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Thomas Gamsjger Nine Reasons Why to Buy a Book

Reason 1. You actually want to read the book. Down-to-earth, almost boring a reason. But people behave in such predictable ways more often than not. Within this framework numerous circumstances provide their contributions, from personal enlightenment to light amusement or as a countermeasure against common boredom. Reason 2. You must read the book. This is the fate of most textbooks at school or university. People respond to incentives. And the incentive is that you are unlikely to pass an exam without consulting the required reading. Some can achieve just that, but most simply do not. Publishers know that, too, which is in itself a reason for the usually absurdly high prices of textbooks. Reason 3. You want to use some bits and pieces of information in the book. Scientific writers fall into this category. Previous knowledge is the foundation of scientific discovery. Some even claim to use the shoulders of giants as their stepping stones, which might appear at times a little over the top if you are not the author of something in the order of the Principia Mathematica. Whereas in many scientific fields articles are published in appropriate, i. e. peer-reviewed, journals, other disciplines have to resort to other measures to negotiate the narrows between Scylla (publish) and Charybdis (perish). Therefore, they write books others are keen to buy. (Even though one must concede that the top scorers on the New York Times best-seller list are typically made of different, more malleable ingredients.) Reason 4. You want to cite the book appropriately even though you have already got the needed information. You are a real scholar! Especially against the sombre backdrop that some hurried researchers dont even care to read the relevant body of literature and content themselves with the information they can retrieve from abstracts on PubMed. Reason 5. You think you might use some bits and pieces of information in the book some time later. Prediction is very difficult, especially about the future. To make it clear on this occasion: This quotation is attributed to the Danish physicist Niels Bohr and neither to Samuel Langhorne Clemens (yes, the real name of Mark Twain) nor Yogi Berra. The handy availability of books through the smaller or bigger online retailers (the latter of which intriguingly tend to be named after great rivers of the Earth) works against this hiding-nuts-squirrely trait of preparing oneself for the long dark hours of the cold season. Reason 6. You think the book should be part of your library. Who has ever read the entirety of the almost inevitable multivolume Shakespeare compilation (particularly considering that Christopher Marlowe might have bestowed greater poetry on us laterborns anyway)? Definitely on the wane are encyclopedias in times of Wikipedias and search engines. But beware of the shaky internet connection. Hardbound good old Britannica might be the measure of last resort.

Short Communication Thomas Gamsjger. Nine Reasons Why to Buy a Book November 1, 2013

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Reason 7. To impress someone. Cover your desktop at work (the real one, which you actually can rest your tired head on) with an assortment of books about topics from your field of occupation supplemented by one or another publication of more exotic style. ('The economic impact of the Tulip Crisis on the Dutch Far East trade in the 17th century' might be a good start.) Colleagues will be either immensely impressed or they will detest your overly ostentatious behaviour. Reason 8. You buy the book as a present for someone else. From cheapish to very expensive, you can cater for all needs. In fact, books are rather practical gifts as they can easily be wrapped in colourful paper and, in addition, fit nicely under the Christmas tree. Many other gifts simply do not meet these requirements. Some instances have been reported when the lack of foresight in the choice of the book was the cause of minor embarrassment first for the recipient and in due course also for the well-intentioned benefactor. But mostly presenting a book as a present works remarkably well. Reason 9. None of the above. What else?

In conclusion Some technologies are able to stand the test of time. Even though the foundations have been laid centuries ago, the app called 'book' can be considered as one of the more relevant achievements of humanity and is still of undiminished importance ever since. But you already knew that.

Short Communication Thomas Gamsjger. Nine Reasons Why to Buy a Book November 1, 2013