[MD] How to Gut a Book

[Dan Glover]

Hello everyone

>From: "ian glendinning" <psybertron at gmail.com>
>Reply-To: moq_discuss at moqtalk.org
>To: moq_discuss at moqtalk.org
>Subject: Re: [MD] How to Gut a Book
>Date: Tue, 6 Feb 2007 11:43:49 -0600
>
>Hi Dan,
>
>Don't shoot the messenger ... I said it was interesting, I didn't say
>I entirely agreed with every word of it.

Hi Ian

I'm sorry if I came on like that. I am not arguing with you as it were but 
rather seeking to understand.

>
>He is not advocating "cheating" - pretending / claiming to read things
>not read. He is simply pointing out reality and fallibility, even
>amongst academic professors like himself.... and "confessing before
>god" etc. In fact he is advocating honesty whilst admitting hypocrisy
>- good character traits IMHO.

Okay. I somehow think intellectual dishonesty is still dishonest even if a 
person admits to it and it is not a character trait I would teach my own 
children. But it could well be that I am missing Lavery's point.

>
>(Pirsig doesn't reference Barfield as you know, but plenty of Pirsig
>scholars and fans do see the parallels., and it was Lavery who linked
>Barfield and Pirsig to his own anti-Cartesian project, also
>paralleling Pirsig's main anti-SOMist agenda.)

Yes I do know. I know because I've read just about everything Mr. Pirsig has 
offered up for reading over the years. That's why I asked.

>
>He is not "putting down" speed reading of the type you claim to use
>... he is putting down the focus on the "speed". It's not a matter of
>how quickly you read, but a matter of how effectively you extract the
>meaning.

If a person can read ten books in the same time that it would normally take 
to read one, isn't that better?

>You actually said something inconsistent across your two
>responses ... let me develop one point.
>
>You first said you could speed read with "almost 100% recall", and
>then you said, when you speed read you "don't read every word".

Right, but there's no inconsistency, imo. For  instance, I think it was x 
who noted we only need to see the first and last letters of a word to know 
the word. Also in the English language there are tons of a's, an's, and's, 
the's, etc. that as words are useless as far as conveying meaning. They only 
make text flow more evenly.

>
>In reality, what you call speed reading is closer to his "gutting" -

It is a "poor relation" according to Lavery. It struck me that to say so is 
rather arrogant, especially when he brought up Walden. But that's only my 
perception.

>reading SELECTIVELY - recognising meaningful patterns as you skim a
>work, and extracting the key messages from those patterns. You don't
>achieve 100% word-for-word recall (god forbid) but you do get close to
>100% knowledge of the writer's message (so far as you understand it).
>(Cleary if you hit disjointed / inconsistent / jarring patterns, you
>re-read those sections, and update what you understand, or ignore a
>point, then skim on.)

Well, for me there's a difference between skim reading and speed reading. 
When I'm skimming I am looking for specific ideas contained therein. I think 
Robert Pirsig writes that as a student he practiced skimming too. There's a 
subtle difference between that and reading for content, imo. Most times when 
I skim read I have already read the material... I am merely looking for 
something I remember reading.

>
>Taking it further - reading a writer's work "selectively" can
>translate to selectively reading second-hand reviews / references /
>derived works by others who have already "selectively" read the
>writer. And still managing to extract a good approximation to the
>author's message. (The Wayne Booth paper I posted about earlier covers
>this second and third order rhetoric. In a wider "information"
>context, it's called "compression".)

Readers Digest offered condensed books (maybe they still do?) when I was a 
kid but I never liked reading such books as it seemed, well, disrespectful 
(though I'm not sure that's the right word) of the author. So I do agree 
with Lavery on some points, you see.

I remember in high school that my science teacher became quite irate when he 
caught me reading WORLDS IN COLLISION during class. You have to understand, 
I was a straight A student and I had already read all the material for the 
whole year. So I secreted my own books inside the text books and read them 
during class.

He held the book up in front of the class and made a huge deal about what 
total trash Velikovsky wrote. When I asked him if he'd ever read the book he 
said no he didn't have to read it to know what garbage it was. He was an 
intellectual bigot. I got the same feeling reading the Lavery article. But 
as always I could be wrong.

>
>Again, none of this has to do with the qualities of reading a book for
>pleasure or the aesthetic value of a given work of literary art ....
>that is quite a separate issue, as Lavery points out.

Right. As I said, I've never read a book because I had to read it. Even in 
school I always read all the text books within 2 weeks of starting class. 
Not because I had to, but because I enjoyed reading. I stumbled across speed 
reading on my own. I am not familar with Evelyn Wood though I remember 
hearing of the program years ago.

>
>It simply says, you don't have to read every word written by each
>author to have a valid, well founded opinion / understanding /
>knowledge of that writer's contribution to knowledge. If it's
>knowledge you're after, it doesn't really matter who contributed it,
>(except for fame and celebrity) so long as you "know" it. That's the
>Pirsigian philosophology angle - which I don't wish to over-emphasize,
>but you asked.

Yes I did and I appreciate you taking time to answer, thank you.

>
>And, finally, I'm no academic. (I wish).
>Just looking for nuggets to apply to real life, whilst holding down a day 
>job.

Oh. Well you fooled me. After reading your writings for some time now I 
assumed you were far more educated (formally) than I happen to be.

Thanks again for your comments,

Dan