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The Need to Read

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Re: The Need to Read

#71

Post by rukuu001 »

udkl wrote: post #20

I don't read entire non-fiction books anymore but just search for it's summaries or notes. Most non-fiction books revolve around a few central ideas. Once you internalize this you realize it isn't necessary to read the entire book. You just need to read the summary and notes that someone else has written. For eg : I'm currently going through the book notes that Derek Sivers has written and just posted this last night…

If you're reading for previously unknown info, that's great.

I think though that some books have a large potential benefit (I'm thinking of Mindset right now) because they spend a few 10's of thousands of words changing your mind. Summaries won't have the same effect.

Re: The Need to Read

#72

Post by Nition »

hackuser wrote: post #70
Nition wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have another example of this sort of thing that I came across recently. There is much talk here in New Zealand, as there is in the US, about the possibility of a Universal Basic Income. Looking it up, I found a relatively short investigation into the idea commissioned by the government back in 2010[1], that has more real statistics and conclusions than all the other talk I've ever seen put together. What you call "…

Thanks; agreed; exactly the sort of thing I'm talking about. > the punishment for reading this stuff is the pain of living in a world full of people commenting who "didn't read the article." :p Yup. And watch them take us blindly into calamity after calamity because they can't be bothered to click a link.

This sort of thing pops up everywhere, I'm glad you pointed it out in words here because it's made me think about it a bit more clearly myself.

For instance you get programming threads where people will spend pages arguing about whether something is more efficient than something else, hours of their time, before someone finally spends five minutes running an actual benchmark.

Re: The Need to Read

#73

Post by tristanho »

Very insightful article. I find it crazy how few people I know read. Successful people seem to unanimously agree with the article that books are "one of the best ways to engage with the world, become a better person and understand life’s questions, big and small".

From Warren Buffett[0] to patio11[1] to Bill Gates[2] to Patrick/John Collison [3][4] it seems incredibly rare to find a successful investor/CEO/founder who _doesn't_ read.

Yet for some reason almost no one (especially not my friends in their early 20s!) reads. I'd like to understand why, if anyone has any ideas? I think the obvious argument is social media and shortening attention spans, but it's probably more nuanced than that.

[0] Warren Buffett apparently spends 80% of his day reading [1] "This makes buying books a stupidly high ROI, assuming you read and get value out of them." from https://training.kalzumeus.com/newsletters/archive/investing... [2] Bill Gates reads a book a week, from http://www.businessinsider.com/bill-gates-favorite-books-201... [3]http://www.johncollison.ie/2013reading.html [4]https://patrickcollison.com/bookshelf

By the way, I'm working on a tool that makes it easier to keep track of what you're reading and discover who's read what. I'd love to chat with any active readers on HN and hear about your reading pain points (I'm at me@tristanhomsi.com ).

Re: The Need to Read

#75

Post by udkl »

rukuu001 wrote: post #71
udkl wrote: post #20

I don't read entire non-fiction books anymore but just search for it's summaries or notes. Most non-fiction books revolve around a few central ideas. Once you internalize this you realize it isn't necessary to read the entire book. You just need to read the summary and notes that someone else has written. For eg : I'm currently going through the book notes that Derek Sivers has written and just posted this last night…

If you're reading for previously unknown info, that's great. I think though that some books have a large potential benefit (I'm thinking of Mindset right now) because they spend a few 10's of thousands of words changing your mind . Summaries won't have the same effect.

Since you mention mindset, here are Derek's notes on the book : https://sivers.org/book/Mindset

The central idea of the book is revealed in it's description on Amazon : Dweck shows how success in school, work, sports, the arts, and almost every area of human endeavor can be dramatically influenced by how we approach our goals. People with a fixed mindset—those who believe that abilities are fixed—are far less likely to flourish than those with a growth mindset—those who believe that abilities can be developed through hard work, good strategies, and mentorship. Mindset reveals how great parents, teachers, managers, and athletes can put this idea to use to foster outstanding accomplishment.

And then Derek's detailed notes will help me understand the sub-ideas presented by the author as well as any relevant and interesting examples.

Re: The Need to Read

#76

Post by pnathan »

sedachv wrote: post #58
udkl wrote: post #20

I don't read entire non-fiction books anymore but just search for it's summaries or notes. Most non-fiction books revolve around a few central ideas. Once you internalize this you realize it isn't necessary to read the entire book. You just need to read the summary and notes that someone else has written. For eg : I'm currently going through the book notes that Derek Sivers has written and just posted this last night…

> Most non-fiction books revolve around a few central ideas. That only applies to business, popular history, popular psychology, self-help, etc. books written for the mass market. Not surprisingly most of them are garbage and frequently wrong. Malcolm Gladwell's books are probably the most well known in this geanra and IMO are garbage. As soon as you start reading serious non-fiction (mathematics, psychology, philoso…

> As soon as you start reading serious non-fiction (mathematics, psychology, philosophy) summaries just do not work. The "book about the book" in fact tends to be much longer in length (good examples: anything on Wittgenstein, anything on Galois theory)

Strong concur. Any serious work is a nuanced beast that demands grappling with and considering.

Re: The Need to Read

#77

Post by pnathan »

tristanho wrote: post #73

Very insightful article. I find it crazy how few people I know read. Successful people seem to unanimously agree with the article that books are "one of the best ways to engage with the world, become a better person and understand life’s questions, big and small". From Warren Buffett[0] to patio11[1] to Bill Gates[2] to Patrick/John Collison [3][4] it seems incredibly rare to find a successful investor/CEO/founder wh…

I read a good deal more than my peer group; my current reading queue is more measured in feet at this pages, and I expect to get through it.

I'm radically uninterested in 'social' or 'web' as it pertains to reading. A command line tool that interacts with org-mode to take notes and serve as a memex UI would be useful to manage sourcing and linkage of ideas.

Re: The Need to Read

#78

Post by dEnigma »

punnerud wrote: post #42

If you can't read, try this link: https://www.google.no/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd...

Thank you, exactly what I was looking for in the comments. I don't want to subscribe for a single article, but I might do it in the future if more articles pop up that sound as interesting as this one.

Re: The Need to Read

#80

Post by rukuu001 »

udkl wrote: post #75
rukuu001 wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're reading for previously unknown info, that's great. I think though that some books have a large potential benefit (I'm thinking of Mindset right now) because they spend a few 10's of thousands of words changing your mind . Summaries won't have the same effect.

Since you mention mindset, here are Derek's notes on the book : https://sivers.org/book/Mindset The central idea of the book is revealed in it's description on Amazon : Dweck shows how success in school, work, sports, the arts, and almost every area of human endeavor can be dramatically influenced by how we approach our goals. People with a fixed mindset—those who believe that abilities are fixed—are far less likely…

That's good (I just read the notes) for understanding the ideas and seeing some good examples that demonstrate those ideas.

The thing is, I'd hate for anyone to miss the experience I had with that book - I really & honestly put myself in the growth-mindset camp, but the book taught me how to see the many, many areas of my life that I had a fixed mindset about.

It's one of the few books that has literally changed my life, so like I said, I'd hate to see people missing out on that (assuming they're in need of it!) by reading a summary.

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