Humanist Discussion Group, Vol. 37, No. 305.
Department of Digital Humanities, University of Cologne
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[1] From: maurizio lana <maurizio.lana@uniupo.it>
Subject: Re: [Humanist] 37.302: why e-mail? (74)
[2] From: Henry Schaffer <hes@ncsu.edu>
Subject: Re: [Humanist] 37.302: why e-mail? (7)
[3] From: J.J. Naughton <jjn1@cam.ac.uk>
Subject: Re: [Humanist] 37.302: why e-mail? (21)
--[1]------------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: 2023-11-13 23:43:52+00:00
From: maurizio lana <maurizio.lana@uniupo.it>
Subject: Re: [Humanist] 37.302: why e-mail?
hi Willard,
i would add a dimension more to your thoughts about email vs.
social-media forms of communication.
i mean web based email (e.g. Gmail) vs. client based email (e.g.
Thunderbird).
for some subtleties i think that web based email is similar to
social-media forms of communication because you don't own the mail
messages, but you are kindly allowed to peruse them when (while) they
are hosted somewhere in the clouds while the deep meaning of using a
client is that of having all the messages of your mail on your computer.
i stress "computer" because it is somehow difficult to do mail on a
smartphone, and not so easy with a tablet. so doing mail through an
email client (an app) at its nest implies the use of a notebook or
desktop computer i think.
and me personally I find myself writing and rewriting phrases, choosing
a word, displacing/relocating a block of words, etc. which is the
contrary of "rapid bursts of short utterances"
best
Maurizio
Il 13/11/23 09:01, Willard McCarty <willard.mccarty@mccarty.org.uk> ha
scritto:
> I suspect that many from the younger cohort of academics these days use
> e-mail less, social-media forms of communication more. As useful as the
> latter is--for some purposes I live by WhatsApp, for example--conducting
> reasoned discourse in Twitter-alias-X et alii must be difficult if not
> impossible. Admittedly, a Heracleitus could show us a thing or two in
> those media, but for us who write in paragraphs, tweets and emojis don't
> quite do it. Rapid bursts of short utterances are great, but I suspect
> that for many whose toolkit contains little else, the mind has shrunk to
> fit the Procrustean form, not (as with Heracleitus) expanded beyond the
> reach of telescopes--even the Event Horizon kind--to say much in little.
>
> Take, for example, that elusive ancient Greek's fragment 33 (Kahn, Diels
> 93): "The lord whose oracle is in Delphi neither declares nor conceals
> but gives a sign." If it's been a while since Heracleitus crossed your
> path, I can recommend more highly than I can explain Miles Burnyeat's
> "Message from Heracleitus", New York Review of Books, 13 May 1982,
> reprinted in Explorations in Ancient and Modern Philosophy, Vol II (CUP,
> 2012).
>
> All this from early morning reflections on why Humanist continues after
> so long to use e-mail, despite the amount of unwelcome dreck that comes
> this way.
>
> Have a good week.
>
> Yours,
> WM
> --
> Willard McCarty,
> Professor emeritus, King's College London;
> Editor, Interdisciplinary Science Reviews; Humanist
> www.mccarty.org.uk
------------------------------------------------------------------------
mentre percorreva il corridoio,
chiedeva di poter parlare
con un avvocato o con il consolato
testimone Delta, atto di chiusura delle indagini
della Procura di Roma sull'uccisione di Giulio Regeni
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Maurizio Lana
Università del Piemonte Orientale
Dipartimento di Studi Umanistici
Piazza Roma 36 - 13100 Vercelli
--[2]------------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: 2023-11-13 13:54:30+00:00
From: Henry Schaffer <hes@ncsu.edu>
Subject: Re: [Humanist] 37.302: why e-mail?
I'm also (sometimes) frustrated by the way apps/social-media push us to
shorter communications. Many make it difficult to have more than one
paragraph and everything pushes toward very brief statements. (Whoops -
this is already too long.)
--henry
--[3]------------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: 2023-11-13 08:18:21+00:00
From: J.J. Naughton <jjn1@cam.ac.uk>
Subject: Re: [Humanist] 37.302: why e-mail?
Dear Willard
Regarding the difficulty of conducting serious discussion via ‘social’ media,
I’m reminded of Neil Postman’s observation of why one cannot do philosophy via
smoke signals: the medium doesn’t have the requisite bandwidth.
So keep emailing!
Best
John
.........
Professor John Naughton
Senior Research Fellow, CRASSH
University of Cambridge
Director, Press Fellowship
Wolfson College
e: jjn1@cam.ac.uk
w: memex.naughtons.org
t: +44 7836 373799
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