Print is dead… or so we’ve been told by those in the media. But is this even remotely true? And if so, what sort of implications does this inevitability have for Christians? Should we do something to stop it? This week, Rich discusses these issues with guest-host Phillip Buchan, avid reader and overall brilliant guy.
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Pop Culture is everywhere. We just acknowledge it. Christ and Pop Culture is an attempt to discuss and think rightly about the common knowledge of our age. 
I actually really enjoy reading my ESV on a digital medium and find it very easy. In fact for a couple of weeks now I have been doing my devotionals on one of these devices and haven’t had any trouble.
Not to be overly critical but it does feel a bit asinine to say that a book and a digital form of that book are so extremely different because one can “put a pencil in it to mark your place and flip back to the endnotes.”
I think the position that the object is material and therefore requires and a different level of interaction is interesting, in theory, but if this is as concrete an explanation we can get of that interaction it’s kind of silly. Take that for what it’s worth: one man’s humble opinion.
David, the fact that books have pages rather than hyperlinks isn’t an “explanation” of how print and digital media differ — it’s merely one of many examples. A lot of little differences like that experienced over a long period of time produces different habits of mind.
Here’s an analogy: when I tutored high school students in math, the students who worked out problems with pencil and paper thought much differently than the ones who did even the simplest of arithmetic problems with a calculator. Each performed better on different types of tests. I can’t explain how it worked, but I could notice a difference. I’m sure technology/methodology wasn’t the only factor, but it was a part of the whole picture of how a student learned and performed.
Phillip,
Again in theory I find the princple interesting, and it certainly sounds like it should be true…I am just not sure it is. I appreciate the analogy, but the difference there seems to be doing the thinking versus allowing the machine to do the thinking for you. It’s a clear difference from reading which can be done with or without thought regardless of the medium. I am not sure how hyperlinked text makes as profound a difference on the reader as basic material print. The distinction doesn’t seem legitimate in my mind, it appears to me more like one of those statements that many book junkies think should be true but just isn’t.
I’m with David here. I am a book eater. I adore books. I would say a life without books is an impoverished life. At minimum, I read for an hour each day. For pleasure. Some days five or more.
I recognize no substantial difference between reading on paper and reading on a mobile device (such as my Kindle). The difference is so negligible to me that I consider Kindles and Nooks and Sony eReaders and Opuses to be print.
To say that reading an page delivered digitally alters the experience is like saying reading in a park alters the reading experience from reading in a library or coffee shop or bed or on a toilet or on a bus while walking to work. Of course the experience is different.
Only not fundamentally so.
Reading on a Kindle does make things like highlighting text, note-taking, and finding passages much easier for me, but I don’t consider those to be primary to the experience of reading in any case. Reading is engagement with the delivered text and—if anything—reading on a device like a Kindle renders that purer experience. No longer do I have a book jacket and font-face assaulting me with their own readings of the text.
Sometimes I think of The Dane as I’ve heard that others think of Christopher Hitchens: when he’s on your side you feel like you can’t lose an argument, but when he’s in opposition you just want to surrender!
David and Dane,
I can’t speak for Phillip, but I agree with him about the difference between electronic media and print. But the difference doesn’t seem to be between books and the Kindle, which has as it’s goal the same reading experience rendered digitally. I think you’re right to say that the differences are not fundamental. But when you consider the difference between reading searchable and hyperlinked texts, the experience is vastly different.
Reading from a book or an e-reader renders you an essentially passive participant. The writer creates an experience for you, setting the pace, order, and duration. You expect and are expected to read through the text as the author intended.
But reading searchable and linked texts encourages skipping around, following your own line of inquiry, rather than the writers, or simply finding the nugget you want and mining it without any need to consider its context. It encourages a vastly different pattern of thought.
The immediately apparent result is that the medium changes the habits of the reader, which influences the nature of the content. The type of writing found on blogs is different from other forms, and that is largely due to the habits of readers, which is, in turn, largely due to the medium.
This isn’t about book vs. e-book, but about the differences between a crafted, linear experience, and an open-ended, “build-your-own” experience.