Re: "maybe even in the fact that you use words as all," (sic)

Sure, but that's why I sarcastically mentioned people in comas. You  
can't always please everyone. If trying to make something clear to a  
small minority of people without even the most basic communication  
skills means that I have to very, very seriously degrade the  
experience for the vast majority, then it is not something I am going  
to spend a lot of my time on. Or any, because I have more important  
priorities.

If a person can only communicate in simple pictures, like Koko the  
gorilla, then they have special needs that they could only be expected  
to be served by special Web sites, not the mainstream. (Koko knew some  
sign language too, but that would be more equivalent to spoken  
language, and thus not relevant.)


On Jul 17, 2008, at 9:18 AM, Philip TAYLOR (Ret'd) wrote:

> OK, at least I can see you are serious, but do you
> not accept that for /some/ people, their literacy
> is already as advanced as they can achieve, yet
> it is still difficult (if not impossible) for them
> to derive any real meaning from anything other than
> the simplest (written) utterances ?
>
> Philip TAYLOR
> --------
> Brad Kemper wrote:
>
> > I'm just a proponent of increasing literacy, not decreasing it. I  
> think
> > it is absurd to suggest that we reduce all written communication  
> to what
> > the illiterate can understand, and I don't think trying to talk with
> > pictures does that anyway. They are still visual a written  
> language of
> > sorts, but just one that is not standardized, much more ambiguous,  
> and
> > less rich in meaning. I think that if you like to write in  
> pictograms,
> > you would have much more communicative effect if you used simplified
> > Chinese, which derives its symbols from word pictures. Or if you  
> wanted
> > to use something even more pictographic, you could advocate for  
> the use
> > of Egyptian hieroglyphics. At least that is something that is more  
> well
> > developed in vocabulary.
> >
> > There are good reasons why written communication developed from  
> pictures
> > into more formalized systems.

Received on Thursday, 17 July 2008 16:40:59 UTC