With the rise of so many new forms of communication like e-mail, chat, and instant messaging one could argue that the age-old art of conversation is experiencing a kind of wired renaissance. We are connected to one another in ways that were previously unimaginable.

But as we 'converse' in this day and age, what’s really coming out of our mouths—or from our overworked fingertips? We may be in contact with our intimates with greater frequency, but can we possibly have that much to say? Do we engage in thoughtful exchanges or are we trafficking in just so much piffle?

In its weekend “Taste” section, The Wall Street Journal recently published an essay about the rise and fall of the art of conversation. According to author Stephen Miller, “Real conversation is a lost art. Chattering and being ‘nice’… now that we do rather well.” As Miller notes, conversation (not to be confused with 'talk') used to be one of the highest forms of intellectual expression. Great thinkers like Samuel Johnson would judge intellectual prowess in others by assessing their skills as conversationalists. A conversation was considered a mutual endeavor to grasp larger, more elusive concepts like Truth and Love.

While the article did mention the negative effects of modern life on the art of conversation (i.e. we’ve been reduced to regularly discussing trivial subjects like vacations and the stock market), remarkably there was no mention of the impact of technology on conversation. (Enter alarm:clock.)

One of the many paradoxes of the Information Age is that while we may be in greater contact with one another via loads of nifty devices, that contact increasingly seems to lack substance. The permeation of wireless communications and the Internet—and the cavalcade of communications gadgets—makes it possible for us to correspond with alarming frequency and immediacy. Of course it’s nice to be able to call Grandma in Florida on her 80th birthday; and business people relish the advent of teleconferencing and distance learning for their ability to boost productivity while reducing costs. But we are connected to the point of distraction.

When’s the last time you were completely unconnected? No phone, no pager, no e-mail access. It’s only at these times that people seem to have minor epiphanies about the art of conversation—when they revert to the grade school lesson that we all internalized, but now seem to have forgotten: Think before you speak. Technology, with its immediacy and omnipresence, hastens us to do the opposite.

Everywhere we turn we are encouraged to make our blather heard: AOL wants us to instantly message, Yahoo Finance wants us to share our penetrating insights about the stock market, and Epinions wants to know what we think about absolutely everything. Check out any one of the countless Britney Spears chat rooms—the maniac pace and impulsive banter are the model of anti-conversation.

It may be that, communications technology or not, we’ve never been much for conversation. As Miller notes in his article, Rebecca West said, “There is no such thing as conversation. It is an illusion. There are intersecting monologues, that is all.”

Perhaps the greatest offense committed by technology is that it obviates the need for us to meet face-to-face—before, at least our monologues were exchanged in person; today, they can soar through the ether at the speed of light.

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