"As for ancient geometrical analysis and modern algebra, even apart from the fact that they deal only in highly abstract matters that seem to have no practical application, the former is so closely tied to the consideration of figures that it is unable to exercise the intellect without greatly tiring the imagination, while in the latter case one is so much a slave to certain rules and symbols that it has been turned into a confused and obscure art that bewilders the mind instead of being a form of knowledge that cultivates it."
— R. Descartes, A Discourse on the Method, 1637
This is mathematics at the beginning of modernity summarized by the inventor of Analytic Geometry; as he introduces it as 'my method' later in the same book.
Screens are part of the computers for about fifty years now. But couple thousand years of imaginative work on paper determined that screens be an imitation of paper, for the most part. Basic container of data was inherited as files and folders. Much of the private computer was put together in a company that makes photocopy machines. Within which the preview of a print had monumental benefit along with a pointer device and a virtual catalog. Word processors, spreadsheets and slides came to be the most used software and suggested a future as typical products. Code is written as if it will go to a printer soon. And we come to look at web pages that were conceived to be accessible versions of physical documents.
Imitation is mostly effective but it can also be frustrating. But frustrations are a bit difficult to demonstrate. First, It is not obvious how information technology should leave the office and become relevant to life besides facilitation of bureaucracies or consumption of packaged entertainment. Second, criticism of digitized paperwork(i.e. finance) seem to fall on deaf ears. And i will not try to point out that relevance at a time anarchy and chaos are taken to be synonyms. Nor will i be an impotent reactionary and define a principal in negation to concentration of power. Instead i hoped to experiment around prevailing institutional dependence and brute specialization that beats their imagination out of people.
Of course, this alone can't leave a dent in the curricular consumption called education but one question had to be made explicit: What can be done better than on paper? So that we come to be aware of the cultural momentum and possibly see a course correction.
For more: github.com/ibrahimsag/canberead/
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