An object that takes physical, material, or corporeal form can be held and seen by humans. When we describe the opposite, something that cannot be held or seen by the naked eye, words like spiritual or non-material are used. I'm looking for a word that's more specific: something to describe the sequences of numbers packed into data chips and technology whatsits.
"Information, whether of material or ________ form, can be found at the library."
Assume that the library carries books and CDs/DVDs. In order to avoid wordy descriptions, does anyone have any suggestions for a single word that can fill the blank? I avoided antonyms of "physical" because they refer to things that are otherworldly.
Best Answer
Electronic data is physical or material, even though it may not be visible. For example it may be in the form of positive and negative charges on magnetic media. I have therefore revised the left-hand side of the juxtaposition in the answers I offer:
That addresses the visibility question, but may sound too technical (and I personally find ‘human-readable’ ugly)
So it may be better to describe the difference in a more mundane manner:
or
Although ‘digital’ is frequently used to describe electronic media, it doesn’t make for a good contrast here as its opposite is generally ‘analogue’, and there are visible objects like clocks that can be either digital or analogue. Furthermore most people would not think of a book as an analogue device.