The internet, identity and intellectual capital: a response to Dreyfus’s critique of e-learning

This paper defends the possibility that meaningful learning can be supported by the Internet. Responding to Hubert Dreyfus’s neo-Kierkegaardian contention that the Internet inhibits and does not support meaningful learning, we argue that it is a valuable tool for learning that can promote the development of intellectual expertise without the accompanying atrophy of personhood that Dreyfus believes is a prominent effect of extensive engagement with the Internet. Additionally, we argue that a conflation of practically ultimate commitments and epistemically ultimate commitments underlies Dreyfus’s conception of unconditional commitments that constitutes the core of his critique of the possibility of meaningful learning on the Web.