RE: [gutvol-d] Perfection
----- Original Message ----- From: "Her Serene Highness" <mbuch@mcsp.com>
You don't have to believe me. Just find this quote. It's from The Koran. "And thou takest vengeance on us only because we have believed on the signs of our Lord when they came to us. Lord! pour out constancy upon us, and cause us to die Muslims." It's in Sura VII. I have no doubt that you'll find it- but it will take you quite a while to do so with no page numbers and no way to go to each section separately.
Not trying to be a smart-### here, but I tried your example. Time to open PG's website and search for Koran... ~25 seconds. Clicked on the Koran link, it downloaded quickly (thanks to a T1 here at work! ;) ~ 5 seconds. Control-F, paste in the first four words from your quote ("And thou takest vengeance), hit return ... first hit was the right one. 5 seconds at most. Total time from reading your paragraph to reading the passage from the Koran... 35 seconds. This is why electronic citation is so much BETTER. I someone points me to the file they cited from, a quick search will turn it up in seconds and opposed to finding the book, flipping to the page and skimming down through the text to find the quote material. And just so you know I did find the material in the Koran... I will surely cut off your hands and feet on opposite sides; then will I have you all crucified." They said, "Verily, to our Lord do we return; And thou takest vengeance on us only because we have believed on the signs of our Lord when they came to us. Lord! pour out constancy upon us, and cause us to die Muslims." Then said the chiefs of Pharaoh's people-"Wilt thou let Moses and his people go to spread disorders in our land, and desert thee and thy gods?" He said, "We will cause their male children to be slain and preserve their females alive: and verily we shall be masters over them." **** Ah, the oneness of religion! Christianity is built upon the foundation of Judaism ... Islam references both ... Yet religious reasons are giving for so much fighting. Josh
This is why electronic citation is so much BETTER. I someone points me to the file they cited from, a quick search will turn it up in seconds and opposed to finding the book, flipping to the page and skimming down through the text to find the quote material.
this is a dangerous reliance on a transitory medium. electronic citation is merely more convenient. --kris
kris foster wrote:
this is a dangerous reliance on a transitory medium. electronic citation is merely more convenient.
What makes medium permanence a value per se ? Academia has developed its traditions around a medium (papyrus, paper) that is permanent. Not the other way around. If the medium they had used was impermanent the methods and traditions of Academia would be different today. Medium permanence can be a big disadvantage too. The scholars in the middle ages relied blindly on Aristotle. Scientific method in the middle ages amounted to find out what Aristotle said about some subject, and that was that. Own research was not deemed a scientific method. Of course, Aristotle said that "wood swims and metal sinks" and that "heavier items fall faster than lighter ones". -- Marcello Perathoner webmaster@gutenberg.org
On Sat, 13 Nov 2004, Marcello Perathoner wrote:
kris foster wrote:
this is a dangerous reliance on a transitory medium. electronic citation is merely more convenient.
What makes medium permanence a value per se ?
Academia has developed its traditions around a medium (papyrus, paper) that is permanent. Not the other way around. If the medium they had used was impermanent the methods and traditions of Academia would be different today.
If you visit any library archive, you might be surprised at the preservations problems they are having on an ever increasing level. A decade or so ago, the Library of Congress just completely gave up on trying to keep much of their newspaper collection, and decided to microfilm what they could and to sell off the rest of those archives before they completely fell apart. I bought several volumes from about a century ago, of the New York Herald, just so I could have an additional perspective on the era. Of course, much of the most interesting parts wouldn't be referenced, as they are advertizing. . .such as the first New York apartments that included cooking facilities. Michael
What makes medium permanence a value per se ?
(I agree with the remainder of your reply) My argument is that the transience in electronic media is more deep than that of books (hopefully it's safe to leave stone tablets out of this). Beyond bit rot or pages fading, ebooks can be altered more easily than books both intentionally and unintentionally. The source of the texts, GP mirrors and publishers, perish yet only a publisher's book remains. And to be a little silly, the internet has shown it can survive for several decades, books have been proven for hundreds of years. It was demonstrated in the message I replied to how quickly and easily ebooks can be used to find quotations. An electronic citation then becomes little more than a convenience and an advertisement, which will likely have a shorter life span than the paper itself. Are people ready to put their academic necks on the line? To be constructive, how are the GP mirrors monitored to ensure consistency today? --kris
Academia has developed its traditions around a medium (papyrus, paper) that is permanent. Not the other way around. If the medium they had used was impermanent the methods and traditions of Academia would be different today.
Medium permanence can be a big disadvantage too. The scholars in the middle ages relied blindly on Aristotle. Scientific method in the middle ages amounted to find out what Aristotle said about some subject, and that was that. Own research was not deemed a scientific method.
Of course, Aristotle said that "wood swims and metal sinks" and that "heavier items fall faster than lighter ones".
-- Marcello Perathoner webmaster@gutenberg.org
_______________________________________________ gutvol-d mailing list gutvol-d@lists.pglaf.org http://lists.pglaf.org/listinfo.cgi/gutvol-d
participants (4)
-
Joshua Hutchinson -
kris foster -
Marcello Perathoner -
Michael Hart