumping between bookmarks in pdfs and ebooks, the only thing that comes close is e ink readers but those have their own tradeoffs
That’s only going to affect me if I am reading something particularly boring and don’t really want to read it.
But if that were the case, I wouldn’t be reading it in the first place.
I don’t feel the need to rid myself of distractions, because when I am not in the mood to read a book, I don’t read it.
Also, this “distracted by functionality” logic is what parents seem to use to get rid of stuff with a screen.
I can say for sure, that people being loud in another room is a much bigger distraction.
If your OS is distracting you, you have installed the wrong one.
Engagement. I’m a teacher and using all of your senses to look for information makes you remember that said piece of information more.
It’s funny, most studying comes down to that… And motivation, which is also something you have if you prefer books over laptop.
The trick is to buy dead tree and also download the same book from the usual online libraries.
I think it’s the mental work of “I don’t have to do anything, it will find it for me” and “I have to find it myself” and I think it puts you in a state mentally and keeps you there. You don’t have to disengage because there’s something else doing the work.
Went to school before the late '90s: Write everything in paper notebooks & exam books.
Went to school between late '90s-2020s: Tap it all into a computer. Learn nothing.
Went to school late 2020s on: Write in paper notebooks, in between scavenging the ruins for food.
Laptops are extremely useful. It really doesn’t make sense to avoid them.
I pretty much treat mine as my second brain.
I pretty much treat mine as my second brain.
Withering away your first brain in the process.
Not really.
As someone who studied without laptop through an entire bachelor’s degree - it is a valid option, and I still often make handwritten notes of study materials.
When you write things down by hand, you process information for longer and use more parts of your brain to do so, which genuinely helps to memorize study materials.
It also allows for more focus. Personally, I found that when I moved, eventually, to using laptop in my studies, it has reduced my attention span and added unnecessary distractions. When all you have at your fingertips is paper and a pen, there is nowhere to get astray.
eh. i prefer desktops. i see the use of laptops, but i prefer to use as little disposable tech as possible.
Maybe something like a Framework would be appropriate?
Just remember to back that shit up.
Nothing like forgetting your brain on public transport and getting instant amnesia for the past five years.
Ever read Stross’s Accelerando? Not far off plot there.
Title is misleading:
Nick, a philosophy student at the University of Cambridge, stopped using his laptop for university work in the last year of his undergraduate degree. He still types his essays, but lecture notes, revision, and essay planning are all done by hand.
The second sentence contradicts the first:
stopped using his laptop for university work
then
He still types his essays
So basically he’s not taking a laptop in to the lecture hall to take notes etc but is still using a computer to complete his work. Which makes sense as pen & paper in that environment is way more practical anyway.
Exactly how does he research his essays without internet access?
Well you see he’s stopped using the internet for his university work. But he still uses the internet for research for his essays.
Maybe he’s lugging a massive typewriter around.
that is hipster
mayb he takes notes with a quill and ink. Dab…dab…dab…
I’ve got images of the lecturer giving him death stares every time he starts typing, filling the room with the cliter-clatter of the keys.
I used to take my laptop into the lecture hall but I hardly ever actually used it.
Same. I mostly used it for homework between classes.
I found the most effective strategy for me was to do the reading before class, bring the book in to refer to, listen intently for things I didn’t get from the book, and reread the section after class. If the professor specifically called out something to take notes on, I’d either do that on my phone or pull out my laptop (esp just before midterms or finals).
My handwriting is awful and I almost never refer to my notes anyway.
Studies have also shown that taking notes by writing causes better learning outcomes compared to typing.
That’s only true if you don’t refer to your notes. Reviewing notes has a much stronger correlation to remembering than how those notes are generated.
Wasn’t the case for me for information dense subjects like biology related subjects. Found I didn’t retain anything, but worst of all my notes were so messy I couldn’t even use them, so ended up wasting time having to go back and listen to the lecture again to create notes I could study off of and make short summaries of to start memorizing.
Some exceptions to typing has been problem solving basic subjects like math where there’s no rush to try to get down bunch of information, so for that I definitely go handwriting. But, for really information dense subjects its typing all the way.
Can confirm, switched away from laptop notes to incomprehensible-to-others fountain pen writing. Writing is the important part anyway.
Yeah, the way he does it is basically how everyone did it even 10 years ago. The tools were mostly the same then as they are now, with the exception of AI and the fact that handwriting wasn’t as big a thing anymore when today’s undergrads were in school. If you have a fluid and moderately quick handwriting, paper notes will typically be easier to take and more useful for revising the material later on.
All assignments are submitted electronically now, and if he’s in philosophy, he will also have to follow formatting requirements like font, font size, margins, and spacing. Practically, he’s doing as much as he is allowed off-computer.
Honestly I used to do the same a decade ago in engineering before changing majors mainly cause my laptop was a fucking brick.
They’re still using computers to do their university work and submit it though. It’s more about them not using a laptop in a lecture hall and using pen and paper instead. That’s not really a big deal considering that’s probably what most people were doing anyway up until relatively recently.
Good for them
Not using a laptop because it can distract you is like shrinking your stomach because you can’t stop eating. Oh, wait…
Stop eating? As if I would grasp the concept of moderation.
Restricting your diet and skipping meals is the best way to lose weight.
i much prefered writing notes on paper but i’d cry if i had to write an essay by hand, i hope those students aren’t torturing themselves this way
i think its mostly AI that was the problem. we all used notebooks even last decade, you just cant concentrate with a laptop writing notes.
Going to school with a book instead of a phone is way more enjoyable.
I really like this idea, but its difficult. when I used to attend uni it was more feasible but in 2025 all of my courses require online submissions, discussion, and materials. I can rent a laptop from the library, but only for 4 hours at a time. Of course there are desktops, but realistically if you want work from home you need a computer/tablet. That said I still just borrow my partners and haven’t bothered to buy one.
I absolutely love doing everything on the computer and can’t stand writing things by hand anymore. I’ve always heard simply by listening — instructors that force students to take notes were the worst because I would be too busy scrambling to write things down than actually listen and learn.
All of this goes out the window when it comes to foreign language though. I have to do everything old school: textbooks, pencil and paper, and if it’s a non-Latin character set I have to write the same characters over and over for hours.
As “someone who gets distracted very easily,” he made the change to reclaim his attention span. Ditching his laptop gave him an environment where “YouTube isn’t around the corner” and he can focus on his reading.
This is just avoiding the issue of having a short attention span.
Reminds me a lot of fellow classmates at my college who I discovered hate online classes because they say they can’t stay focused. So I don’t know how these “luddite” students plan to not get distracted when their job will most likely involve sitting in front of a computer.
That’s not what being a Luddite means
Good for these kids. It’s a wise move!
I do that but its actually because I just don’t own a laptop and don’t want to buy one
Rcklsabndn@sh.itjust.works 6 months ago
I haven’t been to school for a couple decades. Do they no longer teach how to take proper notes in your first year (paper or computer or otherwise)?
Corkyskog@sh.itjust.works 6 months ago
First year… In college? No, that’s pre-requisite knowledge that they expect students to have from secondary school.