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To: 9YearLurker
The Internet alone is dwarfing brains now.

From "Phaedrus" by Plato quoting Socrates discussing the invention of writing:

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. The specific which you have discovered is an aid not to memory, but to reminiscence, and you give your disciples not truth, but only the semblance of truth; they will be hearers of many things and will have learned nothing; they will appear to be omniscient and will generally know nothing; they will be tiresome company, having the show of wisdom without the reality.
I guess Plato wrote this with no irony just as I used my dwarfed brain to look it up on the internet for reminiscence.
51 posted on 01/08/2023 5:53:34 AM PST by KarlInOhio (Soon the January 6 protesters will be held (without trial or bail) longer than Jefferson Davis was.)
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To: KarlInOhio

But with dopamine-driven Internet users, their attention spans are too short to learn anything of significance to forget.


52 posted on 01/08/2023 7:15:26 AM PST by 9YearLurker
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