Each semester, as I introduce myself and the Schwartz Institute to new students, I talk briefly about our philosophy and the importance of communication in all disciplines. I also think about how political and empowering it is to teach communication. Socrates believed that: “to become eloquent is to activate one’s humanity, to apply the imagination, and to solve the practical problems of human living.” We at the Institute stress the Holy Trinity of the written, oral and computer-mediated communication.
But Socrates believed (or maybe he just liked to postulate…) that the young should not learn how to read until they learn to prove, analyze and internalize knowledge (leading them ultimately to posses wisdom and virtue). Literacy would undercut that effort by allowing students to merely decode information, without the necessary skill of internalizing it.
Cognitive neuroscientist, Maryanne Wolf, thinks that Socrates’ concerns warrant a second look as we enter a historical transition in prevalent modes of communication.
She writes (“Socrates’ nightmare”, The Boston Globe, September 6, 2007) about “the plight of the reading brain as it encounters this technologically rich society.” She argues that literacy - as a “miracle” and a skill that transformed the neural circuitry of the brain and the intellectual development of the species - is threatened. This is supposedly “a consequence of the transition to a digital epoch that is affecting every aspect of our lives, including the intellectual development of each new reader.” From the neuroscience vintage point, there is apparently not enough research to answer the questions: Will the students become so accustomed to immediate access to escalating on-screen information that they will fail to probe beyond the information given to the deeper layers of insight, imagination and knowledge that have led us to this stage of human thought? Or, will the new demands of information technologies to multitask, integrate and prioritize vast amounts of information help to develop equally, if not more valuable, skills that will increase human intellectual capacities, quality of life and collective wisdom as a species?” Brain research shows that learning to read (a skill by no means natural to our species) may help us “to go beyond the decoded text to think new thoughts of our own.”
But, would Socrates argue that we should forbid the use of technology until the students learn to be critical thinkers? C’mon, don’t tell me that you are not just a tiny bit tempted by this idea, especially when you receive an email from one of your students, sent via a Blackberry and filled with symbols and emoticons.
Could it be that we confuse means with ends?
As I was preparing for the sixth annual symposium I wondered why we communicate. My conclusion was we do it 1.) to be polite, 2.) to attract attention, 3.) to inform, and 4.) to prompt action.
Shouldn't we, therefore, be more concerned about producing the desired outcome than about the means? Isn't it sufficient if "symbols and emoticons" are effective and efficient in producing the desired outcome? I note, in passing, that symbols have a much deeper and richer communications history than does the language I'm using to write this reply.
The equivalent of symbols and emoticons enter our communication every day. Think of the jargon associated with various professions.
The crux of Agnieszka's post, it seems to me, is the role of communications in critical thinking. I'm reminded here of the following from John Andrew Holmes.
"Speech is conveniently located midway between thought and action, where it often substitutes for both."
I interpret Holmes use of the word "speech" as representing communications of any kind.
We increasingly need to get from thought to action in shorter and shorter amounts of time in order to cope with the increasing pace of unpredictable change in the world around us. If "symbols and emoticons" help us do that, so be it. And if "symbols and emoticons" help us sense and interpret the world around us better than the language I'm using to write this reply, so be it.
My sense is that communications, in all its various forms, has changed through time to meet the demands of the time. And that communications has been an essential enabler of patterns of thought that have also changed through time to meet the demands of the time. Or maybe it's been the other way around. Or maybe communications and critical thinking alternate as drivers of progress and as "first responders" to the demands of the times.
Anyway, I think I'll stop now and read a good book.