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That exercise, in turn, reprograms the brain to perform more complex abstractions with greater rapidity by strengthening connections among networks of brain cells and organs. Think of how you needed to sound out words when you first learned to read, letter by letter, then trained your brain to recognize the word and directly evoke its meaning when reading. When computers were introduced, the power of abstraction became automated — our physical devices, by assisting the nesting and remembering of abstractions, made it possible for our minds to do what they had not previously been able to do.

If we need information lenses, we also need attention-reflecting tools. Could any aspects of the visual human-computer interface be used as reflectors of people’s state of attention? The beginnings of research into the principles of augmenting metacognition are under way. ”47 People solve mental problems and puzzles all the time without looking closely at how they did it; reflection upon and self-explanation of thinking processes is a metacognitive skill that the authors of this paper regard as computer-augmentable.

46 For example, every morning when I sit down in front of my computer, I write two or three goals for the day on a piece of paper and put it next to my computer screen, at the periphery of my vision; whenever I catch sight of the paper, I ask myself where my attention is directed at the moment and whether I am making progress toward the goals I wrote down that morning. With this practice I have established an inner observer, making me more aware of how I use my attention when sitting in front of my screen.