Thanks Bore...

I did find something in Metalink that supports your suggestion and what another fellow said to me. But the same note also says you don't have to necessary be using RMAN as a backup solution to take advantage of this capability - you can simply use RMAN to check for corruption, which makes it cool for us who don't use RMAN for backups.

See Note 283053.1

Here's an excerpt of the note:

Quote Originally Posted by Metalink_Note_283053.1
SCOPE & APPLICATION
-------------------
This document is intended for database adminstrators of all levels.

Note: No need that RMAN has been used or setup previously. There is no need for a recovery catalog. No backup is created. Since a single channel is being allocated there is little overhead. The only requirement is that Oracle8i or later has to be used and the database is mounted open.

During a RMAN backup or RMAN 'backup validate' every block currently used or previously used is read into memory then written to another portion of memory. During this memory to memory write the block is checked for corruption. Therefore RMAN's BACKUP command with the VALIDATE and CHECK LOGICAL clauses allow a Database Adminstrator to quickly check for both physical and logical corruption.