The tyranny of overuse of tyranny in headlines.
And with bad spelling ("tirrany").
It fits here, though. In an oral tradition, why would you worry about spelling?
The Tyrrany of Literacy. On oral tradition and what is lost
51–59 of 59 posts
Re: The Tyrrany of Literacy. On oral tradition and what is lost
#52Earlier quoted context omitted.
Of course they can, why not? The example in the article is really good and perfectly believable. People at that time would wander around a lot in their everyday life, and it would be very easy to remember these small stories which are connected to the landscape. A father would tell his son when they were walking past this feature of the landscape, and the son would later tell his son and so on. Why? Because they didn…
Because of the game of Telephone. Humans aren't capable of repeating stories without permutation.
That applies to the written word as well. You can never guarantee that your modern understanding of what a word means is the same as what the original writer meant.
Re: The Tyrrany of Literacy. On oral tradition and what is lost
#53In this thread: many people missing the points being made in the article. >The ‘tyranny of literacy’ makes us sceptical of knowledge being retained in oral societies for such a long time This is actually not what I thought this would be about from the headline: I thought someone would pull the Plato quote from Phaedrus about how literacy was inferior because it forced us to engage with views from dead men who were no…
I can name exactly one living human being who has memorized Beowulf. 1200 years ago that number was undoubtedly greater. Not as relevant today, you say? OK, name someone who has memorized a work of similar length. So, I agree with you. That kind of "long-read" memorization is no longer appreciated and cultivated, and I have no doubt it impacts our brains differently than watching a YT video.
There are a bunch of people who memorize digits of pi now. These kinds of memorization feats are just status seeking showoffs. Why should imagine the brains of people a 1000 years ago were somehow different because they could memorize something I have no interest in?
Re: The Tyrrany of Literacy. On oral tradition and what is lost
#54Earlier quoted context omitted.
I can name exactly one living human being who has memorized Beowulf. 1200 years ago that number was undoubtedly greater. Not as relevant today, you say? OK, name someone who has memorized a work of similar length. So, I agree with you. That kind of "long-read" memorization is no longer appreciated and cultivated, and I have no doubt it impacts our brains differently than watching a YT video.
There are a bunch of people who memorize digits of pi now. These kinds of memorization feats are just status seeking showoffs. Why should imagine the brains of people a 1000 years ago were somehow different because they could memorize something I have no interest in?
> These kinds of memorization feats are just status seeking showoffs
If it feels this way it's only because 1) it's an optional skill in our society as it's currently constructed and 2) for pi specifically, once you get past 15 significant figures you're kinda wasting your effort anyways[0].
I mean, sure. Anyone can flaunt their excesses. But if the functioning of society depended on people memorizing pi, more people would do it and would be less likely to do it in a showoffy way.
> Why should imagine the brains of people a 1000 years ago were somehow different
Because, in the lifetimes of a bunch of people who hang around here, we've experienced in real time how reliance on search engines can alter our memory processes. It's not a reach at all to extrapolate that to the question of memorization vs. relying on books.
[0]: https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/edu/news/how-many-decimals-of-pi-do...
Re: The Tyrrany of Literacy. On oral tradition and what is lost
#55Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think this view is doing a bit of a disservice to the article and to the concept by looking at things a little too narrowly. The point is this is not about myths this is about reality -- valid oral records exist in the modern world that are not myths. Let's take a modern example. There is a place where the road to it's entrance has changed recently. It's been six months and Google Maps has still not updated the "wr…
> Big pharma is not incentivised to fund clinical studies on these type of plants since they'd rather create a synthetic form of whatever property of the plant is aiding the healing and patent that synthetic formula instead, so studies like these are not prioritized. This is a silly myth that "alternative medicine" advocates preach. Big pharma is completely incentivised to fund clinical studies, exactly so they can r…
>"Yeah, well, if you gather a few ounces of this wild plant and make a tea from it's roots, it's 90% likely to do the same thing as our pill."
You're distorting what I wrote it seems. I said "extracted oil" of the plant not "the roots of a few ounces". For essential oil you would need 100x or 200x of the plant or more depending on the plant to make the essential oil.
>Big pharma is completely incentivised to fund clinical studies, exactly so they can refine a form of the chemical(s) involved and patent them. Even field research into Archaea species is funded by this.
It's pretty evident I'm talking published research in my example. They are incentivized to conduct clinical studies internally on the plant extracts but they are not incentivized to publish that research if it's against their interests. My example would be nonsensical if they are randomly trying to mimic naturally existing compounds without researching first.
Re: The Tyrrany of Literacy. On oral tradition and what is lost
#56Earlier quoted context omitted.
Nobody has oral history from 7700 years ago.
Lol seen the homepage of the ABC? (Australian not American broadcaster).
I assume you're referring to this?https://www.abc.net.au/news/deeptime/
Re: The Tyrrany of Literacy. On oral tradition and what is lost
#57Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Big pharma is not incentivised to fund clinical studies on these type of plants since they'd rather create a synthetic form of whatever property of the plant is aiding the healing and patent that synthetic formula instead, so studies like these are not prioritized. This is a silly myth that "alternative medicine" advocates preach. Big pharma is completely incentivised to fund clinical studies, exactly so they can r…
>"Yeah, well, if you gather a few ounces of this wild plant and make a tea from it's roots, it's 90% likely to do the same thing as our pill." You're distorting what I wrote it seems. I said "extracted oil" of the plant not "the roots of a few ounces". For essential oil you would need 100x or 200x of the plant or more depending on the plant to make the essential oil. >Big pharma is completely incentivised to fund cli…
> It's pretty evident I'm talking published research in my example.
It may have been in your head, but it was not at all evident in your words.
Re: The Tyrrany of Literacy. On oral tradition and what is lost
#58The oral tradition is not lost, it just evolved to suit the times; urban legends and creepy pasta just have a lot more relevance. Literacy created the written tradition, moved writing past being just a medium for storage and transmission and moved the word beyond the limitations of speech. What really killed the oral tradition (in the sense TFA means) is technology, the ability to reproduce without error and the idea…
I think this view is doing a bit of a disservice to the article and to the concept by looking at things a little too narrowly. The point is this is not about myths this is about reality -- valid oral records exist in the modern world that are not myths. Let's take a modern example. There is a place where the road to it's entrance has changed recently. It's been six months and Google Maps has still not updated the "wr…
My point was not about myths either. Literacy created a new tradition, it did not replace the old. The oral tradition will be with us for as long as people can communicate. Also the idea of a myth having no connection to reality is rather narrow especially in context of the oral tradition where myth and mythology often carried everything a well rounded person needed to know to get by in life, things like what plants can cure various ailments and the law.
Re: The Tyrrany of Literacy. On oral tradition and what is lost
#59The Jivaro of Peru ruse up against their Spanish oppressors. Apparently the Spanish governor of the region was very hungry for gold. He got a bit pushy torturing and killing to get compliance. The tribes banded together, took his fort, melted the gold he had demanded and poured it down his throat.
The written record was preserved some couple hundred years later (I seem to recall a priest was present for the confrontation took notes and drew pictures). The oral history in the tribe had lost it.
Cool story, lost because that tribe has a tradition of blood feuds which causes oral traditions to be interrupted.
My point is that oral tradition requires an unbroken chain and events often conspire to break generational tradition.
The written word is a hedge against the loss of oral history. There’s nothing to say we couldn’t have both.