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From: taylor@hplabsc.UUCP
Newsgroups: comp.society
Subject: Re: Written Literacy
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Date: Fri, 15-May-87 19:21:25 EDT
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Posted: Fri May 15 19:21:25 1987
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[Sorry for the delay; I've just looked into `comp.society' yesterday after
 some time. Lots of work to do...]

Hi, Dave!
This is a continuation of our discussion on the Importance Of Literacy.

[>> = me, > = you]

>> It is quite clear that conventional script is a way of copying, storing
>> and repeating human speech.

>I'm not sure I agree with this.  It seems to me that we're needlessly
>limiting ourselves to the vocal aspects of communication.  Written
>communication, by virtue of being able to provide contextual clues and
>non-standard-English information (like italics and font changes) has the
>ability to extend beyond the subset of communication that we vocalize.

Stress markings like italics, font changes, underlining etc. are just the
writing equivalent of raising your voice, whispering or `speaking
impressively', which in my mind is an integral part of `human speech'.
Now, adorning text with pictures goes beyond this, but then that is not what
I would call `conventional script'.

>Next time you're talking to someone close your eyes and listen to what
>they're saying versus keeping them open and watching the gestures, 
>expressions, and other information being transmitted.  Certainly there
>is a lot more to communication than words themselves!

No disagreement here, for sure. One very important "nonverbal" aspect of
communication, both spoken and written, is *context*. The same words, and
even the same gestures, can carry radically different meanings depending on
who generates them, where, when and how, and who receives (and interpretes)
them.

>Instead, I would like to suggest that written communication is (ideally) a
>vehicle for the transliteration of communication between individuals to
>a permanent medium.

Of course. However, I was not discussing `written communication' in general,
I was talking about `conventional script'. Besides, I'm not so sure about the
`permanent' part. When I write a mail message to Hubby about tonight's soccer
game, there isn't much permanence in it (no matter whether it's written on
paper or by electronic means). Script (written words) can be used
equivalently to spoken words, though the interactive element is largely lost.
To qualify as a `permanent recording' of communication, it must be divorced
(or divorcible) from the immediate context of both the originator and the
intended recipient. (But then you were just saying `to a permanent medium',
so maybe we agree here after all.)

>                   (a thought: now that we have the ability to videotape
>discussions, does that make transcripts obsolete?  Should we start giving
>people *films* of plays, rather than *scripts* of plays?) (of course that
>leads to another interesting point, that the ``higher the bandwidth'' of
>a form of communication, the more likely that it will be a subject
>interpretation of the information, rather than the information itself.

Be careful with the `bandwidth' issue. We must distinguish between the
theoretical carrier capacity of an information channel and what of this
capacity is actually used (and usable). In a purely information-theoretical
sense, a TV set can transmit dozens of times as much as a voice channel
(geared to human voice frequencies). In reality, this factor is severely
restricted by the human ability to *take in* information. Try to play a
VCR-recording to someone and afterwards ask questions about `peripheral
information' transmitted - like the color of a car or even the number of
people they saw in a scene. Our minds are trained (by necessity) to screen
out most of what our sensory systems deliver. This applies to optical and
acoustic systems (seeing and hearing) alike, of course; yet the optical
system, bringing in MUCH more raw data, is skimmed much more
discriminatingly. We are generally more likely to remember a `peripheral'
sound than a `peripheral' image. Part of the basic operation of human speech
is that we *actively concentrate* on what is said; in a way, we switch to a
`narrow band' within the acoustical channel but in exchange we get (almost)
everything that is in there. Consider: if you just talk at someone who
doesn't expect you to, he'll probably ask you to repeat the first few words
(or reconstruct them from what you go on to say) - he had to switch to
`speech reception' mode first. Conversely, we are apt to ignore non-speech
noises while listening to words.

What I am getting at is that to get such a `speech-like' effect in picture
(sight) transmission, you would have to create a similar `concentration
effect' on the optical channel. A human is physiologically incapable of
taking in a whole TV picture instantanously (let alone the whole sight
arena). There is this classical `dot experiment' that demonstrates that on
instant pictures, a human can't count more than seven to nine independent
things at one time. (The sign language of deaf people is such a
`concentration device'; it doesn't go significantly beyond what the spoken
word can achieve.)

Of course, the `peripheral information' in, e.g., a TV picture is not
completely lost. Our brains just take all this `non-central' information
(where what is `central' is determined by the picture AND by context) and
reduce it to an acceptable amount. (E.g., many people running around,
shouting, fire => danger, panic, excitement; details are completely lost.)
So while in theory you could transmit MUCH more information via (TV-like)
images, in reality you are just PRODUCING much more information that gets
boiled down to essentials by the viewer. This CAN be a good thing; it tends
to add versimilitude (and thus, in a way, credibility) and requires much less
active involvement (imagination, deduction, consideration) from the viewer.
It does just not automatically transfer more USABLE information per time unit.

Remark 1: If you transmit a still picture and give the viewer as long as
(s)he needs, you can indeed use much of the available bandwidth. Of course,
the recipient will take rather long to take in the whole thing. Note that
this approach again loses the `interactive' feature, giving it something of
the same limitations as `conventional script'.

Remark 2: The above are (often gross) simplifications. If you're interested,
we can discuss this further. But now on with your article:

>> ...when we speak ad lib, we do not produce, on the average, particularly 
>> profound output. 

>I strongly disagree with this.  I would in fact argue that conversations
>are the most natural form of communication that we have, and that our
>languages are designed for that.  The point is that there is a whole lot
>more to communication than just `the words we're saying'.  A somewhat
>social example is that at a party quite a bit more can be learned about
>peoples attitudes towards each other by examining their posturings and
>expressions than by listening to what they're saying to each other.

I'm not sure where the disagreement lies. Conversations are indeed the most
natural form of communication (being the oldest one), and our *speaking
languages* are indeed designed (or rather evolved) for it. Surely you know
that there are distinctive differences between the language we use for
conversations (i.e., spoken dialogue) and the one we use for written
communications.

What I was saying is that the *context-independent information contents* (per
time unit) of conversational speech is rather low. Think about it. After all,
we must put ideas and concepts into it as fast as we can speak (we do not
customarily insert significant pauses into our conversations) and we always
have the `online' feedback to correct, enhance and embellish our information
when we find that it hasn't been received correctly. (In fact, if both
speakers are familiar with each other, this allows VERY compact exchange of
ideas because you don't have to take precautions for misunderstandings and
can in a way transmit `deltas' to the common base of concepts - you end up
speaking in (for outsiders) disconnected phrases. Here's to context again.)
I'm not trying to put down conversation as a means of information exchange -
I'm just saying that any individual thread of conversation is likely to have
low real information contents *in itself*, compared to a (well) prepared
written message.

>So with written communication - we can reproduce quite a large set of
>information in a written medium, but the more 'bandwidth' we add, the
>more likely we are to convey the ideas we're attempting to.  For 
>example, textbooks are almost invariably written using different fonts,
>with lots of photographs, shaded boxes for key phrases, and so on.

You are right, of course. Remember, though, that `bandwidth' is defined as
*information contents per time unit*. If you have to look at a page with
twice the information twice as long, you haven't increased the bandwidth at
all. Of course, it may still be *easier* and *more enjoyable*, distinct
improvements for sure.

>The meta-information is at least as important as the information (some
>famous writer or the other once said that if his book wasn't good enough
>to leaf through and enjoy, it certainly wasn't good enough to READ and
>enjoy...)

If pictures are used to *illustrate* and *embellish* the written word rather
than provide *additional information*, then they are used to provide
additional or easier *access* to the information on the page, rather than
increase the total amount of information contained. This may be a worthwhile
effort (especially for children's books!), but is a rather different aim than
*increasing the information contents*.

There's no question that showing a picture of, say, a torus makes the concept
of `torus' easier to access and comprehend than a verbal description. You pay
with a need for higher physical bandwidth - no free lunches here. So, to a
certain degree, you CAN trade additional information creation and
transmission effort for easier assimilation - though you aren't really
transmitting more information in the first place, you just provide some
explicitly that the receiver could have worked out himself with some effort.

--

  <<  Perry The Cynic >>		   =>> perry@inteloa.intel.com <<=
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