[Avodah] People of the E-Book? Observant Jews Struggle With Sabbath in a Digita (from Areivim)

[Hankman]

>
> [SLB writes] Actually, only if you don't consider the writing on the 
> readers to be like writing on water ? here one moment, gone the next.
>
RYS responded:
> The screen does not keep what you wrote on it in any way, shape or form. 
> That is how all screens function ? you can write the whole Bible on a 
> screen by "scrolling" down one screen at a time, but in fact it is inside 
> the memory, and not on the screen.


CM comments:

I think the analogy to writing on water by R'SLB is a poor analogy because 
of a critical difference. The image on water will degrade and self-destruct 
on its own without any active mechika by the person, so it makes sense that 
it would not be considered a viable image to which mechika applies. However 
the image on your computer monitor will remain in place until a person 
actively is involved in its mechika (I do not think the refresh cycle of the 
computer screen makes it any less permanent as the image persists in the 
phosphors (crt) or lcd and is seen as a persistent, continuous image by the 
eye).

OTOH, the response by RYS is equally problematic to me. I do not think that 
the permanence of the (sequential) bits in RAM will turn this into an image 
to which mechika can apply. These bits do not for form an image, nor is the 
physical location of these bits on the RAM relevant to forming the image as 
would be the case for pixels on a screen or bits of ink on a page, nor are 
they themselves visible. They are merely part of the sequential instructions 
as to which pixels on the screen are turned on. The bits in RAM are merely 
instrumental in forming the image on the screen, but not an image 
themselves.

Kol Tuv

Chaim Manaster
 


-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.aishdas.org/pipermail/avodah-aishdas.org/attachments/20101228/ec386f6b/attachment.htm>