Subject: [IFETS-DISCUSSION:176] Re: Words / Interactions
From: Steve Cavrak (sjc@lemming.uvm.edu)
Date: Tue 29 Aug 2000 - 17:37:08 MEST
Date: Tue, 29 Aug 2000 11:37:08 -0400 (EDT) From: Steve Cavrak <sjc@lemming.uvm.edu> Subject: [IFETS-DISCUSSION:176] Re: Words / Interactions
On Mon, 28 Aug 2000, Bob Leamnson wrote:
> While "interacting" with a book might be an
> expression to suggest a strong "reaction" to the
> author's thoughts, it is in fact a misuse of the
> word since the reader's thoughts and ideas do not in
> any way have an effect on the book.
Unless, of couse, you are one of those readers who
add their notations to a book. Although I am loath
to do that, I have on several times corrected factual
errors in texts - incorrect footnotes, incorrect data,
and, alas, incorrect mathematics.
I'd also argue that the writer of the book is
interacting with some of the readers - initially,
perhaps only in his or her own imagination, with
all readers in the future, later via correspondence,
etc.
> So it is that a student can "react" to a
> website but can "interact" only with another living
> person. I am assuming that Brent intends
> "interaction" in its dictionary meaning.
Melvin Minsky (Society of Mind) imagines building a
"book" that contains his intelligence and interacts with
the reader the way he himself would. When he passes on,
however, his existence then inhabits the book rather
than the cloudy or star filled skies.
See also Edward Bartlett, Society of Text: Hypertext,
Hypermedia, and the Social Construction of Information,
MIT Press, 1991
Steve
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