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Disputatio

It is precisely these qualities--facilitation of change and resistance to stabilization--that have traditionally made the idea of archiving hypertextual writing problematic. Hypertext "blurs. . . conventional notions of completion" (Landow 59). Dynamic, it constantly changes in its form and content (52). Flexible, it defies ownership (Bolter 59). Thus, following pure theoretical notions of hypertext, we could argue that the potentiality of the text defies any attempt to capture it in any reclaimable form--that to do so undermines the integrity of its hypertextuality.

While this view is a reasonable one, it does not address the text's actuality, its inherent static form that is always present, but subsumed in its potentiality. Aristotle's philosophical views toward being and becoming seem to allow for preserving knowledge in any format, whether it be a static text like a print journal or CD-ROM or an evolving one like a hypertextual piece of writing.


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Thema
Philosophia
Verba Volant
Et semper et nunc
Disputatio Forma
Conjectura
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