If men learn this, it will implant forgetfulness in their souls; they will cease to exercise memory because they rely on that which is written, calling things to remembrance no longer from within themselves, but by means of external marks. What you have discovered is a recipe not for memory, but for reminder. And it is no true wisdom that you offer your disciples, but only its semblance, for by telling them of many things without teaching them you will make them seem to know much, while for the most part they know nothing, and as men filled, not with wisdom, but with the conceit of wisdom, they will be a burden to their fellows.
-- Socrates, in Plato’s Phaedrus, circa 370 BCE, bemoaning the deleterious effects of the new technology of “writing”.
I dunno. What good exactly did memorizing texts and dialogues do? The practice seems to survive these days in generally bad contexts—madrassas where the main curriculum is memorizing the Koran and the hadiths, for example. (And in general, memorization seems to go hand in hand with fanaticism.)
My guess is that Socrates was more advocating that his students internalize the concepts he was teaching (and philosophy more generally). Then again, I think he’s identifying a problem with all wisdom received and not discovered.
One historical view of what was going on there is that much of the interesting stuff going on during Plato’s time was due to the intersection of ‘oral culture’ and ‘print culture’. Eric Havelock and Marshall McLuhan, in particular, wrote about that—I don’t have a good online reference though.
For a view of memory and literacy in mediaeval Europe, see Mary Carruthers’ works. A fundamental skill at that time, for the scholarly, was the use of books to furnish one’s mind with ideas to be called forth at will, and the living work held in one’s head was, despite Socrates’ gloomy prediction, still considered superior to the mere written text.
From a later time, here is Francis Bacon:
Reading maketh a full man; conference a ready man; and writing an exact man.
Circumstances have changed, but the thread running through all of these still applies. Knowing only where to look things up is like trying to speak a language from a dictionary instead of learning the vocabulary.
Yeah, basically the “5 classics” and whatever else they felt was important at the time. Not necessarily reciting, though. Often it was being locked in a box for an extended period, expected to transcribe whole passages perfectly from memory.
-- Socrates, in Plato’s Phaedrus, circa 370 BCE, bemoaning the deleterious effects of the new technology of “writing”.
And he was right, too.
I knew that granting the human race the power of psychometric tracery would lead to no good!
I dunno. What good exactly did memorizing texts and dialogues do? The practice seems to survive these days in generally bad contexts—madrassas where the main curriculum is memorizing the Koran and the hadiths, for example. (And in general, memorization seems to go hand in hand with fanaticism.)
My guess is that Socrates was more advocating that his students internalize the concepts he was teaching (and philosophy more generally). Then again, I think he’s identifying a problem with all wisdom received and not discovered.
One historical view of what was going on there is that much of the interesting stuff going on during Plato’s time was due to the intersection of ‘oral culture’ and ‘print culture’. Eric Havelock and Marshall McLuhan, in particular, wrote about that—I don’t have a good online reference though.
I have a short blog post mentioning it here.
EDIT: Fixed link. HT CronoDAS
For a view of memory and literacy in mediaeval Europe, see Mary Carruthers’ works. A fundamental skill at that time, for the scholarly, was the use of books to furnish one’s mind with ideas to be called forth at will, and the living work held in one’s head was, despite Socrates’ gloomy prediction, still considered superior to the mere written text.
From a later time, here is Francis Bacon: Reading maketh a full man; conference a ready man; and writing an exact man.
Circumstances have changed, but the thread running through all of these still applies. Knowing only where to look things up is like trying to speak a language from a dictionary instead of learning the vocabulary.
Fixed your last link for you.
Or the Chinese civil service exam that consisted of reciting (IIRC) the Book of Songs, the Confucian Analects, and a few other things, from memory.
Yeah, basically the “5 classics” and whatever else they felt was important at the time. Not necessarily reciting, though. Often it was being locked in a box for an extended period, expected to transcribe whole passages perfectly from memory.
ETA: Wikipedia link