{"id":12574,"date":"2009-06-22T08:04:27","date_gmt":"2009-06-22T08:04:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2009\/06\/22\/library-stacks-open-or-closed\/"},"modified":"2009-06-22T08:04:27","modified_gmt":"2009-06-22T08:04:27","slug":"library-stacks-open-or-closed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2009\/06\/22\/library-stacks-open-or-closed\/","title":{"rendered":"Library Stacks: Open or Closed?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Some punk having badly defaced a  book I was about to check out, I had the librarian make a note to that effect lest I be accused of the barbarism.  I mentioned to the librarian that the widespread disrespect shown to public property is an argument against socialism.  He responded that it is an argument against open stacks.  He had a point, but on the other side of the question:<\/font><\/p>\n

Open library stacks allow for browsing and finding books that otherwise might have gone undetected. I was on the prowl in the BDs a while back looking for BonJour's In Defense of Pure Reason<\/em> and Searle's Mind: A Brief Introduction.<\/em> Searle's book hangs out at BD 418.3.S4. Nearby, at BD 418.3.S78, I spied <\/font>Leopold Stubenberg<\/font><\/a>, Consciousness and Qualia<\/em> (1998). Though published by an obscure press, and obviously a reworking of the author's dissertation, it is turning out to be an outstanding resource. I'm glad he wrote it, and I'm glad I found it. But I might not have, had the stacks been closed.<\/font><\/p>\n

On the other hand, open stacks allow any Tom, Dick, or Mary to cause mischief by stealing, defacing, hiding and otherwise mishandling books. A common problem is the removal of a volume and its return to the wrong position. Such a book is as as good as lost. A librarian acquaintance tells me that the problem is worse than one might think.<\/font><\/p>\n

No doubt there are other considerations relevant to the open\/closed question. But for the moment, I'm for open stacks. In a society as tolerant of bad behavior as ours is, however, one wonders how long libraries can remain unprotected.  <\/font><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Some punk having badly defaced a  book I was about to check out, I had the librarian make a note to that effect lest I be accused of the barbarism.  I mentioned to the librarian that the widespread disrespect shown to public property is an argument against socialism.  He responded that it is an argument … Continue reading “Library Stacks: Open or Closed?”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[389],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12574","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-bibliophilia"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12574","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12574"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12574\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12574"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12574"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12574"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}