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Ask HN: How do I expand my worldview and meet smart people online?

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Re: Ask HN: How do I expand my worldview and meet smart people online?

#41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Economist? Pretentious leftist echo-chamber. OP was asking about expanding, not shrinking their worldview

It might well be pretentious... but leftist? I guess from a certain point on the spectrum it might appear that way. My far right libertarian friend might think it's leftist...Is the editorial board on the WSJ leftist too?

Right, wsj is quite leftist as well.

That’s the problem with media - ideally it should be balanced instead of pushing particular agenda, whether it’s left or right.

To be fair, the Economist was close to it for some time. I was a fervent reader, but it was hard not to notice systemic decline in quality over years.

Re: Ask HN: How do I expand my worldview and meet smart people online?

#42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Something like that. Where would one find intelligent people exchanging their reading lists/bibliographies?

Also, course syllabii, as mentioned in my first comment here. Generally, I keep an eye (or ear) out for references which I think might prove interesting. William Ophuls, mentioned previously, was mentioned in an aside during a seminar I was listening to (posted to YouTube from a university institute of interest). I think I spent a few hours replaying the clip and trying various search variations before I got the auth…

Thank you so much for detailed response. There's a lot to think of. Cheers

Re: Ask HN: How do I expand my worldview and meet smart people online?

#43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It might well be pretentious... but leftist? I guess from a certain point on the spectrum it might appear that way. My far right libertarian friend might think it's leftist...Is the editorial board on the WSJ leftist too?

Right, wsj is quite leftist as well. That’s the problem with media - ideally it should be balanced instead of pushing particular agenda, whether it’s left or right. To be fair, the Economist was close to it for some time. I was a fervent reader, but it was hard not to notice systemic decline in quality over years.

This is today's editorial board piece from WSJ:

https://www.wsj.com/articles/randi-weingarten-flunks-the-pan...

The editorial board at WSJ meets no reasonable definition of leftist.

Re: Ask HN: How do I expand my worldview and meet smart people online?

#44

Find an area of interest or general framing question[1] and follow that. I've been online since the 1980s. I've come to feel that there's a general hierarchy of informational quality by medium. From highest to lowest: - Books. Particularly Great Books. The list at the end of Mortimer Adler's How to Read a Book is an excellent start.[2] Your library, Project Gutenberg, and the Internet Archive offer lawful access to a…

And since I'm referencing this from later discussions: it's worth noting that this advice is somewhat aspirational on my part. I don't hold to this perfectly by any stretch. It is, however, what I'm striving toward.

Goal, not attainment.

Re: Ask HN: How do I expand my worldview and meet smart people online?

#45

I recommend starting by reading. Read history, politics, fiction. Read banned books and popular books. You can expand your horizons much faster this way than trying to meet 100s of people, and it allows you to find a direction that appeals to you.

Do you know any banned books worth of reading?
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