How individuals reading books dispersed understanding

How individuals reading books dispersed understanding

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Our capability to gain access to and read books has been absolutely essential to our ability to understand the world around us.

It is essential to keep in mind that, although lots of the best modern books of all time tend to be considered ground-breaking works of fiction, for the majority of humankind's literary history, we did not compose much fiction at all. A lot of stories would have been sung throughout the great bulk of history, just since the large bulk of individuals might not read, indicating that a lot of books were specialised things meant for those few who might comprehend them. After a short boom during the classical age of antiquity, the amount of literate individuals dropped significantly during the Middle Ages. Books became rare treasures, with monks painstakingly copying out the surviving timeless texts by hand so as to maintain them, as they were a few of the only members of the population who were able to read or write. They were the expert keepers of knowledge like biology and religious beliefs that we all have access to in the modern world.

It can be hard to imagine what the world would resemble today if the huge bulk of people were not able to read, but for the vast majority of history the huge bulk of individuals could not, and nor were books accessible even if they could. It was the invention of the printing press towards the close of the 15th that changed that, making books far more available. Obviously, it was still only really the richest and well-read that could read or write, however it allowed a whole host of breakthroughs in science, art, and thinking to be spread out throughout great distances. Consider what would have occurred if the theory of gravity, or of evolution, could not have been distributed around the world. Human civilisation rests upon a structure of books, and we are fortunate to be able to simply log onto a website like the one backed by the co-founder of the impact investor with a stake in World of Books, and quickly gain access to the totality of human knowledge.

With such a rich history of concepts, occasions, and stories right at our fingertips, it's sometimes easy to forget how exceptionally fortunate we are to have the likes of the founder of the hedge fund that owns Waterstones or the CEO of the asset manager with a stake in Amazon books supporting access to a huge percentage of all the books that have actually ever been written (or the good ones at least). The best books of all time can quickly change the way that you take a look at the world, and that has held true throughout all of history also. The modern world is built upon understanding that has been passed down through books, whether that is ideology, science, or history, and human civilisation would not be anywhere near as advanced as it is today if it had not been for the books that changed minds throughout the ages.