"....A passage comes to mind that I first discovered in Yates' Art of Memory, from the Phaedrus of Plato. Socrates is repeating the speech of an Egyptian king named Thamus to Theuth, the god who has just invented writing:

[T]his invention will produce forgetfulness in the minds of those who learn to use it, because they will not practice their memory. Their trust in writing, produced by external characters which are not part of themselves will discourage the use of their memory within them. You have invented an elixir not of memory but of reminding; and you offer your pupils the appearance of wisdom, not true wisdom, for they will read many things without instruction and will therefore seem to know many things, when they are for the most part ignorant and hard to get along with, since they are not wise, but only appear wise.

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(This sentiment has probably been echoed with the advent of the pencil, cheap paper, the printing press, changeable underwear, the typewriter, the radio, the television, the pocket calculator, the personal computer and the video game. Is it "true"? A.)


(Quote is from this interesting essay "In Defense of Memory".