Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Path: utzoo!mnetor!seismo!lll-lcc!pyramid!hplabs!hplabsc!taylor
From: chen@gatech.UUCP (Ray Chen)
Newsgroups: comp.society
Subject: Re: Written Literacy
Message-ID: <1686@hplabsc.HP.COM>
Date: Thu, 30-Apr-87 03:27:14 EDT
Article-I.D.: hplabsc.1686
Posted: Thu Apr 30 03:27:14 1987
Date-Received: Sat, 2-May-87 08:54:18 EDT
References: <1673@hplabsc.HP.COM>
Sender: taylor@hplabsc.HP.COM
Distribution: world
Organization: The Clouds Project, School of ICS, Georgia Tech
Lines: 25
Approved: taylor@hplabs

Written information has one advantage over any other type.

The assimilation of the information can be controlled by the person 
receiving the information.

If you're reading a book, you can, at any point, stop reading the book 
and think for a while, jump back to a previous point in the book to 
re-read something, stop reading the book and pick up another book for a 
while, or otherwise control the speed at which you read.

Reading doesn't have to be done in real-time.  This, plus the lack of 
cues normally present in conversation makes it easier for people to 
see through the presentation of the idea to the idea itself.

Contrast that with speech or even recorded speech.

I claim that written information makes it easier to divorce the ideas 
from the presentation of the ideas.  This in turn makes it easier to 
judge ideas on their own merits.

That is why I prefer to write ideas down.  Paper is a cold, abstract 
medium that forces me to nail any down loose ends instead of waving
a rhetorical hand at them.

	Ray Chen