Once in a while, when I interact with high school students and college students, they generally ask a very interesting question. And that question is, what do scientists do in everyday life? This is kind of a common question sometimes when people are not aware of what kind of things a scientist does. There's also a very pertinent question which some students ask, and that is, if there are so many technological tools that are available to us today, why should we at all write by hand?
Pretty valid question, right? Because there are so many technological tools where you can type using computers or phone. So why should we at all write by hand?
And a related question is, why don't we directly learn typing on a computer instead of writing by hand? Again, a valid question. So this always intrigued me.
Because even as a student, I also was thinking about these questions while taking notes, preparing for exams, etc. Even now, as a professor, I need to ask these questions in a specific way. Then I went ahead and tried to address this particular question in knowing what are the benefits of handwriting.
The first and the most important aspect is that it helps you in processing your thoughts. This is very important because it will slow you down and will help you to kind of put together your thoughts in a systematic way at a pace which is not faster than your thought. Because when you're really thinking about some particular concepts or anything, you need to slow down. In fact, majority of the times error in thinking happens because you are thinking too fast and you're not able to express that particular thought. in a form that you actually can judge and you can evaluate.
So therefore, thinking is very important and thinking slowly is equally important. There is also a sense of creation. This is something which is very very important when you are writing by hand because you really feel that you are kind of bringing your artistic self into the form of expression what you have chosen to.
Another aspect which is extremely important if you are let's say a student of science or engineering or any any other kind of analytical person where Mathematical thinking actually is better expressed when you write by hand because there are so many symbolic Representation when you write by hand and it is much easier for you to manipulate these symbols and also really do a higher Higher-order abstract thinking and this is something which is kind of not paid attention to Because there is kind of higher order thinking which you have to do in order to express mathematical thoughts. And therefore, writing by hand is much easier. Of course, you can always do some kind of typing, but that comes later.
Whereas if you want to really quickly think about some particular thoughts and express those thoughts in the form of equation, there is no equivalent of writing, at least until now. There's also a lot of scientific evidence. If you go to Google Scholar and just type handwriting versus typing, you will find so many interesting papers related to this particular concept. And majority of these papers do tell us that writing by hand is very, very useful, especially when it comes to note taking.
It actually has great advantage over merely typing. So there are reasonably good kind of studies. which give you evidence regarding this particular principle.
So it's worth noting that writing by hand has a lot of benefits. There's another aspect which I am very intrigued and very fascinated by is that in the process of the expression, there is also a form of an exploration. And that is what handwriting can help you do. Because when you're really slowing down, try to understand things, and you're trying to put...
those words and thoughts onto the paper there is a form of expression of course but in that particular form of expression there is also an exploration this is true of let's say drawing or any other form of artistic expression but it's something very fascinating and i've already always felt that there is something very interesting to learn from this it is very similar to music because there are a lot of psychological benefits Because in the form of this particular exploration and expression one will also be able to you know Explore oneself in a very systematic way and it's it's a great form of self-reflection it also takes you on a journey which you may not anticipate at all. And this is something which is also equally fascinating. Because when you start writing, maybe you would have already experienced this.
You would have not started to think about something. But once you commit yourself to write something on paper and you start expressing those thoughts, suddenly you'll find that there is something very, very interesting which is arising out of that particular process. And that is one of the major...
major advantages of writing. It also reminds me of this very famous quote by Buckminster Fuller, how often I found where I should be going only by setting out for somewhere else. So you set out while writing to really explore certain things and suddenly you see that there is very interesting form of expression which you would have not anticipated otherwise if you just sat and thought about it or even talked about it. In fact, there's a very famous essay by Paul Graham where he makes a case for writing and he also compares this part kind of expression to let's say talking or merely doing something else where you discuss with some people these are all very important forms of communication but those forms of communication like what I am having with you by talking to you is kind of one form in which you would be able to express your thoughts but those thoughts actually are arising at a rate at which what you're thinking. Whereas in writing, there is a process of iteration, there is a process of revision.
And importantly, there is a process of deliberation, which really is very beneficial when you're trying to express thoughts with a finer detail. And that's the reason why written word is so important. Let me give you two examples. And these are two examples from two people whom I admire a lot. First is Mary Curie.
And this is a beautiful illustration of her lab notebook. You can see fantastic spatulas and really she's trying to draw and make things clear to herself about some apparatus and also some particular experimental detail. Undoubtedly she is one of the greatest scientists as you probably would be aware of and she made so many important discoveries which have great implications even to date. You'll see in this particular book where she is discussing about sample preparation in her lab.
As I mentioned, these are details which you can really express and it also really is at the heart of experimental methods. In laboratory, all of us generally, we do have certain notebooks where we take notes when we are trying to think about an experiment and explore some aspects in greater detail. She also built a school of thought which still is prevalent because majority of the stuff what we do in the context of nuclear physics, in one way or the other, Mary Curie had a very important role to play. And it also became a preamble to so many questions in particle physics.
and various different areas of very high importance nowadays. So this is one example. The other example is the great Virginia Woolf. She was a literary giant, as you might be aware of.
She was considered as one of the greatest writers in fiction and also non-fiction. This particular illustration, what you are seeing on the screen, is a kind of a part of her notebook. when she was writing her famous essay in 1928 or 29. And the essay's name is A Room of One's Own.
This is actually one of the very outstanding essays what Virginia Woolf wrote. And she was a modernist in the way that she really put her thoughts in a very, very thought-provoking way. And here again, you will see the illustration of her expressing her opinion in the form of handwriting.
She kept a very... very regular diary which was equally important for her to reflect on what she is doing so you can see Mary Curie and Virginia Woolf who were part of scientific and literary kind of arenas did really express their opinion by writing on paper you may say okay they did not have modern technology to do so but hey they were still productive and you can see the depth of the the processing of their thoughts in their writing And there are many examples of that kind where people have written by hand and have expressed their opinion. This is no way to actually take away the fact that modern technology has helped us to really make things in a different way and a very interesting and sometimes even a better way. All I'm saying is that slowing down is equally important while writing and this is something people don't pay attention and this is also a lesson which I have learned because many a times you can type very fast, you can talk also very fast but to really write something with reasonable depth and also with some clarity it is important for us to slow down and put our thoughts on paper and reflect and get feedback from our own words so writing by hand in that way slows you down don't underestimate slowing down process.
So preaching without practice is always hollow, which means that I should show you some evidence that I too do that. So this is one of the excerpts from my own writing where I actually have written in the past, maybe around 20 years ago write regularly i'm saying to myself in my in my notebook now that finding one's own voice on a particular subject is important this is what i am mentioning there and it also gives you a freedom to wonder in a systematic way and that is exactly what I have just expressed in this particular words and yeah this is something which is important and I feel it's it's kind of fascinating also to make this kind of exposition in the form of writing. Virginia Woolf also once famously wrote, you know, thoughts without words, can that be? You know, that is a wonderful quote, which I really find it very fascinating.
So I've modified this particular quote to tell you that let me modify as handwritten thoughts, beautiful to see. So our motivation is essentially to humanize science. So through this particular channel, I tend to do that particular thing. So do like, subscribe and share.
This is a normal practice. Whomsoever is doing something on YouTube does this. In my own case, I'm just doing it only for the purpose of kind of reaching to a wider audience because this is a non-commercial venture.
And I hope that it's going to be useful to students or anybody who is actually interested in intellectual history. Thank you. mainly related to science.
So do encourage people to have a look at these things. Do let me know what you think about some of the thoughts I express and some of the videos I do make. The whole idea is to actually share knowledge and that I think is a part of humanizing science.
Thank you. Bye-bye.