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From: chuck@melmac.harris-atd.com (Chuck Musciano)
Newsgroups: sci.lang,comp.cog-eng,sci.psychology
Subject: Re: Effects of poor writing? (Long)
Message-ID: <2000@trantor.harris-atd.com>
Date: 1 May 89 18:47:52 GMT
References: <39131@bbn.COM> <1982@trantor.harris-atd.com> <2947@tank.uchicago.edu> <2970@tank.uchicago.edu> <357@itcatl.UUCP>
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Reply-To: chuck@trantor.harris-atd.com (Chuck Musciano)
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Xref: utzoo sci.lang:4408 comp.cog-eng:1058 sci.psychology:1726

In article <357@itcatl.UUCP> jonathan@itcatl.UUCP (Jonathan Peterson) writes:
>	I think traditional "literacy" is falling more and more by the wayside 
>as it becomes less important to human communication.  One can only assume
>that natural language, speech recognition, and higher resolution communication
>media (HDTV, ISDN) technologies will make literacy less important in the
>workplace of the future.  Literacy is already outdated by TV, film and radio
>for entertainment.  The industrial revolution made literacy a prerequisite for
>success, the information revolution just beginning may well make literacy
>unneeded again.

     This is certainly a horrifying view of the future!  Although TV, film,
and radio are important to our culture, I also think that a grounding in the
written history of our society, both sociological and cultural, is far more
important.  Frankly, there is no more effective way, I think, to communicate
ideas than to write them down and have others read them.  Even in this day and
age of video technology, the written word is unsurpassed in its ability to
reach millions of people.  Bandwidth-wise, it's impossible to beat the 35 cent
paper that hits my driveway each morning.  I cannot foresee video text
technology with the price, capacity, and convenience of a newspaper for some
time.

     An illiterate populace is an easily manipulated, I would even say
stupid, populace.  Literacy is really a cornerstone of freedom.

Chuck Musciano			ARPA  : chuck@trantor.harris-atd.com
Harris Corporation 		Usenet: ...!uunet!x102a!trantor!chuck
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