Quote:
Originally Posted by HarryT
The reason I choose not to use it myself is that I see reading as an “active” activity, but listening as a “passive” one. It’s the same difference, to my mind, that exists between playing a musical instrument yourself, and listening to someone else play one. As a listener, you are simply a consumer of someone else’s performance, whether that performance be the musician playing the instrument, or the narrator reading the book. When you read a book or play an instrument, on the other hand, you are creating the performance yourself. I regard these as entirely distinct activities.
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I think this strikes to the heart of why some may think it's subtly condescending to be told one can't read an audiobook, despite how much others may insist that no one is suggesting it isn't any worse to consume a book by ears rather than eyes.
I also disagree with your assessment. Playing an instrument would be akin to someone narrating a book aloud. In fact, thinking over it, I don't believe reading with eyes is any more active than reading/listening with ears. The only absolute difference in activity is that, since the printed words are spread out on a page, one must move one's eyes around to gather in the words. However, it is possible (and now a reality with certain apps) that one could read a book by having one word flash at a time in the exact same spot, thus eliminating the need altogether to actually move one's eyes at all. Either way, there is nothing more active about consuming a word or sentence through the eyes than through the ears; in both cases one takes in the information and must make sense of it in the brain.