Dear Jim, I much appreciated your comments. Many of them valid, but
for some of us older folks, the technology now available to the blind
and visually impaired it has been a "God-send". At age 80 I have been
legally blind for the last 8 years (20/400). I have always been an
active vigorous person in all of my adult life. Everything I did was
dependent on excellent clear vision. WW 2 pilot training instructor,
B-24 Pilot Commander, retired US Air Force LtCol at age 58.
Self-employed in three successful business activities. All of my adult
life I depended on good vision for these accomplishments. THE last ten
years I worked in residential property management for a privately owned
family investment trust. Good vision was paramount to success. As an
avocation I continued to fly light planes, cross-country motor cycling,
dirt biking the sand dunes of the California desert in addition to back
packing and camping in some of the wilderness areas.
In less than 30 days my life was shut down due to blindness.
Today, my life has new meaning, a reason to be alive. I am again
active in my daily life. I rebelled at making pottery, threading
needles and told I couldn't use power tools etc.
What am I tryig to say...
1. Without todays expanding adaptibe technology I would be siting in my
lounge chair, flipping the renote on ny TV, waiting for a reader (very
expensive) to manage my personal life.
2. Technology and other avenues of opportunity allows me to pay bills
automatically, get cash at the supermarket, travel extensively, local
and cross country with a white cane and a vigorus application of asking
for assistance when necessary.
3. And much more.
he responce to your very valid (for You) comments to the NFB article is
appreciated by myself. Especially the use of "Common Sense" as an
solution to adjusting to blindness at any age. I detest the old
doggerel, "you cannot teach an old dog new tricks." First of all we
are not dogs. But, more importantly, we are not learning new trick!
But, we are finding new ways to live successful and healthy lives.
For example, I grew up and lived in an age where I never had to learn
touch typing, dictation to a compent secretary or a clerk typest took
care of what I used to call "grunt work".
Today, I used my tech assistance to read your e-mail, write this tirade
and have a lot of fun doing it. I dread to think of what my life would
be like if technology had only advance to where it was as short as 20
years ago.
HOORAY! for technology, HOORAAY! FOR progress, HOORAY! the good old
ways, HOORAY! living in today's world, but the biggest HOORAY! goes to
good old "COMMON SENSE". It will never go out of style.
Thanks, Jim. Gordon Wahl
####
Jim Shaffer wrote:
>
> As I read this article, I was struck by the author's misunderstanding of
> technology for the blind, and what it can do for us. Blind people have, of
> late, become dependent upon the technological solutions to blindness, and
> have lost sight of the larger picture. It seems to me that the NFB was
> attempting to present this larger picture. Many of us have been finding
> solutions to problems for years, sometimes using high tech solutions, but
> often using simple common sense.
>
> As a college student in the early 1970s, I got a double major in physics
> and math, not by using any great technological solutions, but by simply
> using my Braille skills, and, yes, by using readers. The author made
> reference to Mr. Maurer's statement that a human interface, a reader, is
> still the best way to get reading done. This was certainly true for me,
> and would still be true today. All the technology we have still can't
> describe the diagrams I often encountered in my studies, nor could it have
> rendered the complex mathematical formulas I had to deal with. I went
> through college using readers, and a slate and stylus. Today I use a
> Braille Lite to take notes, but I used to get along fine with my slate when
> that was what I had, and I could still do that today.
>
> As a further example, it is known that, even with the Kurzweil or Open Book
> software, it is often necessary to play around with the scanner settings
> before you can get a usable scan. Wouldn't it often be simpler to simply
> get a reader and do the job? It is just not practical for me to use
> scanning software to, for example, pay my bills that come by mail. I've
> found it far more efficient to get a reader for a couple of hours and go
> right through the mail.
>
> I wonder just what technology he expected. The NFB's technology center has
> screen readers, Braille printers, note takers, scanners, and all that. But
> the important thing is for the blind user to believe in himself or herself,
> and all the technology in the world won't change that. It seems to me from
> reading the article that that was what the NFB was trying to
> demonstrate. Experiences such as cooking and using power tools while
> wearing a blind fold were designed to do just that. Even the author
> admitted that the students did better than he expected under the blind
> fold. If they went home with an increased sense of their abilities as
> blind people, then the NFB accomplished far more than it could have ever
> done by simply demonstrating technological solutions to a few problems
> blind people face.
>
> --
> Jim Shaffer
> home phone: (512)989-5701
> work phone: (512)989-5537
> e-mail: [log in to unmask]
> url: www.jjshaffer.net
>
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VICUG-L is the Visually Impaired Computer User Group List.
To join or leave the list, send a message to
[log in to unmask] In the body of the message, simply type
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