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Interesting study comparing reading on paper vs tablets

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IainB:
@40hz: Your comment about "Remember the "God Particle"...":
I didn't see what all the fuss was about. Creationists would probably assert that we are all made up of "God particles" anyway. This was my view, FWIW:
Yes, I found this about the theoretical Higgs boson in Wikipedia:
SpoilerThe Higgs boson is a hypothetical massive elementary particle that is predicted to exist by the Standard Model (SM) of particle physics. Its existence is postulated as a means of resolving inconsistencies in the Standard Model. Experiments attempting to find the particle are currently being performed using the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN, and were performed at Fermilab's Tevatron until Tevatron's closure in late 2011. Recently the BBC reported that the boson will possibly be considered as "discoverable" in December 2011, although more experimental data is still needed to make that final claim.

The Higgs boson is the only elementary particle predicted by the Standard Model that has not been observed in particle physics experiments. It is an integral part of the Higgs mechanism, the part of the SM which explains how most of the known elementary particles obtain their mass. For example, the Higgs mechanism would explain why the W and Z bosons, which mediate weak interactions, are massive whereas the related photon, which mediates electromagnetism, is massless. The Higgs boson is expected to be in a class of particles known as scalar bosons. (Bosons are particles with integer spin, and scalar bosons have spin 0.)

Theories that do not need the Higgs boson are described as Higgsless models. Some theories suggest that any mechanism capable of generating the masses of the elementary particles must be visible at energies below 1.4 TeV;[4] therefore, the LHC is expected to be able to provide experimental evidence of the existence or non-existence of the Higgs boson.
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Interestingly, there are apparently two groups of scientists:
(a) Higgs: those scientists who are believers in the SM (Standard Model) predictions and who apparently:
... expect the LHC experiment to be able to provide definitive experimental evidence of the existence of the Higgs boson.
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and

(b) Higgsless: those scientists who are non-believers in the SM - and who thus hold instead that the HM (Hiiggsless Model) is the Truth and who apparently:
expect the LHC experiment to be able to provide experimental evidence of the non-existence of the Higgs boson.
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Scientists! They're a funny lot aren't they?     :huh:

I don't know how many of either group might be climate scientists.
-IainB (December 08, 2011, 06:26 PM)
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zxcvbn:
I have only just seen this topic, so I come late to the discussion - the story of my life   :(

I bought a Kindle 2 or 3 years ago, downloaded several books I had never read, and got going.  All I can say about that is/was that if you want to read a book, and there is no other way to do it, then the Kindle is OK.

But, I do like to handle a book, I like to know who printed it and where and when it was printed, and above all I like to be able to flip back and forth to remind myself of who somebody is (an absolute necessity in Dickens, for example) and I never found any easy way to do this on a Kindle.

I live in the UK, so I use Abebooks (I hope this doesn't constitute advertising ! - I won't link to the URL just in case) and I can get a good quality paperback for about 60p - the postage and packing is the most expensive part of the deal.  This I find much more rewarding and enjoyable.

However, lest you should think I am a total dinosaur, I DO read "The Guardian" every day, and it is often interesting to compare the Kindle version of the newspaper to the online version.  Sometimes what has appeared on the Kindle is unfindable on their web site.

And if you are a book lover, may I respectfully suggest you take a look at, and perchance subscribe to "Slightly Foxed" which you will quickly find in a web search.  It has introduced me, a literary ignoramus, to books and authors I would never otherwise have known about.

TaoPhoenix:
Back to paper vs tablets:
I'll read certain stuff like "papers" as PDFs as they show up in web links, but if I really want to dig hard into a book I feel is of major importance to me, paper is the way to go. Kindles sound seductive for "yay, I have 5,000 books on my kindle", but of course you're not going to read 5,000 books. It's about the selection on a whim. If I identify a book I feel is really important to me, paper it is. I picked up from somewhere a double system of underlining. If a whole paragraph looks useful, I draw a slightly curved line down the whole left hand side of it. (If the whole page is incredible, just fold down the page corner!). Then later if some three sentences are the key, underline them. Write notes in the margins.

Use a large nibbed blue ball point pen for "Bold" to underline certain section titles. Then stick bookmarks in various sections so you can flip back and forth at high speed comparing the "five fundamental points".

(Borrowing the marine motto) "There are 4999 other books on my Kindle, but this one is mine."

On another angle, if you're doing elusive instinct level research, I haven't seen an analogue for 7 tomes all spread out over a desk at once.

crabby3:
 ... too soon for a relyable study or survey.  wait a couple hundred years - if we're still here

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