The reason why individuals having books to read built the modern-day world

The reason why individuals having books to read built the modern-day world

Blog Article

The world today is built on a practically incomprehensible quantity of understanding that has actually been handed down in books.

It is essential to bear in mind that, although lots of the best modern books of all time tend to be considered as ground-breaking works of fiction, for most of mankind's literary history, we did not write much fiction at all. A lot of stories would have been sung throughout the great majority of history, just due to the fact that the large bulk of people might not read, suggesting that a lot of books were specialised things meant for those few who might understand them. After a short boom during the classical age of antiquity, the quantity of literate individuals dropped drastically during the Middle Ages. Books became uncommon treasures, with monks painstakingly copying out the enduring timeless texts by hand so as to preserve them, as they were a few of the only members of the population who could read or write. They were the expert keepers of understanding like biology and religious beliefs that all of us have access to in the modern-day world.

It can be difficult to envision what the world would resemble today if the vast bulk of individuals were unable to read, but for the vast majority of history the large bulk of individuals could not, and nor were books accessible even if they could. It was the innovation of the printing press towards the close of the 15th that changed that, making books a lot more available. Naturally, it was still only really the richest and well-educated that could read or write, but it allowed an entire host of developments in science, art, and thinking to be spread out across great distances. Consider what would have happened 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 merely log onto a site like the one backed by the co-founder of the impact investor with a stake in World of Books, and easily access the totality of human knowledge.

With such a rich history of ideas, events, and stories right at our fingertips, it's in some cases 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 big proportion of all the books that have actually ever been written (or the good ones at least). The best books of all time can easily change the way that you look at the world, and that has been true throughout all of history as well. The modern world is built upon knowledge that has actually 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 actually not been for the books that changed minds across the ages.