I’ve just finished reading Os Guinness’ book Fit Bodies, Fat Minds: Why Evangelicals Don’t Think and What to Do About It. There are some good general reviews of the book on Amazon. I’d agree with some of those reviews that accept the book’s overall premise (that Evangelicals have forgotten how to think), but find it analytically thin.
A chapter on “virtual reality” in particular dates the book, as VR technology, and the dangers Guinness saw in it, never materialized. It would be interesting to hear, however, what Guinness thinks of the blogsphere. The blogsphere poses some of the same dangers as VR, in that it provides a sense of community without “real” personal contact, relies on shorthand communicative conventions, and gives voice to thought that varies widely in quality.
Yet those same qualities could equally be seen as strengths. We — me, the blogging author, and you, the readers and commentators — couldn’t have this conversation without the blogsphere. And blogging communities do tend to police quality informally, as higher quality blogs get read and cited as authoritative within the sphere. So, I would view blogging as a promising tool for evangelical intellectual renewal.