Comments for Margui's Weblog

Comment on Lessing’s Hunger For Books by Bobby Wilson

Bobby Wilson — Fri, 01 Feb 2008 16:21:52 +0000

While Lessing’s story is compelling and heartfelt, her means of getting her point across and swinging others’ opinions is based on emotion, and not rational thought. It is true that developed countries have an wealth of information at our fingertips, and countries such as Zimbabwe do not. But to criticize the developed countries for not “taking advantage” of these opportunities is ludicrous. Clearly, as the Information Age has begun, it has led to improvements in the fields of education, science, and medicine. This is clearly due to an increase in the sharing of knowledge, which Lessing is claiming that we are not taking part in. To put ALL of the information available to us to use would be nearly impossible. The key to a successful society is using the resources available as the people see fit to better themselves. And while Lessing may not look at the children in developed countries and sense a “hunger for knowledge,” that is because the hunger is instilled in us, and we no longer need to feed that knowledge with books alone.

Comment on Lessing’s Hunger For Books by Sarah Low

Sarah Low — Fri, 01 Feb 2008 16:05:59 +0000

Lessing’s argument states that recent technological advances have caused the population to move away from learning and understanding which was so important during the days of print. She also argues that by specializing in only certain areas of subjects, we have limited ourselves and in return have lost valuable skills. Although her argument brings up good points, I want to point out that she contradicts herself. Throughout the print age and present day, people have always specialized in certain areas of subject like medicine, law, literature, history. This is because there is so much information, more now than ever before, and it is impossible for one person to know everything there is to know about the world. As specialization gets more and more specific, people can learn more about certain things that were never understood in past. For example, we are finding cures for diseases, taking expeditions to mars via robots, and discovering ways to manipulate DNA. By approaching the matter of technology in this manner, I see television and the internet as a positive influence in the lives of everyone today. Furthermore, we have the option to choose what information we want to know opposed to only learning about what a few newspapers or print sources say about a few subjects. Today, people can go online and research ultimately anything. This was not available in the days of print, so I argue that Lessing is ignoring all of the advancements to knowledge and learning that technology has provided society.

Comment on Lessing’s Hunger For Books by Amber Orebaugh

Amber Orebaugh — Fri, 01 Feb 2008 15:44:02 +0000

I believe that the internet has a great influence on today’s society in a sense that it has ‘dumbed’ down our knowledge in some fields, but gained in others. We do not need to know everything about geography because the internet is right there to give us our information that we need. For example, map quest. But we have gained in other knowledge. Without the use of technology, surgery, prosthetic limbs, eye sight, medicine, and other things would not be where they are today. If technology is affected our intelligence in a negative way, then how come we still are inventing new things that is making lives easier and giving others a chance to experience life and freedom? The generation before us would have never dreamed of the things we are inventing now and coming up with. I think our knowledge now and the knowledge back then are on opposite ends. More important subjects are needed for today’s world. For example, my mom was watching me one day do some math homework in high school and was amazed in what I was doing and said they never had to learn anything like that in school. The need for mathematics are astronomical. There is a lot of math in everything we do now. I can sort of see where they are coming from though. I see the generation after me, and I can’t believe what all they are doing. The video games and tv shows are ridiculously violent and morbid now days for the younger audience and pregnancy rates are increasing for this age as well. The internet has a lot of information on anything and it is easy for young minds to be curious and go explore what things really mean. Parents used to get away with the stork brought babies into the world, but since the knowledge is at the young one’s finger tips, parents can no longer say things like that. Just like the older generation frowns upon us, we frown upon the younger generation, although I think it is not technology necessarily, but what the idea of entertainment is coming to.

Comment on Lessing’s Hunger For Books by Hannah Harvey

Hannah Harvey — Fri, 01 Feb 2008 05:35:40 +0000

Lessing’s acceptance speech presents her viewpoint in a very emotionally appealing way. Any individual who lives in better conditions than those people in Zimbabwe are drawn to respond with a shocking reality of the negligence they take part in towards their readily available books(knowledge). Any experienced and educated public speaker knows that presenting information tied to your listeners emotions is a good technique to swing them to your side. With her heart felt stories, Doris Lessing probably knew what she was doing. Now the question stands, is her side really worth sticking with? Although Lessing’s point on today’s generation’s lack of a “hunger for books” is mostly valid, I agree with John Connell in that this shift that lessened the want to learn is probably more so “a reflection of major shifts in social, political and economic realities.” Sure chat rooms, blogging, and web surfing distract us from print based information but many forms of temptation has existed for many years to take us away from the “Golden Age.” Just because we are in the “Information Age” dominated by the Internet, and T.V., does not mean these recent technological advances are the sole cause of division from printed material. “Culture shapes technology”, not the other way around. We live in a different culture in today’s world. Our culture has made a need for faster systems of simpler information, just like past culture’s made a need for the printing press, or radio. Both sides of the spectrum include necessary information to ponder on. Determining which is MORE truthful is hard to say. All in all, Lessing made a great effort to present her view of technological determinism, but the real truth behind the spectrums, lies in the audience’s ability to look past her heart tugging story.

Comment on Lessing’s Hunger For Books by Jamie Small

Jamie Small — Fri, 01 Feb 2008 05:00:10 +0000

The debate over the supposed downfall of the intellectual capabilities of my generation have been greatly overestimated. We have simply grown up in a more technologically advances society that stresses the importance of technology. There are multiple forms of intelligence and particular forms of it characterize a decade. Our generation is characterized by the computer and the internet.

The “hunger for books” that is addressed is not dead. It may have been lessened due to the internet, but it is certainly not dead. The internet has allowed global awareness and accessibility. Information can be shared around the planet. Everything is easily accessibly, easy to find and easy to summarize. The internet is not to blame for the lack of interest in reading books. Entire books, encyclopedias and poems are available on the internet. Reading itself is not the issue.

Fostering the importance of reading lies with our educational values and upbringing. My parents emphasized the simple need to read. To read books and the newspaper are essential to being informed. However, all the information that is available in print is easily and equally found on the internet. The internet is about information being a click away. Books, and more importantly, knowledge are simply a click away.

Comment on Lessing’s Hunger For Books by Andrea Dominguez

Andrea Dominguez — Fri, 01 Feb 2008 04:49:44 +0000

Times have changed a lot since the day reading was seen as a privilege rather than a chore in our society. Whether or not the advances in technology molded our culture in this manner is hard to say, especially when I have never experienced a day when technology wasn’t constantly advancing. I believe it is a mutual effect; however, in this case I would agree most with Connell. I believe that our culture wants quicker news, more free time, better information and as a result, technology molded in that direction. It is inevitable that a society that has little to nothing, such as the one in Zimbabwe, will want something they don’t have. This is where I agree with Lessing. The literature they have the less they hunger for it, just like any other necessity. We no longer have children who “hunger for knowledge” because it is ingrained as part of their everyday lives. They, thus, have the opportunity to expand and do extracurricular activities that help them grow in a different way. No longer do they hunger literature, but they hunger a privilege society didn’t have before….free time.

Comment on Lessing’s Hunger For Books by Alex Perryman

Alex Perryman — Fri, 01 Feb 2008 03:53:02 +0000

Lessing’s argument is an interesting one, however i strongly agree with Alyse, when she says that the internet is incredible when it comes to the information available. You can search for information about anyone or anything. Lessing’s argument almost reminds me of a little old lady who doesn’t know how to use new technology and instead of taking time to learn what a gift it can be to our culture, she just criticizes it. You can make an argument that new media has taken away from literature, but again i agree with Alyse, if you like to read for fun, you will find time to read for fun. I admit i spend quite a lot of time online, whether it be for school or pleasure, I still make time to read for pleasure. I would still read the same amount whether i had internet or not because I read when I want to read, i would find other things to do if the technological medium was absent. Ultimately, again i agree with Alyse, it is about self control as is anything in life, even with literature. You have other responsibilities, and couldn’t read all day long if technology was absent. I would still have other things to do and i would have to exhibit self control when reading.

Comment on Lessing’s Hunger For Books by Samantha Hayes

Samantha Hayes — Fri, 01 Feb 2008 03:32:02 +0000

I guess it is easy to see both sides of this argument but of course, being part of the generation of all of these amazing technological advances, I am a little biased. I can see Lessing’s point about people depending more on the internet other than books but isn’t that understandable. The internet provides a wide variety of activities and opportunities for learning. Yes, the internet does have a lot of distractions that people find entertaining and end up spending their days surfing the web, but that doesn’t mean the opportunity for learning is not there. It is the person’s responsibility to use the internet to find what they need to in order to expand their knowledge. It is on the person if they choose to play internet games over looking up something useful for their own education. It’s their choice. The internet is overflowing with information and it makes it very simple to get a hold of. I admit that I would much rather type in a few key words to find what I am looking for than going through row after row of books looking for the right one hoping that it will be there. On the internet, you can go straight to what you need within the text saving time. Lessing does put her argument very eloquently but she is also biased towards, what she grew up with, print. She is from the “Golden Age of Print” whereas we have grown up with technology. Times have changed and it will keep doing so. The internet is too far set into this generation that I don’t see it going anywhere. It can only get faster, better, and more convenient.

Comment on Lessing’s Hunger For Books by Alyse Lasley

Alyse Lasley — Fri, 01 Feb 2008 03:02:14 +0000

What so many of these people discout is the incredible amount of resources that are on the internet. In a matter of minutes, you can find the definition to a word, the statistics of a country from the cia, or even your friend’s telephone number. They also tend to forget the books that are just leisure reading. Who of these people will boast of the wonderful nature of print while standing next to a stack of Harlequin Romances? Of course, TCU bookstore has a wealth of information on it’s stacks, but it also has comic books, vampire novels, romance novels etc. I am not opposed to these books, I only believe that they should all be taken in with self-control. The same should be applied to chat rooms, facebook, and blogging. There is a reason we are called the “Information Age”; people, teens and young adults especially, are flooded with facts, figures, statistics, and names every minute. There are advantages to both mediums as well as drawbacks and self control is the key to getting the best out of each source.

Comment on Lessing’s Hunger For Books by Rachel Holt

Rachel Holt — Thu, 31 Jan 2008 23:39:19 +0000

It would be great if we all still lived our lives like “Leave it to Beaver.” Where all the houses had white picket fences, the wives wore pearls, the husbands were never late for dinner, and the kids rode bikes and read books. But life changes, constantly. I understand how Lessing’s views as a writer are not the same as someone who is 20 and uses the internet on a daily basis, but the advances that have been made in technology are fascinating. Why would she want people to stop the world from moving forward? Don’t get me wrong I love books and I try to read as often as possible; which unfortunately is just on vacations. But I agree with John Connell, WE determine how far technology can go. So like I said, why slow it down? I can see how there are certain wastes of the internet and television, such as on line gaming and how people just “watch TV” not necessarily for any such purpose. But these are luxuries that my generation has grown up with, and no one’s opinion is going to be swayed by an 88 year old woman, no matter how brilliant, who most likely doesn’t fully understand all the capabilities of internet and gets confused by the computer or even something such as the remote control, which we find so simple.