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Subject: 
Re: The value of reading (was: If you could leave any book on Kjeld's nightstand...)
Newsgroups: 
lugnet.off-topic.debate
Date: 
Mon, 1 Apr 2002 17:29:49 GMT
Viewed: 
1538 times
  
In lugnet.off-topic.debate, Christopher L. Weeks writes:

I don't get TV, but I'd been under the impression that these channels
had some pretty good stuff even if it was _Popular Science_ caliber rather than
_Nature_ caliber.  What you're describing sounds more like _Omni_.

  Upon further reflection (and watching) I can say that certain mainstream
"nature" type programs aren't bad, especially the stuff on deep-sea
exploration.  Some of the military and "justice files" stuff might be good,
too, but I can't speak with any expertise on them.  And Discovery does have
a real and unforgiveable lust for wacko pseudoscience.

I agree that the fact that people don't do it much does mean that they think
they have better things to do.  But not that they think it's hard. Surely some
people do.  But I don't think that most people have to strain to read street
signs or restaurant menus.

  In that case, I agree absolutely.  The act of reading for utility is
itself quite simple--it's the deeper, reflective reading that takes work.

This is a counter-factual, of course.

Is it?  I guess I misunderstand the term.

  Doh! That's what I get for trying to sound like a know-it-all.  I thought
that was the term, but perhaps I need to read more!  Anyway:

It was asserted essentially that people couldn't do anything better than
reading.  I was merely pointing out that this might not be true.  Really, I
think my goal was very close to yours in pointing out the futility of such
hypotheses.

  Ah!  Then I re-agree with you again.

Barring a book-destructive catastrophe and the sudden world-wide
accessibility of electronic information technology, electronic media won't
likely extinguish the hardcopy written word for at least several centuries.

Certainly not while I live.

  Is that a "from my cold, dead hand" comment, or simply an expression of a
timeframe?  8^)

     Dave!



Message is in Reply To:
  Re: The value of reading (was: If you could leave any book on Kjeld's nightstand...)
 
(...) [snip] (...) Really? I don't get TV, but I'd been under the impression that these channels had some pretty good stuff even if it was _Popular Science_ caliber rather than _Nature_ caliber. What you're describing sounds more like _Omni_. (...) (...) (23 years ago, 1-Apr-02, to lugnet.off-topic.debate)

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