Rescuing Books from the Tsunami of the Digital Age

By:  Dale Weckbacher

John 8:31-32

So Jesus said to the Jews who had believed him, “If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, ³² and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”

(ESV)

As a Christian seeking a closer relationship with my God, the Word of God, the Bible is something I place a high value upon.  While the Bible can be a liberating force in our lives (John 8:32), it can also be a surgical knife in the hand of God (Hebrews 4:12).  To Christians, the Bible is more than just a book, it is the life changing Word of God.

Libraries are repositories of books which through history have helped facilitate the spread of information.  (1)  Currently living in the information age, we are beginning to become comfortable with easy access to vast amounts of information.  No longer is information limited to the pages of books and now is accessible at the click of a mouse or touch of a finger.  While most view easy access to information as a blessing, there are those, especially tyrannical leaders that see easy access to information as a threat.

From the Nazis of Germany to ISIS, the twentieth and twenty-first centuries have witnessed the insane bonfires of book burning to destroy information threatening tyrants power and control over their people.  However, the history of book burning dates back to antiquity with the Babylonians and their allies burning the library of the scholar King Ashurbanipal in 612 BC.  In 213 BC, Chinese Emperor Qin Shi Huang ordered the burning of all history and philosophy books from states other than Qin.  It is probably safe to surmise these ancient burnings were an effort to destroy threatening information and maintain power.  (2)  However, in the digital age we must wonder if our reading on the fly from our smart phones and computers is making our synthesis of information shallow and exposing us to radical erroneous information.

In the July 2008 issue of the Atlantic, Nicholas Carr postulates the possibility that our constant surfing and searching through massive amounts of information online may actually be changing the wiring of our brains.  (3)  One theory is that our quick surfing the web in search of quick soundbites of information is affecting our ability to pay sustained attention to what we are reading.  In essence, we have been losing our ability to deep read and synthesize information.  (4) 

The danger with this shallow synthesis of information is it makes us susceptible to the rantings of extremist groups using soundbites on social media, done to stir up violent emotions, in order to spread their dangerous extremist rhetoric.  (5)  Instead of having to resort to the burning of books to destroy potentially threatening information, extremist tyrants now can flood the information superhighway with their dangerous rhetoric coupled with a public of short attention spans hungry for information eager to digest it.  What we need is a return to deep reading encouraging deep thought and reflection on issues but what can we do to return to this manner of reading and synthesizing information in the digital age?

Spritz, founded by CEO Frank Waldman is devoted to making reading books easier and faster by focusing on that they call “on-the-go reading.  (6)  Their technology causes words to flash rapidly, helping hold the attention of readers since our eyes are naturally drawn to movement and change.  Also, since the words flash at a rate faster than the rate at which most people read, more reading can be done.  However, while this technology may be attractive to a generation raised in the digital age used to seeing information flash rapidly before their eyes, I am concerned it does nothing to enhance attention spans and may actually further shorten them.  I therefore want to propose another solution.

I have previously written in this blog about not allowing technology to become an idol in our lives.  In my post, I proposed disconnecting from technology to eliminate distractions.  This undistracted time could be constructively used to interact with others face-to-face but it could also be used to deeply read a book.  If you are unsure of a book to begin deeply reading, I would like to suggest the Bible, the Word of God. 

Books contain a wealth of information that men and women have compiled throughout all of human history.  Even the Bible is a compilation of words written by many authors, written under the inspiration of God.  The value of the information contained in books is priceless and explains why it has represented a threat to power hungry tyrants throughout human history and why they burn them.  As we live in the digital age, let us not allow the tsunami of information and heated rhetoric in the digital world drown out the valuable information and history contained in books.  Instead, I want to challenge each of us to disconnect from the digital world regularly on a daily basis and take time for face-to-face social interaction and the deep reading of a book. 

1. University of Wisconsin-Milaukee. Book Burning, 213 BC–2011 AD. uwm.edu. [Online] University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Libraries. [Cited: September 2, 2017.] http://uwm.edu/libraries/exhibits/burnedbooks/.

2. Corn-Revere, Robert. Bonfires of Insanity: A History of Book Burnings From Nazis to ISIS. www.thedailybeast.com. [Online] Daily Beast, February 28, 2015. [Cited: September 2, 2017.] http://www.thedailybeast.com/bonfires-of-insanity-a-history-of-book-burnings-from-nazis-to-isis.

3. Carr, Nicholas. Is Google Making Us Stupid? www.theatlantic.com. [Online] The Atlantic, July/August 2008. [Cited: September 2017, 2017.] https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2008/07/is-google-making-us-stupid/306868/.

4. Jordinson, Sam. Have you forgotten how to 'deep read'? www.theguardian.com. [Online] The Guardian, July 21, 2008. [Cited: September 2, 2017.] https://www.theguardian.com/books/booksblog/2008/jul/21/haveyouforgottenhowtodeep.

5. Luckert, Steven. Extremists Are Thriving On Social Media. How Should We Respond? www.huffingtonpost.com. [Online] Huffpost. [Cited: September 2, 2017.] http://www.huffingtonpost.com/steven-luckert/extremists-are-thriving-o_b_14390260.html.

6. McFarland, Matt. Books are losing the war for our attention. Here’s how they could fight back. www.washingtonpost.com. [Online] The Washington Post, March 19, 2014. [Cited: September 2, 2017.] https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/innovations/wp/2014/03/19/books-are-losing-the-war-for-our-attention-heres-how-they-could-fight-back/?utm_term=.80cbb1ae729a.