"We’re tl;dr’ing what we should be r’ing in full, if we even r at all. We are collectively outsourcing writing and foregoing deep reading, both of which are, when judiciously applied, prime tools to develop empathy, personality, and critical thinking skills."
Agree completely.
I would never subscribe to services that summarize books/articles for you. It's like the difference between fast food and healthy food. Reading books the old way makes your brain work, instead of having the summary prepared for you.
So if the Sumatran orangutans embed more than three levels of recursion into their calls, do they cause a stack overflow?
Given how much of our minds work around language, I'm not surprised that so many of our society's problems have been linked to the overall declining use of our linguistic abilities. It's also no surprise to me that the solution is so simple: write, read, speak, and listen more.
However, it doesn't seem that we're reading less overall, but what we are reading is much more fragmented and disordered. Books effectively being replaced by the likes of Twitter and Facebook, and later others like TikTok have really wreaked havoc on our ability to use language, especially in a focused and sustained manner. Overuse of emojis seems to be another symptom of this problem. Cue the jokes about Egyptian hieroglyphs. That's why I'm glad that the likes of Substack exist to help counteract this trend, at least for the relatively few people who still care.
This does raise a question though: may orangutans and other animals eventually evolve more advanced languages than us humans sometime in the distant (or not so distant) future? Would this be compounded by the apparent regression of our own linguistic abilities?
Very nice work putting this article together, which ironically helps combat the aforementioned linguistic decline.
Great point in that it's not so much the overall quantity of the reading, but the format/style. Sustained focus and complexity are key, I think.
On the evolution of advanced animal language, I see (at least) two big hurdles: open-endedness and counterfactuals/hypotheticals. As far as we know (for now) that's something that seems to be uniquely human, and it's hard to say what gave rise to those. It could be the case of cognitive complexity co-evolving with language. But who knows...
I have always been, and still am, a voracious reader. Before we were old enough for kindergarten, my parents used to read to both me and my younger sister. They made no effort to *teach* us how to read. They wanted us to be hungry to learn it in school. Which we were. Sis is a voracious reader as well. One of the best ways ever to expand your mind and experience new things!
Agh good stuff! I'm gonna have to copy-paste that orangutan part for my 19yo son who recently told me how excited he was to learn about orangutans, changing his degree at college to potentially be able to study them.
And reading. Sigh. So few people read. I read to my kids every night, first one kid, then the next, then the youngest two together. Took about two hours each night, time I cherished. Read to my oldest until he was 17! Such good memories, such good shared time together.
"We’re tl;dr’ing what we should be r’ing in full, if we even r at all. We are collectively outsourcing writing and foregoing deep reading, both of which are, when judiciously applied, prime tools to develop empathy, personality, and critical thinking skills."
Agree completely.
I would never subscribe to services that summarize books/articles for you. It's like the difference between fast food and healthy food. Reading books the old way makes your brain work, instead of having the summary prepared for you.
Thanks, Rajendra!
The analogy with junk and healthy food is so on point.
So if the Sumatran orangutans embed more than three levels of recursion into their calls, do they cause a stack overflow?
Given how much of our minds work around language, I'm not surprised that so many of our society's problems have been linked to the overall declining use of our linguistic abilities. It's also no surprise to me that the solution is so simple: write, read, speak, and listen more.
However, it doesn't seem that we're reading less overall, but what we are reading is much more fragmented and disordered. Books effectively being replaced by the likes of Twitter and Facebook, and later others like TikTok have really wreaked havoc on our ability to use language, especially in a focused and sustained manner. Overuse of emojis seems to be another symptom of this problem. Cue the jokes about Egyptian hieroglyphs. That's why I'm glad that the likes of Substack exist to help counteract this trend, at least for the relatively few people who still care.
This does raise a question though: may orangutans and other animals eventually evolve more advanced languages than us humans sometime in the distant (or not so distant) future? Would this be compounded by the apparent regression of our own linguistic abilities?
Very nice work putting this article together, which ironically helps combat the aforementioned linguistic decline.
Thanks, Michael!
Great point in that it's not so much the overall quantity of the reading, but the format/style. Sustained focus and complexity are key, I think.
On the evolution of advanced animal language, I see (at least) two big hurdles: open-endedness and counterfactuals/hypotheticals. As far as we know (for now) that's something that seems to be uniquely human, and it's hard to say what gave rise to those. It could be the case of cognitive complexity co-evolving with language. But who knows...
I have always been, and still am, a voracious reader. Before we were old enough for kindergarten, my parents used to read to both me and my younger sister. They made no effort to *teach* us how to read. They wanted us to be hungry to learn it in school. Which we were. Sis is a voracious reader as well. One of the best ways ever to expand your mind and experience new things!
It's a lifelong gift that keeps giving, indeed.
Agh good stuff! I'm gonna have to copy-paste that orangutan part for my 19yo son who recently told me how excited he was to learn about orangutans, changing his degree at college to potentially be able to study them.
And reading. Sigh. So few people read. I read to my kids every night, first one kid, then the next, then the youngest two together. Took about two hours each night, time I cherished. Read to my oldest until he was 17! Such good memories, such good shared time together.
Orangutans are amazing! Good luck to your son.
And it's so good to hear that you read to your kids so consistently, Shannon.