possible by the isolation of the visual sense by means of 
alphabet and typography. Perhaps it cannot be said too often. 
This illusion may have been a good or a bad thing. But there 
can only be disaster arising from unawareness of the 
causalities and effects inherent in our own technologies.

     In the later seventeenth century there is a considerable 
amount of alarm and revulsion expressed concerning the 
growing quantity of printed books. The first hopes for a great 
reform of human manners by means of the book had met 
disappointment, and in 1680 Leibniz was writing:

     I fear we shall remain for a long time in our present 
     confusion and indigence through our own fault. I even 
     fear that after uselessly exhausting curiosity without 
     obtaining from our investigations any considerable gain