thought

TRX
January 21, 2013
204:
@154:
no evidence for people be able to read 1200 wpm and comprehend it,
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During the standardized-testing craze in the American school system, I clocked 950 wpm in officially-administered tests, reading and passing the exams. More than once.

*However*, when I was 15 years old, I had few preconceptions or data structures; I could vacuum down huge amounts of information as it was presented.

As I've gotten older, my reading speed has dropped considerably. I'd estimate to less than 200 wpm. And the more interesting the text, the slower I get. The more I already know about the subject, the slower I get. Because now I'm no longer accepting the presentation as-is; everything has to go through multiple critical filters. Is this true? How does it square with what I've read before? If it's different, how does that affect other things that are based on it? Even reading fiction, I'm liable to be doing something similar. There are times when my reading speed drops to zero for lengthy periods as I go off thinking about what I've read so far.

Some years ago I came across this quote from [self-redacted in recognition of Godwin's Law]. The James Murphy translation, btw, if you decide to look it up for yourself. It is a bit windy, but apt:

"I know people who read interminably, book after book, from page to page, and yet I should not call them 'well-read people'. Of course they 'know' an immense amount; but their brain seems incapable of assorting and classifying the material which they have gathered from books. They have not the faculty of distinguishing between what is useful and useless in a book; so that they may retain the former in their minds and if possible skip over the latter while reading it, if that be not possible, then--when once read--throw it overboard as useless ballast. Reading is not an end in itself, but a means to an end. Its chief purpose is to help towards filling in the framework which is made up of the talents and capabilities that each individual possesses. Thus each one procures for himself the implements and materials necessary for the fulfilment of his calling in life, no matter whether this be the elementary task of earning one's daily bread or a calling that responds to higher human aspirations. Such is the first purpose of reading. And the second purpose is to give a general knowledge of the world in which we live. In both cases, however, the material which one has acquired through reading must not be stored up in the memory on a plan that corresponds to the successive chapters of the book; but each little piece of knowledge thus gained must be treated as if it were a little stone to be inserted into a mosaic, so that it finds its proper place among all the other pieces and particles that help to form a general world-picture in the brain of the reader. Otherwise only a confused jumble of chaotic notions will result from all this reading. That jumble is not merely useless, but it also tends to make the unfortunate possessor of it conceited. For he seriously considers himself a well-educated person and thinks that he understands something of life. He believes that he has acquired knowledge, whereas the truth is that every increase in such 'knowledge' draws him more and more away from real life, until he finally ends up in some sanatorium or takes to politics and becomes a parliamentary deputy."

Pretty much an inditement of the whole memorize-test-forget system of "education" in much of the Western world, too...

TRX
January 21, 2013
205:
@158:
But often had to go to great lengths as Jeanne Bare did http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeanne_Bar%C3%A9
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Hm. Interesting to compare that to the local legend of "Petit Jean", presented as fact in the school I went to:

http://www.encyclopediaofarkansas.net/encyclopedia/entry-detail.aspx?entryID=3474

TRX
January 21, 2013
207:
@158:
Also, everything isn't recorded magnetically. A lot of stuff gets backed up as laser pits.
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When Philips introduced the "Compact Disc" medium in the 1970s, they waved their magic wand and estimated the lifetime of a CD at ten years. People were already running into deterioration problems from the old wire recorders and new magnetic tapes then, so ten years was probably picked for marketing purposes or compliance with some obscure government requirement, like the expiration date printed on bottled water.

Commercially produced music discs may still be done by burning pits with a laser, but most computer software or data discs are burned by using the laser to burn a dye embedded in the plastic. These dyes degrade over time; in my personal experience, ten years seems to be about right. Last summer I went through my backups and found a number of previously-verified discs were no longer readable. No big deal, since the newer snapshots were just fine, but for archival purposes discs over five years old aren't considered reliable.

TRX
January 23, 2013
306:
@304
Everyone's pre-installed mysoginist.
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That is, what, the feminist version of Original Sin?

Your paintbrush is exceedingly wide.