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Rules for Choosing Nonfiction Books

herman.asia

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Re: Rules for Choosing Nonfiction Books

#71

Post by ilikehurdles »

claudiawerner wrote: post #66
Emma_Goldman wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know any of the authors you've mentioned, but in my own experience, not reading books written by journalists is a good rule of thumb . That doesn't mean, obviously, that it's impossible for a journalist to write a good book. By profession, journalism is both shallow and narrow: it focuses on the surface of events in the given moment. That tends not to equip someone with the knowledge or expertise to write a t…

As a funny counter-point, Marx was a journalist and Capital is one of the most insightful books I'm reading at the moment.

Is it a total coincidence that you bring this up responding to a user with the name Emma_Goldman?

Anyway, I definitely second your point. I wonder if “Capital in the 21st Century” will be relevant for the entire century (although doubtlessly won’t be as consequential as Marx’s series).

Re: Rules for Choosing Nonfiction Books

#72

Post by cfmcdonald »

tptacek wrote: post #16

John Carreyrou wasn't an expert on phlebotomy or biochemistry. Roger Lowenstein wasn't an expert on hedge funds or technical finance. Eric Schlosser on nuclear command and control? Nope. Woodward and Bernstein and constitutional law? Not so much! I don't think these are very good rules. I thought it was especially amusing that this person doesn't trust journalists to write about anything but journalism. If you believ…

These are heuristics. They will of course produce false negatives. Given the huge volume of available books relative to available reading time in a human life, the most important thing is to minimize false positives.

Whether the particular books you refer to are false negatives on these heuristics is of course a matter of opinion. I don't know Woodward and Bernstein's book on constitutional law; their most famous book, All the President's Men, would surely fall under a similar exception to biography/memoir, since it is an account of their own investigation.

Re: Rules for Choosing Nonfiction Books

#73

Post by pvg »

Emma_Goldman wrote: post #64
tptacek wrote: post #16

John Carreyrou wasn't an expert on phlebotomy or biochemistry. Roger Lowenstein wasn't an expert on hedge funds or technical finance. Eric Schlosser on nuclear command and control? Nope. Woodward and Bernstein and constitutional law? Not so much! I don't think these are very good rules. I thought it was especially amusing that this person doesn't trust journalists to write about anything but journalism. If you believ…

I don't know any of the authors you've mentioned, but in my own experience, not reading books written by journalists is a good rule of thumb . That doesn't mean, obviously, that it's impossible for a journalist to write a good book. By profession, journalism is both shallow and narrow: it focuses on the surface of events in the given moment. That tends not to equip someone with the knowledge or expertise to write a t…

It seems like a rule of thumb that’s served you poorly, given it’s left you unfamiliar with some of the most widely acclaimed recent (and less recent) non-fiction work.

Re: Rules for Choosing Nonfiction Books

#74

Post by cfmcdonald »

misiti3780 wrote: post #2

Interesting post, but i would say you can easily read more than 3000 books if you retire at 65 and live to be 90+. Also there are great non-fiction books by journalists that are not about journalism, a few that come to mind are Bad Blood, The Chickenshit Club, Angler, All The President's Men, books by Matt Taibbi, etc.

For similar reasons to the "time value of money" concept, books read now are worth more than books read in the future. e.g. reading GEB at 20 and having it change the course of your life to become a Computer Science Ph.D. is very different from reading it on your death bed.

Moreover, 3000 books is still only scratching the surface of all non-fiction ever published in English (let alone other languages), so strong heuristics will still be needed.

Re: Rules for Choosing Nonfiction Books

#75

Post by padolsey »

Emma_Goldman wrote: post #64
tptacek wrote: post #16

John Carreyrou wasn't an expert on phlebotomy or biochemistry. Roger Lowenstein wasn't an expert on hedge funds or technical finance. Eric Schlosser on nuclear command and control? Nope. Woodward and Bernstein and constitutional law? Not so much! I don't think these are very good rules. I thought it was especially amusing that this person doesn't trust journalists to write about anything but journalism. If you believ…

I don't know any of the authors you've mentioned, but in my own experience, not reading books written by journalists is a good rule of thumb . That doesn't mean, obviously, that it's impossible for a journalist to write a good book. By profession, journalism is both shallow and narrow: it focuses on the surface of events in the given moment. That tends not to equip someone with the knowledge or expertise to write a t…

A counterpoint to your point on shallowness and narrowness is Andrew Solomon's "Far from the Tree: Parents, Children and the Search for Identity". Journalists, ostensibly, are good at writing, interviewing, and exploring wide-ranging societal struggles. The archetype of journalist has unfortunately fallen into disrepute if they're no longer trusted as relayers of information. On reflection it may be worth distinguishing the 'columnist' archetype from the 'reporter' and 'investigator'. The latter two I value greatly. Although I also value reflection and summation. No mainstream audience wants to read a white-paper on recent Syrian conflicts. For this we need good relayers of information.

Re: Rules for Choosing Nonfiction Books

#76

Post by mc32 »

tptacek wrote: post #59
mc32 wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So, imagine if even professionals/experts in their fields are prone to mistakes, then what can we expect from people who know little about a foreign subject? Then there are things like economics where even the experts in their field can’t agree on either theory or in data interpretation. If they can’t reach consensus being informed and all, imagine someone in a different field like journalism trying to write expertly…

What book reporting on economics that wasn't written or co-written by an economist are you concerned is too influential or widely read? As we can obviously see, even professionals in medical sciences were wrong about Theranos. How did John Carreyrou, a WSJ reporter, do such a good job reporting on them?

To do journalism well, I think you need insider help: a whistleblower without ulterior motive, corroborating evidence and subject matter experts who can confirm suspicions. So, I think there are ways for journalists to marshall resources and then do their part which is to write a coherent story based on credible evidence and opinion, but much of what comes from journalism is hurried and often put together after having formed a conclusion and finding data supporting the conclusion and omitting data which would weaken the conclusion.

Re: Rules for Choosing Nonfiction Books

#78

Post by minouye »

Here's what I do. If I get a book recommendation, I immediately buy it and put it on a bookshelf. Every time I walk by, I scan the shelf and pick what speaks to me at that given time: fiction, non-fiction, cookbooks, science, history, classics, short-story collections, biographies, etc. If you match your what you read to your mood and frame of mind, you can consume and retain information much more quickly and enjoyably. And having the book on hand is really important since my interests and mood change from day to day.

I also try follow some other general rules, that work for me:

* Read several books at once, esp. across disciplines.

* Read paper books.

* You don't need to finish books. Stopping mid-way is fine (still have problems with this!)

* Seek out durable works over bestsellers (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lindy_effect)

* Read across disciplines

* Write in books and make notes. Write up notes a couple of weeks after finishing (create your own commonplace book)

* Avoid audiobooks (if you want to retain the content). I just can't retain when I listen while driving/multitasking, but like listening to fiction for fun.

* Tag interesting books/papers cited in the books you like. Look them up and read them too.

* Find interesting/prolific readers on Goodreads. Lookup the books they read, esp. the ones you've never heard of.

* Let other people know that you like reading, and ask what they've read recently. When they read interesting books, they'll recommend them to you.

Re: Rules for Choosing Nonfiction Books

#79

Post by 0000011111 »

jcoffland wrote: post #11

A trick I use to "read" books much faster is to feed them through Google's TTS but set a much higher than normal read speed. I call it robotting a book. It takes some getting used to and requires more focus but it's very efficient in terms of information dump. I've been able to increase the speed over time. My wife thinks I'm crazy. I use headphones.

Ya I started doing this while on a bicycling tour and on Air planes. Both situations I can give my brain lots of attention on absorbing the information at a faster rate because my other information inputs are not as busy.

The air plane is easiest for 2* speed because I can close my eyes which helps me focus on the sound even more.

I use Audible though.

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