Precisely why people having books to read constructed the contemporary world

Precisely why people having books to read constructed the contemporary world

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Books, and the quantity of individuals who could read them, have been definitely crucial to human development over the centuries.

It is necessary to bear in mind that, although plenty of the best modern books of all time tend to be regarded as ground-breaking works of fiction, for most of humanity's literary history, we did not write much fiction at all. Many stories would have been sung throughout the great majority of history, just since the large bulk of individuals might not read, indicating that the majority of books were specialised things meant for those few who might comprehend them. After a quick boom throughout the classical period of antiquity, the quantity of literate people dropped considerably throughout the Middle Ages. Books ended up being uncommon treasures, with monks fastidiously copying out the enduring 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 understanding like biology and religious beliefs that we all have access to in the contemporary world.

It can be hard to imagine what the world would be like today if the vast majority of individuals were unable to read, but for the huge bulk of history the large majority of people 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. Naturally, it was still just truly the richest and well-educated that could read or write, but it enabled a whole host of developments 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 lucky 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 understanding.

With such a rich history of ideas, occasions, and stories right at our fingertips, it's in some cases easy to forget how incredibly 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 substantial percentage of all the books that have ever been composed (or the good ones at the very least). The best books of all time can easily change the manner in which you take a look at the world, and that has actually held true throughout all of history also. The modern world is built on 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 actually not been for the books that changed minds across the ages.