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Reading. It's bad for you.
Feb. 17th, 2010 12:09 pmAt the Egyptian city of Naucratis, there was a famous old god, whose name was Theuth... and he was the inventor of many arts, such as arithmetic and calculation and geometry and astronomy and draughts and dice, but his great discovery was the use of letters.
In those days, the god Thamus was the king of the whole country.
To him came Theuth and showed his inventions, desiring that the other Egyptians might be allowed to have the benefit of them; he enumerated them, and Thamus enquired about their several uses, and praised some of them and censured others, as he approved or disapproved of them.
It would take a long time to repeat all that Thamus said to Theuth in praise or blame of the various arts.
But when they came to letters, "This," said Theuth, "will make the Egyptians wiser and give them better memories; it is a specific both for the memory and for the wit."
Thamus replied: "O most ingenious Theuth, the parent or inventor of an art is not always the best judge of the utility or inutility of his own inventions to the users of them. And in this instance, you who are the father of letters, from a paternal love of your own children have been led to attribute to them a quality which they cannot have; for this discovery of yours will create forgetfulness in the learners' souls, because they will not use their memories; they will trust to the external written characters and not remember of themselves."
- Plato, "Phaedrus"
In those days, the god Thamus was the king of the whole country.
To him came Theuth and showed his inventions, desiring that the other Egyptians might be allowed to have the benefit of them; he enumerated them, and Thamus enquired about their several uses, and praised some of them and censured others, as he approved or disapproved of them.
It would take a long time to repeat all that Thamus said to Theuth in praise or blame of the various arts.
But when they came to letters, "This," said Theuth, "will make the Egyptians wiser and give them better memories; it is a specific both for the memory and for the wit."
Thamus replied: "O most ingenious Theuth, the parent or inventor of an art is not always the best judge of the utility or inutility of his own inventions to the users of them. And in this instance, you who are the father of letters, from a paternal love of your own children have been led to attribute to them a quality which they cannot have; for this discovery of yours will create forgetfulness in the learners' souls, because they will not use their memories; they will trust to the external written characters and not remember of themselves."
- Plato, "Phaedrus"
