Reading is Magic, Part 2

Summary

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Armstrong & Getty On Demand

"Reading is Magic, Part 2" (May 6, 2026)

Main Theme

In this follow-up episode, Armstrong & Getty continue their exploration of the value and transformational power of reading, especially literature, in shaping abstract thinking and society at large. Building on the previous discussion, they reflect on a thought-provoking piece by Sam Kriss and delve into the alarming decline of literacy, the consequences of digital culture, and the broader societal shifts toward a post-literate world.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Link Between Literacy and Abstract Thinking

(02:17–05:15)

• Armstrong expresses his personal love for reading and notes research claiming literature benefits the brain, but questions whether a lack of such engagement truly handicaps people:

  "Most people don’t read literature and they do fine in the world and did before literature came along and well after." (Armstrong, 02:17)

• Getty references a Sam Kriss essay about Soviet scientists observing a remote, illiterate community unable to think abstractly. This leads into a discussion about how reading fosters abstraction—thinking beyond direct experience.
• Mike the Lawyer’s story about scientific discovery highlights the importance of abstract thought, even in scientific fields:

  "My favorite chemistry professor pointed out that the great scientists also could think abstractly... Faraday had a dream of a snake circling around and grabbing its tail. And then he thought, 'Wow, maybe it’s ring shaped.'" (Getty paraphrasing, 03:29)

2. The Declining State of Literacy

(05:15–10:09)

• Getty summarizes Kriss’s concerns: U.S. literacy peaked in 2014 and has been declining, with 40% of fourth graders below basic reading abilities.
• Even "mechanics" of reading (decoding words) are failing, but deeper is the inability to process and think in "text-like" ways.
• Professors at elite universities report students unable to read entire novels, or even short pieces, relying instead on AI for comprehension and essays:

  “They’re willing to pay $300,000 for the privilege of dumping an entire text into ChatGPT." (Getty/quoting Kriss, 06:31)

• An eye-opening study: only 5% of English majors at two Kansas universities could show detailed literal understanding of Dickens' Bleak House's first seven paragraphs.

3. Loss of Metaphorical and Abstract Comprehension

(07:33–09:56)

• The difficulty students have understanding figurative language (e.g., interpreting a metaphor about a "megalosaurus" in Dickens) is discussed:

  “They could only read the sentence with the assumption that Dickens was describing the presence of an actual prehistoric reptile in Victorian London.” (Getty, 08:10)

• Getty stresses: Bleak House was once "mass entertainment," thus this is not an issue with elitism, but a societal shift.

4. Technology, Culture Shift, and the End of the Reading Era

(09:56–14:30)

• Kriss’s point: communication technology (first TV, now internet and AI) accelerates the move away from reading.
• Armstrong and Getty discuss their personal journeys with reading—Getty’s nostalgia for love of reading, Armstrong’s conscious effort to rekindle that muscle:

  "When I first started back up again a couple of years ago, it was hard. Really hard." (Armstrong, 10:53)

• Emphasis on generational differences: many young people may have never experienced reading as enjoyable.

5. Societal and Political Implications of Post-Literacy

(12:24–15:52)

• Kriss warns: a population with diminished literacy loses the ability for abstract, critical thought vital for democracy—risking a fallback to "tribal headcount" politics.

  "All democratic politics assume a literate population... Without that, democracy becomes a kind of tribal headcount or a struggle for state resources." (Getty/quoting Kriss, 13:31)

• The end of literacy means the end of public reason. A post-literate world could become "unreasonable, irrational, full of anger and madness, and people eating each other in the streets." (Getty, 13:32)
• Armstrong is skeptical but concerned:

  "Will we be a post literate world? Hundred percent. Hundred percent." (Armstrong, 14:10)

6. The (Un)Reality of Future Perception

(14:30–15:52)

• Kriss (via Getty) speculates that the post-literature world will be shaped entirely by AI-generated images—our "direct sensory experience" becomes unreal:

  "We will no longer try to think outside of the things we can see. It’s just that absolutely nothing we see will be real." (Getty/quoting Kriss, 15:40)

• Armstrong notes the danger: “Those who control what we see are in control of our entire perception of reality.” (Armstrong, 15:43)

7. AI and the Vanishing Need for Human Creativity

(17:53–19:29)

• Armstrong and Getty riff on the speed, ease, and cost-effectiveness of AI-generated ads, and how "there'll be no human beings in practically anything soon."
• Even local advertising is now lagging behind what AI can generate.
• Getty concludes, “Nobody’s gonna read," and both agree mass reading is unlikely ever to return.

8. The Memetic Present: "Tongue, Tongue Sahur"

(19:38–20:49)

• Getty investigates the reference to "Tongue, Tongue Sahur," discovering it’s a viral AI meme and Internet cartoon—symbolizing the new, shared ‘spiritual knowledge’ of digital generations, replacing traditional literary knowledge.
• Armstrong jokes about referencing it with his kids to see if he can gain cred.

9. Memories of Literary Guidance

(20:59–21:22)

• Getty reminisces about school librarians and learning the Dewey Decimal System—implying these foundational experiences are vanishing.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• "Most people don’t read literature and they do fine... But there are claims that literature does things to your brain."
  — Armstrong (02:17)
• "The great scientists also could think abstractly... An appreciation for art and music helps us advance our scientific knowledge.”
  — Getty, quoting Professor Zumdal (03:29)
• “Professors at elite universities increasingly report their students are no longer capable of reading an entire novel... Instead, they’re willing to pay $300,000 for the privilege of dumping an entire text into ChatGPT and submitting its responses and essay.”
  — Getty, from Sam Kriss (06:31)
• "It was mass entertainment at the time. And when Dickens visited America in 1867, over 100,000 people paid to see him speak."
  — Getty (09:36)
• "The end of literacy is the end of public reason. A post-literate world will be unreasonable, irrational, full of anger and madness, and people eating each other in the streets."
  — Getty (13:32)
• "Will we be a post literate world? Hundred percent. Hundred percent. If not basically there already... That age of reading lasted 300 years and it’s over and it will never return."
  — Armstrong (14:10)
• "We will no longer try to think outside of the things we can see. It’s just that absolutely nothing we see will be real."
  — Getty, quoting Kriss (15:40)
• "Those who control what we see are in control of our entire perception of reality, which is, you know, kind of obvious."
  — Armstrong (15:43)
• "Nobody’s gonna read. They just aren’t. That’s never coming back."
  — Getty & Armstrong (19:29–19:30)

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Timestamps for Critical Segments

• [02:17] – Armstrong: Literature and the brain, intro to abstract thinking
• [03:29] – Mike's story: Science and abstraction; Faraday’s discovery
• [06:31] – Decline in literacy; AI replacing reading in higher ed
• [08:10] – Students misread Dickens; Loss of metaphorical comprehension
• [09:36] – Dickens as a "global celebrity"; comparison to today’s students
• [13:31] – Political and democratic dangers of post-literacy
• [14:10] – Armstrong predicts reading’s decline is irreversible
• [15:40] – Quote: "Nothing we see will be real" – the AI-simulated future
• [19:38] – "Tongue, Tongue Sahur" as symbol of new cultural literacy
• [21:19] – Dewey Decimal System memories; end of traditional library skills

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Conclusion

Armstrong and Getty's discussion is a sober, at times humorous, but ultimately thought-provoking journey through the consequences of a society losing its capacity for deep reading and abstract thought. Using personal anecdotes, academic studies, and the lens of cultural criticism, they link the decline in literacy not just to educational shortcomings, but to existential questions about democracy, culture, and what it means to experience reality in an AI-dominated world.

The episode closes with a nostalgic look back at the era when librarians taught the Dewey Decimal System and a resigned acknowledgment that mass reading, as a cultural pillar, is likely gone for good.

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For further reading, the hosts promise to post the full text of the Sam Kriss essay at armstrongandgetty.com.

Transcript

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[Armstrong]

sale prohibited views is a vapor product website restricted to age 21 plus tobacco consumers. Copyright 2026 RJRVC Part two of Reading is Magic.

[Getty]

It's One more thing Armstrong and Getty One more thing. I

[Armstrong]

love reading practically more than just about anything on earth and at this point in my life and I came across a good thing on why literature is good for your brain. I haven't brought it on the air because I don't know if anybody cares, but there are claims and it kind of fits in with what you were talking about yesterday and today that literature does does things to your brain that are good for you overall. But but most people don't read literature and they do fine in the world and and did before literature came along and well after it's gone. So I Don't know. I don't know what I think of it.

[Getty]

You got to define your terms, do fine and stuff. Well, it depends on your personality type of thing. But anyway, if you missed yesterday's One More Thing podcast, just grab it and listen to it now and then. This is part two of that discussion. Long story short, absolutely brilliant piece of writing by fellow by the name of Sam Chris with a K, K, R, I, S, S, who's talking about scientists from the Soviet Union who went into a remote village that was completely illiterate and found to his shock that the people had a tremendous problem thinking abstractly at all. And again, we covered that the last time around.

[Armstrong]

What does that mean, thinking abstractly?

[Getty]

Oh my gosh. Well, well, we gave a bunch of examples yesterday and presumably people have just listened to that. So I don't want to go through it again. Anything outside of their direct personal experience, the ability to imagine other things and other ways of approaching whatever. But I want to start with this note from Mike, the lawyer from Chicago, longtime friend of mine and of the shows. He really enjoyed it. He said, I wanted to share something I learned as an undergrad. As a chemistry major. Most of us thought very literally, using mathematics and science and not really thinking outside the box because we were looking for an absolute answer. My favorite chemistry professor, Steven Zumdal, pointed out that the great scientists also could think abstractly. Michael Faraday, for instance, discovered benzene, which is a ring shaped organic compound. Nobody could figure out scientifically what the structure was because of the number of carbons and hydrogen didn't add up properly. Faraday had a dream of a snake circling around and grabbing its tail. And then he thought, wow, maybe it's ring shaped. And he took a look and sure enough, the professor then explained how an appreciation for art and music helps us advance our scientific knowledge. So that's good, Professor.

[Armstrong]

My son's good at. One of my kids in particular is really good at that abstract thinking. I will do something and it's embarrassing often. Why do you do it that way? I say, what if you did this first, then that, that would be a lot better and faster and I just never thought of it.

[Getty]

Yeah, that's my, my go to consultant for that is my wife. So anyway, we ended up the last Yesterday is one more thing with the discussion of how in these remote, completely literate areas there were formerly scientists, astronome, mathematicians, poets, etc. But those folks had vanished from the world along with the sophisticated literary culture, et cetera, et cetera. So anyway, Chris writes Today, the same thing seems to be happening to us. The kids can't read. I don't mean they're incapable of sounding out letters and forming them into words, although an increasing proportion of them can't do that either. In the U.S. literacy peaked around 2014 has been sliding since 40% of fourth graders have below basic reading abilities, which means they struggle to extract any meaning from a written text. The number of illiterate students has been rising every year since 2014. Part of that is rampant illegal immigration. But anyway, don't want to get hung up on that. But even when students can perform the mechanics of reading, it no longer seems to make their minds start working in text like ways. It's an entirely different set of technologies producing their mental processes. And when they come to the written word, they come to it from the outside. And he gets into how. Professors at elite universities increasingly report their students are no longer capable of reading an entire novel or even a a 30 page extract. Some of them have difficulty making it through a single sentence. Instead of reading and understanding anything, they're willing to pay $300,000 for the privilege of dumping an entire text into ChatGPT and submitting its responses and essay. Probably the most alarming index of this was a study in which a group of English majors. Holy cow. At two well regarded public universities in Kansas. We can guess what they are. It's not like there are 70 of them in Kansas. Were expected to read the first seven paragraphs of Bleak House by Charles Dickens and explain after every sentence what they thought was happening. Only 5% of the students could produce a detailed literal understanding of the text. 1 out of 20. The rest were either patching together vague impressions from a bunch of half understood phrases or could not comprehend anything at all.

[Armstrong]

Yipes.

[Getty]

In specifico, one particular stumbling block was the novel's third sentence which describes London in December. I will read that sentence to you now. As much mud in the streets as if the waters had but newly retired from the face of the earth. And it would not be wonderful to meet a megalosaurus 40ft long or so, waddling like an elephant elephantine lizard up Holborn Hill. The students found this figurative language impossible. They can only read the sentence with the assumption that Dickens was describing the presence of an actual prehistoric reptile in Victorian London.

[Armstrong]

Wow.

[Getty]

You know, in their defense, and boy, I love kicking the young. But in their defense, words like fantastic or in this case wonderful had a different meaning at the time. And you can get hung up on that a little bit because he means Wonderful as in like we would use the word astounding. It would not be astounding to meet a megalosaurus 40ft long or so, waddling like an elephantine lizard. A pole hill. Think they might get that more. But anyway, they. They couldn't get that. It was a metaphor. One respondent glossed it like this quote. It's probably some kind of an animal or something or another. So, yup, I think we've encountered some kind of an animal. These characters have met in the street. The study assessed this person is a competent rather than a problematic reader because they'd at least managed to form an idea of what the text meant, even if it was wrong. Wow. And then he gets closer to his point. He points out that Bleak House is not an elitist text. It was mass entertainment at the time. And when Dickens visited America in 1867. 1867, over 100,000 people paid to see him speak.

[Armstrong]

Often called the world's first worldwide celebrity. Dickens.

[Getty]

Yeah, yeah. Anyway. Today, a person studying English literature at a degree level responds to his work in essentially the same way as an illiterate Uzbek peasant in the 1930s, incapable of thinking outside of immediate sensory reality.

[Armstrong]

I'm going to say to my kids the next time I'm disappointed in them. You're like an illiterate Uzbek peasant from the. Whenever the 18th century.

[Getty]

Your face is an illiterate. But Uzbek peasant in the 1930s, they'd reply, and here it comes. The situation is not likely to get better. Every advance in communications technology creates a new generation of people progressively more divorced from the abstractions of writing. In the late 20th century, television was bad enough to inspire jeremiads like Neil Postman's Entertaining Ourselves to Death. Excellent book I read at the time. Now it seems almost benign. Our supposed cultural elites keep congratulating themselves on their ability to watch an entire episode of a prestige drama without distractedly poking at their phones, as if Mad Men were a kind of penitential mental gruel. Wow. That's some good writing. I'm old enough to remember the first time I ever went online, and a lot of my contemporaries seem to have the same story. They love to read as children, but mysteriously lost interest in books around the time that permanent broadband connections started appearing in every home. Interestingly, you're. You're kind of the opposite, aren't you?

[Armstrong]

I've had to work at it, though.

[Getty]

Yeah, true. Yeah.

[Armstrong]

I had to make it had to be a goal was to reintroduce myself to reading and long form. Reading and do it on a regular basis because when I first started back up again a couple of years ago

[Getty]

is hard, really hard. And I think, to Mr. Chris's point, I'm reading Tim Sandifer's fabulous new book, Proclaiming Liberty. I want to say Declaring Liberty, because.

[Armstrong]

Claiming liberty.

[Commercial Voice]

Proclaim.

[Getty]

I finally got it right. Proclaiming Liberty. And it was a bit of a struggle at first. After about five, ten minutes, I get into the groove and I'm really good at it.

[Armstrong]

Yeah, you got to break through that first few minutes because I was a

[Getty]

voracious reader, like for my entire life. A kid, a youngster, a college student who's, you know, most of their intellectual consciousness has been post Internet and God helped them post smartphone.

[Armstrong]

And you've probably never had reading as an enjoyable experience ever, once in your life. So what would draw you to it?

[Getty]

So they're not waking up an old muscle like I am. They're trying to develop a completely new one.

[Armstrong]

I'm so excited. My son finding a book that can grab people, you know, getting them into reading is the challenge, really, to get started, I think. And my son is super into dinosaurs, is reading the original Jurassic park book, which is supposed to be really good. I've never read it. The actual book. Michael Crichton, anyway, he loves it. He can't. He can't stop reading it. I'm just so happy. Thank God he's reading an actual book.

[Getty]

All right, here's the why it matters.

[Armstrong]

And also their eyesight. So good that they can sit down with those paperbacks, with those tiny little print in a dimly lit room and read them, which I can't do anymore.

[Getty]

Oh, please. No, no. Speaking of torture bar. Okay, here's why it matters. And I wish we had. I suppose we have time to read the whole thing, but I don't know if anybody wants to hear it. But he points out that this is not a world we're prepared for. Oh, he says. He talks about what we just talked about. Kids who don't have those muscles. What about the cohorts? They can't parse complex sentences. At least they can identify words. But what about the cohorts who don't have a gaping hole in their education at 12, but at 6? What happens when the babies currently being raised AI powered dolls grow up when it's their turn to govern the world? This is not a world we're prepared for. All democratic politics assume a literate population, people who are willing to think in abstract terms about the kind of world they want to live in and and though I would add in the ability to shape the future too, even if they're not going to be in it. Without that, democracy becomes a kind of tribal headcount or a struggle for state resources between competing patronage.

[Armstrong]

Sounds right.

[Getty]

This is what lies behind a lot of the growing liberal panic over the decline of literacy. For a growing chorus of people who write in the Atlantic, we're recoiling into pre Enlightenment conditions of absolute domination. A population that can no longer think for itself will end up voluntarily ceding power to strongmen or demagogues. The end of literacy is the end of public reason. A post literate world will be unreasonable, irrational, full of anger and madness, and people eating each other in the streets.

[Armstrong]

Ding. Don't know if I'm certain that that second half will happen in a post literate world.

[Getty]

What the cannibalism?

[Armstrong]

If I had to bet, I'd bet probably we're going to go that direction. Will we be a post literate world? Hundred percent. Hundred percent. We're if not basically there already. The age of reading lasted 300 years and it's over and it will never return.

[Getty]

There are many paragraphs to this. We'll post the entire [e-mail] I'm just going to hit you with his conclusion. Getting Back to Marshall McLuhan, I think McLuhan was right that the post literature age will have more in common with primitive society than it does with the industrial modernity that produced it. After writing, we will once again live in a world defined entirely by our direct sensory experience. But now our direct sensory experience won't be of the things that physically surround us, but the images streaming through our phones. Bones, it's likely that before very long, absolutely, all those images will be generated by AI in the same way that a Tolstovian peasant has a deep spiritual knowledge of the land, we will have a deep spiritual knowledge of tongue. Tongue, Tongue Sahor. I don't even know what that is. I hope I'm allowed to say that on a podcast. I have a feeling it's something very internety. The politics of the future will be cautious, conservative, pragmatic and unadventurous, grounded in empirical experience instead of fanatical ideology. We will no longer try to think outside of the things we can see. It's just that absolutely nothing we see will be real. Oh my.

[Armstrong]

Yeah, I don't see how this doesn't happen.

[Getty]

Therefore, those who control what we see are in control of our entire perception of reality, which is, you know, kind of obvious.

[Armstrong]

It's a celebration 250 years in the

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making and we want everyone in America, from Maine to Montana, from Alabama to Alaska to be a part of it.

[Armstrong]

This year marks America's 250th anniversary and we're coming together from coast to coast at star spangled events, live performances and the largest day of giving in American history.

[Commercial Voice]

Join the nationwide celebration at america250.org

[Podcast Announcer]

what if your next favorite hobby came with a built in crew? That's cornhole. Whether you're brand new to the game or just looking for an excuse to get outside, there's a whole world of players out there ready to welcome you in. Local leagues, weekend tournaments, backyard throwdowns. It's all happening near you. Find your people at your next [e-mail] events. New hobby, new friends. Same you just having a lot more fun.

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[Armstrong]

I was watching an ad yesterday for some minor clothing outlet they they couldn't have. They're an upstart. They couldn't have a ton of money to spend. They had this unbelievable ad that was obviously AI with the AI Rugged man model wearing their stuff and all that that I'm sure they put together for free. And I thought this is clearly there'll be no human beings and practically anything soon because why would there be? Why would you even have the time to have somebody drive across town to film something when you can just pick the man or woman, put them in the clothes you want, have them say what you want and you're done?

[Getty]

Yeah, this is much less important than the discussion, but I heard a jingle on the radio the other day and it was like, not a good one. Like, where did you get those singers? And who wrote that? Like, do you not read the papers? I mean, do you not. Do you not have access to the Internet? There's.

[Armstrong]

Oh, you're thinking that humans made it and you're thinking AI could have done a much better job.

[Getty]

It was like if a hardware store with two locations in a very small city in America had like hired a couple of gals from the church choir and dashed off a quick jingle. Right? It was just not good. And I was like, dudes, meanwhile, have

[Armstrong]

you heard of AI Hanson Crafts? Sounds like it came out of a la studio songs for our end of our show every single day.

[Getty]

Oh, yeah, yeah.

[Armstrong]

But yeah, with all that going on, no, nobody's gonna read.

[Getty]

I'm a hundred percent.

[Armstrong]

People aren't going to read. They just aren't. That's never coming back. I. I can't even imagine the scenario where that's ever going to come back.

[Getty]

And all they'll have is a deep spiritual knowledge of tongue. Tongue. Tongue Sahor.

[Armstrong]

Are you gonna look that up real quick?

[Getty]

I'm gonna look that up real quick.

[Armstrong]

Something obscene. Oh, my God. Sexual act in which you get a dog and a woman. And you what? Can't say this.

[Getty]

Oh, thank you. I like dogs and women, but I like to keep them separate. Oh, it appears to be an AI cartoon character that's popular. Yeah, it's kind of funky looking.

[Armstrong]

I feel like I've seen that. Okay. Must be really popular.

[Commercial Voice]

Yeah.

[Armstrong]

Okay. The point is something young people like.

[Getty]

Speaking of being online. Tongue. Tongue Tung Sahur, sometimes shortened to Tongue Tung Sahur or Triple T, is a viral Internet meme. It was introduced, blah, blah, blah. The character has since been featured in many songs and video games including Steal a Brain Rot and Fortnite.

[Armstrong]

I gotta throw that at my kids today. Like, just offhand, like I know what it is. What would Tongue, Tongue Tongues think of this?

[Getty]

Triple T. You'll never remember the name.

[Armstrong]

What would Triple T think of this? That's what I'll say. See if my high school son rolls his eyes at me so hard they get stuck in the back of his head.

[Getty]

67 references.

[Armstrong]

That's right.

[Getty]

It's 6. 7.

[Armstrong]

He would jump out of the car,

[Getty]

throw himself into traffic.

[Armstrong]

No, get it wrong.

[Getty]

Say seven.

[Armstrong]

Six. That's what my parents would do. Yeah. Anyway, as a young kid, I remember the school librarian teaching us the Dewey

[Getty]

decimal system and the difference between fiction and nonfiction books.

[Armstrong]

There you go.

[Getty]

Those days are gone.

[Armstrong]

Well, I guess that's it. It's a celebration 250 years in the making.

[Commercial Voice]

And we want everyone in America, from Maine to Montana, from Alabama to Alaska, to be a part of it.

[Armstrong]

This year marks America's 250th anniversary, and we're coming together from coast to coast at star spangled events, live performances, and the largest day of giving in American history.

[Commercial Voice]

Join the nationwide [e-mail]

[Getty]

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law shop [e-mail] because summer's too short for bad cornhole. Most Mother's Day gifts end up in a drawer, but a song lives in the heart forever. This year, tryjoybox.com is giving away 1 million free custom songs to celebrate 1 million incredible moms. Just share a few memories and joy. Box produces an original track in greeting card just for her. Instantly, it's the most personal gift you'll ever give. And right now, it's completely free. Make mom the star of her own [e-mail] 1,000,000 songs $0 [e-mail] Warning.

[Armstrong]

This product contains nicotine. Nicotine is an addictive chemical.

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At Views we're vapor. Done right, always simple, always in your pocket so you can focus on what really matters. Like getting back to your podcast. Find out [e-mail] that's v u s

[Armstrong]

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