Total literacy is a great social achievement of the 20th century. Thanks to the efforts of the governments of developed countries, educators and educators, an educational system was created that spread throughout the world. And today it is difficult to find a person who cannot read. At the same time, modern technologies are changing the attitude of people towards the text, which in the long term can lead to unexpected consequences.
Death of books
In 1953, the cult novel Fahrenheit 451 by American science fiction writer Ray Bradbury was first published. It showed the world of the future, where the state is purposefully destroying books, and readers are driven underground. It should be noted that Bradbury did not describe the world of illiterate people - his characters are quite educated and know how to read: only fiction, including recognized classics, is sentenced to burning.
In such a spectacular way, the science fiction writer reacted to the introduction in the United States of censorship restrictions under the so-called "Code of Comics", which prohibits comic book authors from portraying vampires, werewolves and zombies, scenes of excessive violence or murder of police officers, characters in revealing clothes that emphasize sexuality, etc. Even before the introduction of the code, the concerned public took the initiative: in some American cities, relevant literature was removed from shops and libraries, after which it was publicly burned in the squares. Formally, the code was in effect until 1971, in one way or another influencing the work of many writers.
Today, in the context of the global spread of the Internet and the emergence of many electronic libraries, Bradbury's fears cause an indulgent smile: the book has not died, but acquired a new format, and it seems unrealistic to stop the spread of the artistic word. However, social psychologists point to another danger that Bradbury, for all his foresight, could not discern from the 1950s.
Last year, another screen version of the novel "Fahrenheit 451" was released, which takes into account the experience of distributing network services. Books are also burned in the film, but not for the artistic content, but because they can compete with the electronic methods of presenting information, which is increasingly visualized. The characters no longer even need to read manuals or instructions - writing has been replaced with pictograms, and a person with a book, even an electronic one, is classified as a potential rebel.
Of course, in the film, as in the novel, exaggeration is used to enhance the effect - it is unlikely that states will ever undertake to prohibit reading; it is simply unprofitable for them, at least from the point of view of propaganda. But the trend is obvious: people read less and less fiction and more and more correspondence on the Web, conducted in a rather primitive everyday language, which is also rapidly degrading, often boiling down to “likes” and “emoticons”.
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Reading as work
Another great science fiction writer, Boris Strugatsky, once said that "reading is the work of the soul." Therefore, he was opposed to empty entertainment in literature and believed that books should stimulate the thought process by posing and solving issues that go beyond the boundaries of everyday life. And, of course, it was not about reference books and encyclopedias.
It's hard to disagree with Boris Strugatsky: reading smart books broadens one's horizons and vocabulary, disciplines thinking and gives skills for the perception of different cultures. However, there is one more aspect related to physiology. In 2011, through experiments, psychologists found that reading fiction awakens neurological zones that would be involved if readers themselves experienced what is happening in the text. Without regular reading, not only intellectual but also emotional impoverishment occurs; people stop growing as a person, empathize, delve into and perceive someone else's point of view. This is probably related to the talk about the "moronization of the population", which are conducted by some radical publicists, not realizing that the problem is much deeper.
Today, the “vacuum” of empathy is filled by cinema and television, but they also make us dependent on the finished “picture”, and, as the practice of recent years has shown, people stop perceiving information if it is not accompanied by an illustration. Comics is becoming an increasingly popular genre, although it used to be exclusively literature for teenagers. That is, it is quite possible to say that what is happening is not "moronization", but "infantilization" of society, which is theoretically capable of leading the world to a very unpleasant outcome.
Estates of the XXI century
Doctor of Philology and neurolinguist Tatiana Chernigovskaya, who studies the influence of reading, claims that without constant intellectual load, the brain quickly "relaxes". We know this from our own experience: if you don't practice in a foreign language for a long time, it starts to be forgotten; if you do not work in your specialty for a long time, habitual skills are lost. However, Chernigovskaya points out more serious consequences: without reading, the algorithm for the perception of complex information is destroyed. That is, switching from books to movies will not be an adequate substitute: at some point, the brain will stop perceiving films that are built more non-standard than straightforward video sequences.
Futurists have only recently noticed the problem. After all, the fall in the attractiveness of regular reading of books was superimposed by the rapid development of all kinds of Internet services, the program code of which is based on self-learning neural networks, ready to please any whim. The further, the more the average user relies on them when searching and sorting information. Today you do not need to improve your own qualifications in order to find answers to pressing questions - the Network itself will offer you them, and for every taste. Because of this, the criticality of perception decreases in users, cognitive abilities decrease; they become ideal objects for manipulation and malleable material for the introduction of any harmful ideas.
Of course, a person who trusts the Network will not become illiterate like a pre-revolutionary peasant, but his literacy turns out to be worse than the pre-revolutionary village “simplicity”. For example, he can be sure that he is competent enough in many special issues: he understands history better than historians, better than engineers in technology, better than judges in jurisprudence, etc. At the same time, due to narrowing his horizons, he will not see his mistakes and will not learn strangers.
As a result, a special "class" will arise - self-righteous "infantiles" without sensible education and experience, from which it will be rather difficult to escape. Worse, there is no legal way to stop this circle from expanding. Modern politicians and businessmen are interested in reducing the number of people who are able to formulate truly adult questions and independently seek answers. The new elite, which has sufficient knowledge and skills to qualify for the formation of a favorable future format for it, must be narrow, because the growing scarcity of resources puts an obvious barrier on the path to a dignified life for everyone. The idea of equality will remain in the past, but, most importantly, the new "peasantry" will not even notice that they have lost something important, because they will have nothing to compare with.
However, such a grim scenario is optional. The fashion for reading may well return. Have you read this article to the end? Now make an effort - buy a good fiction book. It's time for your brains to stretch!
Anton Pervushin