[HN Gopher] Eyes That Bite
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       Eyes That Bite
        
       Author : samclemens
       Score  : 28 points
       Date   : 2022-12-23 20:06 UTC (1 days ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (www.lrb.co.uk)
 (TXT) w3m dump (www.lrb.co.uk)
        
       | wpietri wrote:
       | "... I am sure Wolf is accurate to the MRIs when she says that
       | the shift to digital has made skimming the new norm. Scrolling
       | and swiping have increased our ability to survey large amounts of
       | information, but they do not engage those areas of the reading
       | brain where we imagine and are moved by the lives of others. We
       | have, in neurological terms, an app for that and it is no longer
       | being switched on."
       | 
       | Ouch. Right between the eyes. Lately I've been mournfully
       | surveying my bookshelves and realizing how much my reading has
       | shifted away from whole books. In trying to get back to it, I
       | feel like in some ways I'm learning to read all over again.
        
         | yummypaint wrote:
         | The article brings to mind the cognitive changes associated
         | with literacy. As socrates put it at the time: _You have not
         | discovered a potion for remembering, but for reminding; you
         | provide your students with the appearance of wisdom, not with
         | its reality. Your invention will enable them to hear many
         | things without being properly taught, and they will imagine
         | that they have come to know much while for the most part they
         | will know nothing. And they will be difficult to get along
         | with, since they will merely appear to be wise instead of
         | really being so._ These days when people hear about someone
         | reciting an hour long story from memory after hearing it once,
         | the assumption is they must be some kind of savant, but it used
         | to be much more commonplace.
         | 
         | I worry particular about broad systematic losses in empathy
         | relative to the previous baseline. Maybe this is a side-effect
         | of changes to our attention, but it sounds like a much bigger
         | problem. Writing made us more forgetful, but it also had
         | tremendous upsides. I struggle to see comparable benefits from
         | the skim/filter mindset. It seems like it's more of a defensive
         | reaction to the amount of garbage online than something that
         | can elevate human thought as a transformative mental tool.
        
         | alar44 wrote:
         | Who cares? A couple hundred years ago the avg person couldn't
         | read at all. I find it annoying that people equate long form
         | writing with "the default way humans are supposed to be". The
         | default normal way of a human is being a shit chucking ape in
         | the woods. Give yourself some fucking credit.
        
           | wpietri wrote:
           | I obviously care. And I didn't equate the two things.
           | 
           | The average state of the universe is hard vacuum with a
           | sprinkling of hydrogen, but I'm still going to aim a bit
           | higher myself. You do you, though.
        
         | spockz wrote:
         | This resonates. It seems like on digital I have become very
         | adapt at skimming and filtering text to see whether it is
         | relevant but once I found something it is that much harder to
         | let it _really_ sink in.
        
         | williamsmj wrote:
         | You might enjoy Wolf's appearance on Ezra Klein's podcast
         | https://www.nytimes.com/2022/11/22/opinion/ezra-klein-
         | podcas....
        
       | neonate wrote:
       | http://web.archive.org/web/20221224173133/https://www.lrb.co...
       | 
       | https://archive.ph/UWZlY
        
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       (page generated 2022-12-24 23:00 UTC)