Where's the map?

I've always enjoyed finding my way around places and navigating through areas. Nothing gives me greater pleasure than pouring over a map and trying to work out where you are and where you're going to. I suppose being a history nut, I can imagine how early adventurers and explorers studied maps as they chartered new paths and discovered new worlds and civilizations. There's a sort of romance and mystique about the whole thing.

Today though that has fallen away to a large extent, as we now have navigational systems in our cars that lead us to our destination. All you do is key in your chosen destination and voila!! it takes you - hopefully to the place you wish to go to. The technology is impressive and it has been of inestimable use in many fields.

Call me old fashioned and behind the times, but I think we've become so spoilt and cosseted with the information we're fed that we've lost our primal sense of direction and ability to use it. Everything is fed to us and we tend to just sit there and take it in - largely unquestioned. We just seem to accept what information is given to us, instead of trying to use our skills of reason. In other words, we've largely lost our ability to navigate.

How long will it be before we lose our other precious abilities???