Sadowski: Smartphone addiction isn't the problem

Do you ever feel addicted to your smartphone? Well you’re in luck – there’s an app for that. But Jathan Sadowski, a graduate student in the Consortium for Science, Policy and Outcomes at Arizona State University, contends that smartphone apps that promise to free you from the entanglements of the digital world are a solution in search of a problem.

In his Future Tense article in Slate magazine, Sadowski writes that “our world is augmented by digital technologies, not replaced or superseded by them.” He argues that the distinctions we frequently make between the “real” world around us and the digital world can be misleading, and that the art of conversation and interpersonal interaction is alive and well in the digital age.

Future Tense is a collaboration among ASU, the New America Foundation and Slate magazine that explores how emerging technologies affect policy and society.