Why Nobody Reads Anymore... Or Do They? | The Literacy Crisis Explained

Article link: https://trevoraleo.substack.com/p/three-theses-on-the-literacy-crisis

Cameron (00:01.052)

Hello and welcome to Thinking Out Loud. I'm your co-host Cameron McAllister.

Nathan (00:05.567)

And I'm your co host, Nathan Rittenhouse.

Cameron (00:07.44)

Well, to riff on Mark Twain, rumors of the death of literacy have been greatly over exaggerated. Or at least right yeah, I see I see what you did there. Well, that that is the thesis of Trevor Al Aleo. Aleo. Trevor Oleo A-L-E-O. Make of that what you will. He has an interesting piece called Three.

Nathan (00:17.272)

I don't even know who Mark Twain is. is he yeah. Okay.

Cameron (00:35.558)

Theses on the literary crisis. This is his Substack, and it's a worthwhile read. So he is chiming in on a subject that is getting a lot of airtime lately, especially so a big article came out in The Atlantic Monthly, and some of the examples in that were pretty sobering. You have, you know, intel from Ivy League professors who say things like, well,

My students can't even read or decipher a single paragraph from Charles Dickens's bleak house, let alone that whole entire giant novel. And my goodness, when that came out, kids were reading it when that when that novel first came out. And now look at how far we've sunk. So it's a familiar tale, but it is a serious one. I I can confirm, Nathan, I was speaking with a college professor couple weeks ago, and I asked her if

This was her experience as well, and she confirmed that it is. She said, Yes, my students, their ability to understand what they're reading, to make conceptual sense of it, to focus on it, to stick with a an argument has has been vastly diminished in in recent years. So there seems to be some consensus on this. Yeah, there's that. There's that.

Nathan (01:55.278)

There's that. Yeah. So so the other the other literary classic that we should throw in here is Chicken Chicken Little and the sky is falling. So yeah, this is but but this sky has been falling for quite some time. I think, Cameron, you have a book from the nineties. What was that one? The

Cameron (02:14.192)

Yes. So I have behind me on the shelf somewhere, I have a of a book by Sven Buckertz called The Gutenberg Elegies. And it's making the same argument that we're, you know, we're w the literacy is declining. We're moving toward a post liter literate society. And this was written in nineteen ninety four. So there there are many books like that, by the way. It it it's a little

Nathan (02:34.977)

Yeah, so there you go. But it is but it is categorically true that we might just be worse readers now. I mean, so just because the argument has been be like, maybe in the nineties they were worse readers than the sixties and we're worse readers than they were in the nineties. So we could be just we I mean, it just could be that that's true.

Cameron (02:53.2)

Yeah, don't want to fall prey to the genetic fallacy here and just say, dismiss this just on the basis of, well, they've been saying this for a long time. But it is interesting to me that this is a little bit of a subsh subgenre, the death of literacy. What I don't like about narratives of decline in general, even though let's okay, let's decline is a real thing. There there is such a thing as cultural decline, societal decline, literate literary decline. That it does happen. We've and societies do ascend and then descend.

Sometimes precipitously. That's real. So let's let's not pretend that there you go. There you go. But on the other hand, when we indulge in narratives of decline, there's something a little self-congratulatory about it, a little too easy about it. Because what ends up happening is if you're not careful okay, I'll speak personally. If I'm not careful, I will reach behind me and pat myself on the back and say, Well

Nathan (03:25.175)

Sometimes the libraries get burned down.

Nathan (03:36.437)

Mm, mm-hmm.

Cameron (03:48.537)

this is just so and I can pretend I'm very sad and I'm as I survey all the wreckage around me. But you know, it's sort of unspoken that well, you know, I'm part of the the remnant. I'm the remnant here. Right.

Nathan (03:57.218)

Well yeah, I like reading books. Look at all these other poor souls who don't like reading books. Well w wo wo t woe to them. How awesome am I? Yes, so anyway, good good word there.

Cameron (04:04.922)

Yes. TikTok? What's that? I still read Dante every year. Yes. Correct. Yeah. Yeah, so that's cringe, as the kids say these days. So I don't wanna

Nathan (04:15.15)

See you're you're literate in a whole nother genre of speak there, so

Cameron (04:19.078)

Well, part of so and that's germane to what this this article is is arguing. So it it's worth it's worth taking a look at it. If if this is a subject that's close to your heart or you're interested, this piece is worth reading. You're probably not gonna agree with everything in it, and that's okay, but it it's it's a it's a thought-provoking piece. One of the things he does is he says, Look, we we need to expand our definition of literacy. And actually, I think he's justified in doing this because literacy

need not simply be limited to educational circles who are able to do close readings of literary classics, for instance. So somebody who went to St. John's College and went through the great books program. Okay, that's one that's one measure of of literacy, but it certainly isn't the only one.

Nathan (05:08.268)

Yeah, and that and that person might be able to read Dickens well, but also might struggle to make sense of the National Electric Code.

Cameron (05:15.204)

Yes. And that's and that's an an example he he essentially uses. He talks about well, actually he he brings an example I think that we would just say he's describing somebody who's a digital native who's able to parse and make sense of reels and some of the different online discourse in a way that an older person who isn't as versed in these in this in this form of media would be able to. Right.

Nathan (05:26.286)

Mm-hmm.

Nathan (05:39.116)

I'm I'm not great at interpreting emojis. It's true.

Cameron (05:42.855)

So my point so the bigger point is here is he's describing that as a form of literacy. I don't know, you can c I mean call that digital literacy, but part of what he's getting at and part of what I think why I think this is important sometimes to people in in Christian circles is that we tend to we tend to be a little bit narrow and individualistic in our focus. And maybe that's not all wrong, by the way, when it comes to literacy. And I think Nathan has some good stuff to say here. But we tend to discount without realizing it.

This is one of those you don't know what you don't know kind of deals. We tend to discount the the sort of communal aspects of literacy. And he is pointing out that literacy, when we just consider it as some form of commons, a commons, you know, some form of a larger conversation that involves that in that involves us all, that's going to depend on our shared life. That's going to depend on

Some of the the literary infrastructures. Yeah, I'm I'm rather abstract here. Yep.

Nathan (06:42.1)

Well, let me let me give you let me give you a simple example. Go down to your go go down to your local middle school and let's say that the national statistics show that your average fourth grader, a third of them can read on grade level or something, and you're like, that you know. Now let's talk to them about Pokemon. And I bet more than fifty percent of them can name six hundred Pokemon and their relationships to each other and the full taxonomy of an entire world that is totally foreign to most of us. So is this a

a form of intellectual inability or it's just a focus on things that are more important and it's the context in which people are learning different things of what's functional in their relationship to the people around them at that time.

Cameron (07:23.558)

Let's try something dangerous here. Let's you and I put our heads together right now and think out loud and try to come up with a definition, a basic definition of literacy itself. Because I think there's one point I there were points in the article where I thought he is defining that he said we need to, you know, have a more expansive definition of literacy. But there were times where I thought his definition is getting so expansive that.

The word literacy is kinda getting diluted here. It's we're we're losing the the bigger picture.

Nathan (07:56.32)

Yeah, 'cause 'cause on a on a very broad sense, you're talking about the ability to interpret a symbolic representation of reality. So the the word duck, D U C K, does not look like a duck. So you you have to be able to to Yeah, so so it's it's the skill set involved in take in in in interpreting symbols that are meant to represent reality. And then I would also say to be able to replicate them and make use of that information.

Cameron (08:02.011)

Yes, right.

Cameron (08:09.299)

Mm-hmm.

Nathan (08:25.686)

in a practical way. I I know that that last part of I'm literally just making this up as we're talking about it. So forgive me a little bit, but I I would say that that secondary part of the is the is the understanding and the application an important part of literacy as well. There's my first shot. Now over to you.

Cameron (08:42.235)

Yes. I like that. Okay. I would say along those lines, then building on what you on what you've said, Nathan, granted we're we are thinking out loud and it's it's not easy to do this. This isn't this isn't fun. I personally I know I'm on a podcast called Thinking Out Loud, but I I don't actually like thinking out loud. I prefer to have what I'm gonna say in somewhat of a refined state before I say it it say it out loud.

Nathan (09:05.42)

I think everybody who's listened to this knows that that is not the case for me.

Cameron (09:10.117)

So this is I would say literacy will involve, among other things, a sound interpretation of texts. I'm just gonna go very, very modest here and very, very broad because I think that'll that a sound interpret a sound interpretation of texts. I'm using texts plural. So and that and I'm also avoiding expert language here. I'm saying sound, meaning adequate.

Nathan (09:11.298)

Ha ha ha.

Nathan (09:23.405)

Okay.

Nathan (09:39.02)

Y okay, but that but let me so let's let's say, and I think this fits with Trevor's broader definition. Let me put some feet under it. So let's say that there's somebody who lives in an inner city and is very adept at interpreting gang graffiti and can read all of the signs and understand what the sp squiggles on the side of the train cars mean. That's a world that is unknown to me. So I'm not literate in in and it is a text. Yeah. So

Cameron (09:39.613)

Meaning good.

Cameron (09:55.986)

Right.

Cameron (10:03.141)

Mm-hmm. And that is a text. Yep.

Nathan (10:08.738)

I've just given that as an example of a of a s of so subcultures develop their own literature sometimes. That's that's the same thing with my middle school Pokemon reference. I think of you have crucial text to subcultures. The the reason that that definition is is challenging for, I think, and maybe our your your political and philosophical assumptions will come to light here, is to say, yeah, but that's not big enough, Cameron, because we want people to engage with a with a broader set.

of known knowledge that's foundational to Western civilization or human flourishing, or, you know, pick your definition there, to say it's not enough to only be able to read Instagram posts and graffiti. You really ought to be able to engage with the founding fathers.

Cameron (10:47.527)

Well, my anno of course.

Well, my annoyingly broad definition can actually accommodate that criticism, because I said sound interpretation of texts. So a sound interpretation may run along the lines of if I am not a person involved in the actual the street life of this particular community, I may not need to know this, I may not need to know all the rules of this vandalism. If I'm not a researcher or an anthropologist doing field work.

Nathan (10:59.446)

Okay.

Cameron (11:20.741)

I may not need to know this and I mean I may need to prioritize a text that is more part of the commons in the larger sense. So in that sense, the Founding Fathers would be, right? That's a that's more in that's that's higher up on the commons pyramid. So it also involves prioritizing texts. If we say if we say sound, yeah.

Nathan (11:41.42)

Yeah, so that but that that's not an individual task necessarily though.

Cameron (11:45.114)

No. And I think that's part of the larger point of the article that I think is sound. This is this is a shared project. And where, if I'm if I'm reading Trevor correctly, where he is concerned is that it's in that, it's in the shared aspects of that literacy project that we are really struggling. So he's willing to grant that there is he's not willing to grant that there's a decline in literacy full stop.

He is going to grant that literacy is changing. And if if he is willing to grant that if if by literacy you mean close readings of Virginia Wolves to the lighthouse, yes, that's changing. If you have a broader definition of close of of literacy that doesn't that doesn't it's not restricted to close readings, that's really kind of the domain of academia in a certain sense. Then literacy continues apace, but the shared project.

is wavering. That's where we're really struggling. That's Trevor's argument. Yeah.

Nathan (12:42.606)

I yeah. Okay. So and and I think I think it's it's an interesting launching point. The

And maybe your again, your political or philosophical assumptions would show here in the way you answered the question of me just asking, let's talk about the pragmatics of it and does it matter? So let's say that you haven't studied Virginia Wolf.

and I have and I don't remember most of it. The the the Well, you know. Anyway, the so so so I I think the point could easily be made so what, Cameron. if if I'm an engineer and I know how to run the technological apparatus around me to accomplish the task, I'm a solid citizen, pay my taxes, who cares?

Cameron (13:07.389)

Sure. Shocking. I I I the horror. You didn't like Mrs. Dolloway? What's wrong with you, Nate? I'm just kidding.

Nathan (13:35.202)

Like so so we're living in so what so what we're talking about is not necessarily the definition of the of what literary is, it's what is the the the the depth and the breadth of what's necessary in order for us to have a common experience of humanity.

Cameron (13:50.546)

think we can say uncontroversially that people do these days, and especially younger people who have been who who have just gone along with the culture if they haven't been very intentionally kind of sequestered from the whole digital world, we can say that focused attention for a long period of time is a challenge for most people.

And that's across the board. And it doesn't it's not limited to young people. We can say that is that is true. So I think, in some sense, the person who sort of beat everybody to the punch on this one was Neil Postman when he wrote the book with the title that it I I'm sure so many people are beating themselves up for not coming up with this. But when he wrote Amusing Ourselves to Death, and then he followed it up with Technopoly. But that was his point quite a while ago. I think Amusing Ourselves to Death came out in the early 90s. But he wasn't.

He wasn't just arguing for the the the death of literacy. His argument was a broader one. It would take us off off off subject here. He was but he was talking about how basically our capabilities haven't changed. You know, well, our innate capabilities, our aptitudes haven't changed. But we've we're wearing ourselves down with incessant entertainment and amusement. And that is, if we're not careful, that's destroying our critical faculties. And it's really

hurting us as independent thinkers and it's really constraining what what and he and he looks at historic examples of people who would even at you know in elections in the past in America where people would sit and listen for two to three hours to somebody running for election talking in detail about policies, about I mean political infrastructure. And now of course if if we watch political

discourse, any kind of speeches or anything like that. I mean, they they're not very sophisticated, we'll put it that way. And so there has been a notable decline in that sense. So I think we can s what what we're just trying to say is, okay, Nathan and I admit that's real. That happened.

Nathan (16:01.26)

Yeah, but it but is that because is it a decline or is it a sh a technological shift to a better way of communicating?

Cameron (16:07.345)

Some some might make might make that argument and say, Yes, we've got well, you could say that well the technological shift is certainly I mean, the technology has certainly gotten way more sophisticated and way more subtle. The mediums of communication, but the communication itself, if we're just judging by common standards, has been in has has declined there.

Nathan (16:32.334)

'Cause 'cause back up a hundred years and if you didn't go sit for two hours down at the town hall and listen to the politician give their speech, you missed it. Like th that was a one and done one shot. Now we can like we'll we'll watch the reviews and watch a couple shorts on it the next day. Onward we go. Yeah. Yep.

Cameron (16:48.765)

Yeah, read a journalist talking about it in the paper, perhaps. But no, that's right. So we yeah, our rec our recording and surveillance technology has changed. I mean, it's it's my my you can't we can't even begin to wrap our heads around how much has has changed from a technological standpoint since then. But all that to say, I think we would I mean, we have to admit, setting you know, bracketing literacy for a second, people's attention has changed in very dramatic ways.

in recent years. And so that's real. I don't think those these professors who are reporting what they're experiencing with their students are exaggerating. That also is real.

Nathan (17:28.984)

What if it's not re what if it's real but not reversible?

Cameron (17:32.744)

it's probably yeah, I'm not sure reversible in the I mean, we can't there's a sense in which we can't go back to I mean, there are certain technologies that that come around that are irreversible. I think wasn't it it's I think it's Nicholas Carr who makes that argument. He talks about the wheel as the primary you know, once the wheel is introduced, there's no going back. But then he but then he makes Yeah, comes around Bucks comes back around, yeah, spinning on and on.

Nathan (17:53.56)

Comes back around, well played, Cameron. The the wheel comes back around. I appreciate the game.

Cameron (18:00.584)

But he but then he comes back to also but well he doesn't come back to then he says the s the he thinks the smartphone is in a similar category as far as a technology that yeah.

Nathan (18:08.972)

Yeah. Okay. Well, ca 'cause here's what here's where I I get a little So the sky is falling, whatever. We're not as good at reading as we used to be. and the kids are even worse and it's gonna go down so at one point you can talk about it. The other point is to the kids but the other point is to say, okay, well, this is the reality that we live in. How then shall we live? And I think the reason that the Atlantic article generated a lot of interest in the Christian world, particularly among pastors and preachers is

Cameron (18:23.333)

It's these days. Yeah.

Nathan (18:38.784)

Who I mean the kind of the core one of the core elements of our church services is a long form analysis of a written text and then the ability for thirty or forty five minutes to sit there and and think right, yeah. Well, t to sit through and engage a sustained multi point argument from a written text. Like that is kind of our bread and butter. and so if if you're saying, hey, there's a chance that a third of the people sitting in the congregation this morning

Cameron (18:47.727)

If you're Protestant, yes. Yeah.

Nathan (19:08.696)

Can't hang with this. That has some implications.

Cameron (19:13.509)

And anecdotally speaking, from where I sit, they can't. At least judging by phones and hands. They could, but they won't. I th that'd probably be the more accurate way of putting it. Plenty of people try, but plenty of people just just don't. And so that's that's true as well. Yes. So I mean we we do we do have a vested interest here. Let's maybe talk a little bit about why anybody why reading would be valuable in the first place or why

Nathan (19:17.73)

Ha ha.

Cameron (19:43.368)

reading is valuable in the first place because I think I can hear critics saying, Yeah, okay, but what's so what's so important about reading Chaucer anyway? And by the way, I don't think everybody needs to read Chaucer. Okay. Or why should everybody read the Divine Comedy, you know, on a yearly basis or something? Well, I I don't I don't Exactly. Yeah, nice. I don't I don't think everybody needs to necessarily do that too, but I think it would be helpful to to talk a little bit

Nathan (20:01.998)

Abandon all hope, ye who start that task.

Cameron (20:13.381)

about some of the advantages of of reading, of reading well.

Nathan (20:22.306)

Yeah, I don't think I started in on it with any profound philosophical it was just fun, enjoyable. It was a way to travel in your mind and engage a whole lot of reality that you didn't have access to otherwise.

Cameron (20:32.817)

I like that. And I think so I'll recommend a book on this one. It's a sh it's a little slender volume. It's very short by Alan Jacobs and it's called The Pleasures of Reading in an Age of Distraction. And Alan Jacobs, longtime English professor, he was at Wheaton and now he's at Baylor. But he talks about how it there was a time where I mean he he read voraciously ever since he was a young child. But he found himself Alan Jacobs is also quite he's he's one of these rare English professors who's also quite tech savvy and writes

Writes very well about technology and not in an alarmist fashion, but he found himself highly, highly distracted and reading substantially less than he used to. And so he he did what lots of humanities scholars did. He started, he embarked on a large reading project to try to investigate what was going on. He started reading all about the virtues of reading.

you know, and he read, you know, Mor Mortimer Adler and I I forget the other his co author's name, the How to Read a Book. He I mean he went through all this stuff. And the conclusion he came to was that a lot of these books extolling the virtues of reading fall into the eat your broccoli camp.

Nathan (21:41.378)

I was just getting ready to use that exact yeah phrase of do it 'cause it's good for you is not going to make a cultural change.

Cameron (21:48.454)

Absolutely not. And so he talked about yeah, he was and the moment of recognition came for him as he was reading how to read a book in the living room and his son came in and he said, even if that book told me, you know, e even I mean, even even if it gives a lot of really good advice on reading and I would it would just I would after reading that I would never want to in the first place. And that's when he kind of shifted gears. And so he he recommends as his two guides for reading whim and serendipity.

So in other words, yeah, and and and he called it the pleasures of reading in an age of distraction. Some people actually who know who were somewhat offended by that title because they would they would have preferred the virtues of reading. And that's precisely what he was pushing against. He was saying, no, I mean, in the end, when when Charles Dickens wrote Bleak House, he didn't at the time he wrote it, it wasn't intended to be something for close reading programs that

Harvard or anything like that. He was he was writing a pot boiler. He was writing something that he he was trying to make money. It was long because the mo the longer the book, the more money he made. So it was long. But he was right it was he he was writing for for an audience and he was writing for pay and he was writing to entertain. And he did. That's why people read it. They liked it.

Nathan (23:01.042)

okay, but but here's what we don't know is if I'm any good at this or not, because I grew up since I'm from the nineteen hundreds, to the time like I rode my bike to a public library to apply to go to college. So I grew up in a house that didn't have the internet or cell phones. So w the only written text available or a TV. So I mean th the only ideas or written text available to me.

were through books. So it's not like I was some little, you know, naturally budding philosopher at age twelve in the mountains of West Virginia. It's just that I lived beside a fantastic public library and my parents read and loved reading and got me books and people gave me books as gifts. And so I think this gets us back to Trevor's point of the the cultural element of it, of what are the socioeconomic and and political and perhaps nefarious technological structures at play.

Cameron (23:52.689)

Mm-hmm.

Cameron (23:58.28)

Yet you had access to a library. That's an infrastructure. Yeah.

Nathan (24:00.876)

Yeah, but I didn't have access to a whole bunch of stuff that my kids most certainly now do. So I if if if Virgil had the internet, we don't know what his life would have looked like. But it probably would have been less productive. I don't know. I it's it's just we I don't I don't think we can compare across times because the context in which we're living in parenting is is totally different. And and so if you're listening to this and you are

Cameron (24:05.693)

Right.

Cameron (24:23.42)

No.

Nathan (24:29.066)

a good reader in you, delight in rich text, those full of whim and serendipity, that's probably because the people around you who loved you built the nest in which you could test drive that.

Cameron (24:43.835)

Yes. I mean, and speaking of from my own experience, the nest was was built for me by my parents. I grew up in a home filled with towering bookshelves because my dad is Stuart McCallister. And so he was he ha was and is a voracious reader and an autodidact. So the virtues the virtues of reading were all around me. But also I came to reading late. I wasn't interested in any of it until I was about eighteen years old. And for me, it wasn't it was I'll just speak

In personal terms, because I mean just personal testimony, I think, means a lot here. That's that's what eventually helped me to become a become a reader. And if you're s if you're interested, maybe this will help you. Reading opened my eyes to how interesting and strange the world is. It's sad that it took books to do that. The world was right in front of my face for eighteen years. But books, because what you're getting especially I mean, when you read a book, you're you're having you're making brief contact with another consciousness, somebody else's mind.

And if they're really articulate, you're making I mean that the then the more vivid and real that contact contact is, yes, you're walking a mile in their shoes, you're seeing through eyes not your own. And for me, that was an exhilarating and thrilling experience when I finally recognized what it was. It took me a long time to to see that, but when I finally understood that books have the power to not just take you to other worlds, I like I mean they they do.

Nathan (25:48.834)

You're walking a mile in somebody else's shoes for free.

Cameron (26:11.057)

That sounds narrowly escapist. I prefer to say that they even even fantasy books brought home to me how strange our world is. Because I mean the the the wildest fantasy is still built from the raw material of our world. This is I like Tolkien's phrase here that we are sub-creators using r harvesting the raw materials of God's creation and refashioning it into, you know, artistic forms. So

That's if you want the world made strange or the world vivified or the world electrified or you know, I just can't keep I could keep going on. Reading can do that. It it and it really can. And it and it also it's not restricted to novels. For some people, academic books can do that, arguments can do that. I mean, people have graphic novels can yeah. I mean, different people have different personalities. Well, I mean

Nathan (26:56.152)

Graphic novels for Cameron. That's how he goes to sleep at night. No.

Cameron (27:02.215)

Graphic novels are often gateway drugs for people. I I know several people who became voracious readers but they got started by reading graphic novels. And graphic novels can be very sophisticated and literary indeed.

Nathan (27:12.76)

Well well let's so let's back up just add one thing in here because this is a hilarious memory now that I'm thinking of this. so we're living in a time yeah, just use my personal so you you think about I remember conversations and concerns that my parents had with my reading habits, which were so here's a kid who didn't have internet, TV, or a phone, who read a lot of books, and my parents were concerned, particularly in the summers.

Cameron (27:30.119)

Mm.

Nathan (27:40.738)

that I would struggle in life to balance reading with the actual physical work that needed to be done in the world. So I would maybe get my chores done and go back right back to the book and not deeply work, but just do the minimal amount of

Cameron (27:55.4)

Your parents were worried that you were reading too much. This is not true of most kids, but this was true of Nathan.

Nathan (27:58.792)

This is a real concern. Yeah, but but I but but I I there the the s the the conversation's is a is a parallel there of like, kids these days are spending too much time on their screens. Well, you can spend too much time in anybody else's consciousness, regardless of the format. So while books and just reading a good old paperback can transport you and travel and all of that, there is an element of like

You can't live in somebody else's fantasy. Like there is an actual world in front of you that you have to come back to. And so I think that's why there are a lot of shots taken at what's it called? Romanticy, like the romance fantasy and all this where it's is this purely escapism, or are we whether you're getting it through a YouTube video or through a book, like there are some YouTube videos that are better than some books as far as engaging the mind in a creative way and real

Cameron (28:35.389)

Mm-hmm. Sure.

Cameron (28:47.035)

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yep.

Nathan (28:53.964)

I'm I'm butchering this thought, but I'm I'm trying to say ev to how to separate the escapesm from the actual value character formation and then how do we live actually well in the physical world around us, distracted by or enabled by books.

Cameron (28:55.899)

Yeah, let me yeah.

Cameron (29:07.591)

Well, you're argu yeah, you're arguing for a sense of balance, which is important. There is such a th such a thing as reading too much. There is such a thing as spending too much time on a screen. Yeah, you I you need overall balance in your life. But I think part of what you're also gesturing at, I mean, look at us. We're doing this, we we we do a podcast for goodness sakes. We're very much in the digital space because this is this is part of our commons today. And so there is we obviously, Nathan, you and I believe there's some value in adding our own noise.

To all the other noise of the discourse out there. I like Brad East's way of putting this when he calls some of now he's talking, he's he has in mind something like Bible Project or some of these other broadly theological or cat, you know, catech. Yeah, yeah, dig tra yeah, not d not not that so much, but yeah, v various forms of digital.

Nathan (29:58.488)

Like veggie tails. No.

Cameron (30:05.809)

catechism or church instruction that are on the line. He calls them digital lecterns. And he it's clear he he doesn't think they're the greatest thing ever, but he he also concedes this is part of it's not a if you can't beat them, join them. It's this is where people are are are congregating. This is where he this is these these are sp no no. It's not a concession, but it's this is where people are gathering. And so it doesn't it's not a it's not a carte blanche to do anything. I mean I I think there are certain

Nathan (30:23.464)

I

Cameron (30:35.311)

areas where that are in inherently perhaps inimical to bigger arguments. Well, you are doing it though. My point is you're you're you're you're a podcaster.

Nathan (30:39.842)

I think I get the argument and I'm not going to do it.

Nathan (30:46.178)

But but I don't consider I don't consider us gathering.

Cameron (30:50.661)

And we're on YouTube. Well, I'm using no, but I get what you mean there. You you you're you're gonna you're gonna give a crunchy big definition of a flesh and blood definition of gathering, but you know what I mean. I mean gathering in the sense that people people are firing up their devices and opening up YouTube or wherever they get their podcasts, or they're scrolling and they see a reel of Nathan.

Nathan (30:53.027)

So yeah.

Cameron (31:20.423)

talking about chickens because he he done he of a does whet whether it's chicken little or actual real t chickens. And they pause for a second. Now part we're we are so we're we're part we're there. That's not the only place we are. And in fact I would say that Nathan, you and I, the the most meaningful stuff that we do is always one on one. It's when we're sitting down with somebody at an actual table. But

Nathan (31:41.164)

Right, yeah. So so maybe I'm not gonna say I'm not going to do it. I said I should say we we aren't prioritizing it.

Cameron (31:48.998)

Right. But it's it's part of that's part of what you said earlier about you know, where well w would Virgil do that? Yeah, but well in a sense that's a silly thing to say. It's all it's an anachronistic thing to say, you know, when people talk like that or, you know, where's our C.S. Lewis now? Well, whoever is writing or communicating w you know, at you know, with with the the degree of sophistication or whatever whatever of a C. S. Lewis, it will

it will look very different today than it did in in his day or than it did in Virgil's day. So I think trying to make the most of the time we have been given is one way of putting that.

Nathan (32:28.13)

I I d I do think though, just to slightly clarify here, when I was talking about Virgil, I'm saying that yeah, well but but but I think y yeah.

Cameron (32:34.399)

I wasn't I wasn't going after you there. I was I was saying when people lament we don't have any Virgils anymore, which is not what you were saying.

Nathan (32:40.788)

Right, but but what is different is can't I gotta okay, I'm gonna say this out loud and then you help me work through it. Are there more distractions in your life than there were in C. S. Lewis's?

Cameron (32:53.405)

Yes.

Nathan (32:54.848)

So that yeah, and and and and my my hunch is that that is true. I think the way my the way my grandpa put it, he he he said, you know, growing up in the nineteen thirties, you had to go looking for trouble. In a digital age, trouble can find you. so that does seem that the distract it's I mean, not that I can't distract myself with a yo yo, but it's

Cameron (32:57.009)

Yes. Yeah. That's my hunch too. Yeah. I don't I don't know that definitively.

Cameron (33:09.266)

Yes.

Nathan (33:21.442)

The the pressure the pre or the the the the the sirene songs are all amplified now, I think, in a way that every generation's had to deal with that, but it does categorically seem different to me somehow.

Cameron (33:21.479)

Well yeah.

Cameron (33:35.304)

I think that's fair. Yeah, I I my hunch is also that there are there are more distractions and also that we are conditioned for distraction in a way that people were not, even in C. S. Lewis's day. And I mean, C. S. Lewis is I mean, he's still a he's a modern writer. Again, I keep saying this. Pascal is writing about a war is fairly distracting. But but think about people have pointed this out. Think about how different

Nathan (33:55.778)

I mean a war is pretty distracting, a world war, so I mean

Cameron (34:04.303)

a war is with social media and constant coverage or twenty four seven news, which was not going on at the time. Yeah.

Nathan (34:08.575)

yeah, you an example of this? I was talking to my grandmother who largely missed the fact that World War Two happened. She was ten ten years old in Pennsylvania in nineteen forty. she's like, Yeah, we knew about it, but

Cameron (34:14.822)

Yeah.

Cameron (34:22.427)

Right. Now see that that would be unimaginable today, given media today. It d it doesn't work like that anymore. So that's one way of of talking about so the distraction thing is real, but it need not define us. And I think we can come th this is where I will say something I've said before. Narratives of decline are all around. Sometimes they're a little bit too easy, but sometimes decline is real.

Nathan (34:24.268)

Okay.

Cameron (34:52.381)

But here's a distinction cultures decline, human nature does not decline.

Cameron (35:03.227)

In the sense that human nature doesn't fundamentally change.

Nathan (35:07.33)

Right, yeah.

Cameron (35:08.667)

Now, some plenty of people would you have to you have to take that in Well y and you have to and I submit that for your consideration, listeners. Pl you might have to turn that over in your mind a little bit, because plenty of people actually do believe that human nature does fundamentally change. And some people who have bought into a narrative of precipitous decline often inconsistently maintain that human nature has fundamentally changed. It's inconsistence in in the inconsistent in the sense that they'll say, Yeah, everybody else has fundamentally changed and declined. And somehow mysteriously

Nathan (35:10.89)

All impulses of the human heart have remained constant.

Nathan (35:37.486)

I alone, yes. From my cloister.

Cameron (35:38.482)

You have exempted yourself. Yes. So that's but I would say that no, you have you have periods of real cultural decline. You have periods of cultural degradation. And that can affect I mean, we're affected by our community. People can behave in abominable ways during those times, but that doesn't mean that human nature itself has changed. Human we human beings, we don't Yeah.

Nathan (36:00.088)

Well but but but but that also means that human capacities haven't either.

Cameron (36:04.369)

That's right. And that's my point. That's my point. There's the hope. Yes. No. So and anybody can tell you anybody will tell you that. In fact, more and more people are saying I put away my device for a month or I downgraded to a dumb phone or I, you know, used some there are ingenious technologies that restrict your online access. I mean, there are ways to and it changed my life. And I found that after a month, my brain was I mean, they they c we you know, they call it neuroplasticity now, but

Nathan (36:05.39)

So yes, and so there's the hope line in this.

Nathan (36:33.217)

He hasn't.

Cameron (36:34.203)

I would just prefer to say that human beings are transformable. We we can ch we can change in many in meaningful ways and we can change our mindset and we can change our and it starts by changing our habits. So it can happen. You can take your attention back. It it's it's sometimes it becomes a s a d l a convenient excuse, doesn't it, Nathan? Well, you it's our age of distraction and just things are different now. Hmm. If you really if you if you want to think you're gonna do what's important to you.

Nathan (37:00.204)

You're going to do what's important to you, and you have time to do it.

Cameron (37:03.259)

Yeah, and if and if you if you recognize that part of what makes that not necessarily reading tons of books, but if you recognize that you want focused attention, you want the ability to think clearly and carefully, to slow down and to not treat yourself like a machine or not just passively consume entertainment all the time, hey, you you really can do that. You can absolutely change in all of those areas.

Nathan (37:27.67)

All right. Let me say two things. one, this is a general reading thing. I do like Cameron having a sense of we make we made jokes in reference to Dante in the in this podcast, and we both knew what the other person was talking about because we had a common set of r there's a common reference point there. There there that there is so the I do want my kids to have access to a commons that other

Cameron (37:49.139)

Commons. Yeah.

Nathan (37:57.344)

reading thinking people have access to. And then it I mean there's almost like a Napoleon dynamo dynamitification of this where, you know, when that movie came out, it was dumb, but like you people were quoting it. And then like once you heard knew the c movie, you'd you heard the quotes everywhere. There is there is a richer engagement with community and with information at all sorts of levels if you have a baseline knowledge of just some rough and it's not like I don't know

Cameron (38:11.57)

Yes.

Cameron (38:15.539)

Mm-hmm.

Nathan (38:25.056)

I didn't read Virginia Wolf for the fun of it. It was a college English class and a professor who is all about it. And I didn't read any of the Divine Conspiracy just for the fun of it. I just, you know, I needed to have somebody hold my feet to the fire and work through some of that. There's discipline that so so I'm grateful for the people that encourage me. So I think A, that's a role that we can have moving forward of how do we encourage these things in the lives of the people that we love. But then the second one is is let's say, okay, that you're awake seventeen hours a day and that a lot of it is digital.

Cameron (38:35.933)

There's discipline involved. Yeah.

Nathan (38:56.312)

Taking just some time to carve out, it's like our friend Tom says, there's no biblical command to read the Bible. All of it is about meditating and thoughtfully reflecting and slowly working through it so that it seeps into I don't think in Romans twelve the being transformed by the renewing of your mind is metaphorical. I think he really felt like that was in fact some theologians have gone so far as to argue that a significant portion of Paul's conception of salvation was a change of focus.

Cameron (39:05.287)

Mm-hmm.

Cameron (39:25.469)

Mm.

Nathan (39:26.642)

as as as the core movement necessary for for living a life in light of what it is that God has done in the world through Christ. So we we want like, okay, let's say you're really, really distracted 16 hours a day. We still have to. And so and so there's some things, it's nice if you can do it, but really, if you want to be, I think, living well as a follower of Christ, there is going to be a certain degree of time that you're going to have to invest to.

Contemplative, undistracted, meditative engagement with doesn't necessarily have to be text, because most Christians couldn't read historically, and there are a lot of ways around that. But I think if you do have the ability to do that, then that's a phenomenal gift, privilege, and blessing. And let's let's not make sure that we are casting aside things of beauty in our life, or that we're taking these things for granted, I think, would be the maybe the way that I want to phrase that.

Cameron (40:21.009)

Hmm. It's a good closing thought. And just in parting, it's worth mentioning that one of the biggest movies that's out there right now is a r is The Odyssey. It's it's, you know, Chris Nolan's The Odyssey. And that's going to probably presumably I I think it's gonna drive quite a few people to read the Homer's Odyssey again.

Nathan (40:47.586)

Yeah. My wife just read it a couple months ago and she's like, This is dumb. But you know, te teaches it.

Cameron (40:52.243)

To each is a but that's a that's a a you know, part of the the cultural commons that is very much very much part of the Yeah, boat. But very much

Nathan (41:00.162)

Sometimes you have go far back to get all of us in the same boat. Yeah. I should I shouldn't say she said this is dumb. There are parts of it that she's like, this feels like an over over analysis of degrees of detail that are unnecessary to keep this story moving forward. That's more accurate, maybe what she said.

Cameron (41:14.237)

Sure. But yeah, all that to say, I mean, a major literary text is is now in in the text is in the conversation again and

Nathan (41:21.706)

And we'll fight about it, I'm sure it'll be wrong, and then people have opinions on whose translation came through best and what modern cultural elements were woven into the and understanding that is part of being literate in the modern era.

Cameron (41:34.771)

Afraid so. Thanks for listening. You've been listening to Thinking Out Loud, a podcast where we think out loud about current events and Christian hope. If you like what we're doing here, you like us. Some of you really do like us. It's amazing. What's wrong with you? Hey, tell other people about it. Like, share, and subscribe. And Yeah, go read a book. There you go. Or if and if you'd like to support us financially, of course, you can do that by going to www.t-o-l together dot com.

Nathan (41:51.405)

Or go read a book. Thanks.