Socrates thought the new technology of his day, reading, would ruin higher learning. and every prediction he made has come true. And he missed a number of problems that reading and writing would later cause. But he does not seem to have given any thought to whether reading and writing might have any positive impact on how learners would learn and think.

Walter Ong, whom Fernandez cites, points to written language's pivotal role in the emergence our vision of critical thinking. Few people have noticed, and no one has tried to measure, the impact of widespread word processing, computer spreadsheets and other such tools on the development of critical thinking. But, as one person who lived through the transition, the impact was obvious and profound. When my essays and other projects were created with a pen or typewriter, revision was a painful, tedious business. Once I began using a word processor and could revise easily, rethinking became a powerful mode of learning for me. If we were to examine syllabi today, compared with those of 30 years ago, I think we'd find far more reliance on rewriting and rethinking as modes of learning.

And I also agree with Fernandez the continuing development of new media has other implications for how students learn to think. I've tried to describe some of those implications in this web site about digital writing across the curriculum: http://www.tltgroup.org/resources/GX/Digital-WAC.htm

I agree with Fernandez (and Socrates) that new media inevitably weaken or distort some of the learning that was based on older media. But I can see that new media, used appropriately, also open up new modes of thinking and learning. That is true in some very exciting ways today.