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I say a bit about why books are better in the paragraph preceding the one containing what you’ve quoted. I can make a positive case for reading over TV watchin

I say a bit about why books are better in the paragraph preceding the one containing what you’ve quoted. I can make a positive case for reading over TV watching, and the book I mention in the comment does just that, but first I’d like to quibble with your first question. I don’t say that watching TV is not enriching in general. Certain television and certain movies are awesome and even indispensable. I do think books are better than watching TV though. For starters, you are in a thread about how TV is associated with cognitive decline. Reading on the other hand is promoted by the results of a number of studies showing its relationship to improved cognitive performance. Perhaps the simplest argument I can think of now is this. When we as a society look to create great educators, lawyers, doctors, scientists, and philosophers, we make sure they’re reading a lot. We don’t have them watch TV. When society builds education systems they fill their curriculums with books, whether at the primary, secondary, or tertiary levels. This is still true despite television existing for almost 100 years. The replacement of reading by television has been actively resisted by educational leaders generally. In the most potent cases, professors would find it totally laughable that their graduate curriculums be facilitated by TV watching rather than books.

pbhjpbhj 7y ago
>Perhaps the simplest argument I can think of now is this. When we as a society look to create great educators, lawyers, doctors, scientists, and philosophers, we make sure they’re reading a lot. We don’t have them watch TV. // Not the GP. You're right that argument is simple, it's also not compelling. The reason for that is most of the information is currently encoded in the form of literature. It might be that we'll made TV/computer programmes can convey the information, and build knowledge, better; we've just not tested that yet. Is an anatomy book better (alone) for learning than text and visuals that are interactive - maybe VR - for example. If you take the people who read and make them watch TV it seems likely to me that they'll watch stimulating television, if they read stimulating books? In short maybe it's the content, and one content group prefers one medium. I'd totally agree that TV with advertising breaks is anathema -- but Netflix documentaries (say), seems like they might be better than a Mills & Boon bonkbuster? If it is solely the medium the problem is significant and we need quickly to find out what specifically about the medium is the issue. It's unlikely to get solved though, TV advertising is a cornerstone of Capitalist society; keeping the masses "sedated" by TV (raging about Soaps or MCU plotlines instead of real life) helps to control society. MOOCs are huge and often don't use books as primary media, they rely on lectures delivered through video. My most recent learning has all been this way and I find it works well for me. But presumably you include "screen based text" with "books"?
- thundergolfer 7y ago
  In Amusing Ourselves To Death the author does go into a lot of detail about how "the medium is the message", or as he extends it, "the medium is the metaphor". Postman contends that Television as a medium has significant problems. Given that you're bring up lectures and MOOCS, it's definitely worth being more clear about what Postman understands as constituting the medium of TV. It's not merely the transmission of audio-visual content, it's is the whole technology, taking the concept of "technology" in the broad sense. For example, the usage of music in TV is part of the technology, and it is usually conspicuously absent from MOOC lectures. Postman would not consider a digital textbook as TV, but if such a textbook were borrow from TV, for example using conventional drama narrative as a device then he would be against that. Does this more or less resolve the problem? TV != digital textbooks or MOOC lectures.
onion2k 7y ago
In the most potent cases, professors would find it totally laughable that their graduate curriculums be facilitated by TV watching rather than books. If someone told me that the only way to learn linear algebra or calculus would be from a textbook I'd have believed them when I was at university (about 25 years ago). If someone told me that now I'd send them some great YouTube content that explains it far better than any math textbook I've ever seen. I think that says more about professors than about how people are able learn difficult subjects. I don't think books are going to go away, and I think it's important to cultivate an enjoyment of reading in children so they can read complex subjects later in life, but the common line that "books are better for you than TV" in adults who aren't reading for education is just something that I think is hard to justify. People always end up comparing low-brow TV with high-brow books to show how TV is bad. That's what I think is unreasonable.
- yesenadam 7y ago
  You don't seem to be talking about TV at all, though, but online videos.
  - thundergolfer 7y ago
    Yeah I now realise people replying are not agreeing that TV != any audio-visual content. When TV is attacked there's defenses bringing up digital textbooks.

pbhjpbhj 7y ago

>Perhaps the simplest argument I can think of now is this. When we as a society look to create great educators, lawyers, doctors, scientists, and philosophers, we make sure they’re reading a lot. We don’t have them watch TV. // Not the GP. You're right that argument is simple, it's also not compelling. The reason for that is most of the information is currently encoded in the form of literature. It might be that we'll made TV/computer programmes can convey the information, and build knowledge, better; we've just not tested that yet. Is an anatomy book better (alone) for learning than text and visuals that are interactive - maybe VR - for example. If you take the people who read and make them watch TV it seems likely to me that they'll watch stimulating television, if they read stimulating books? In short maybe it's the content, and one content group prefers one medium. I'd totally agree that TV with advertising breaks is anathema -- but Netflix documentaries (say), seems like they might be better than a Mills & Boon bonkbuster? If it is solely the medium the problem is significant and we need quickly to find out what specifically about the medium is the issue. It's unlikely to get solved though, TV advertising is a cornerstone of Capitalist society; keeping the masses "sedated" by TV (raging about Soaps or MCU plotlines instead of real life) helps to control society. MOOCs are huge and often don't use books as primary media, they rely on lectures delivered through video. My most recent learning has all been this way and I find it works well for me. But presumably you include "screen based text" with "books"?

thundergolfer 7y ago
In Amusing Ourselves To Death the author does go into a lot of detail about how "the medium is the message", or as he extends it, "the medium is the metaphor". Postman contends that Television as a medium has significant problems. Given that you're bring up lectures and MOOCS, it's definitely worth being more clear about what Postman understands as constituting the medium of TV. It's not merely the transmission of audio-visual content, it's is the whole technology, taking the concept of "technology" in the broad sense. For example, the usage of music in TV is part of the technology, and it is usually conspicuously absent from MOOC lectures. Postman would not consider a digital textbook as TV, but if such a textbook were borrow from TV, for example using conventional drama narrative as a device then he would be against that. Does this more or less resolve the problem? TV != digital textbooks or MOOC lectures.

onion2k 7y ago

In the most potent cases, professors would find it totally laughable that their graduate curriculums be facilitated by TV watching rather than books. If someone told me that the only way to learn linear algebra or calculus would be from a textbook I'd have believed them when I was at university (about 25 years ago). If someone told me that now I'd send them some great YouTube content that explains it far better than any math textbook I've ever seen. I think that says more about professors than about how people are able learn difficult subjects. I don't think books are going to go away, and I think it's important to cultivate an enjoyment of reading in children so they can read complex subjects later in life, but the common line that "books are better for you than TV" in adults who aren't reading for education is just something that I think is hard to justify. People always end up comparing low-brow TV with high-brow books to show how TV is bad. That's what I think is unreasonable.

yesenadam 7y ago
You don't seem to be talking about TV at all, though, but online videos.
- thundergolfer 7y ago
  Yeah I now realise people replying are not agreeing that TV != any audio-visual content. When TV is attacked there's defenses bringing up digital textbooks.