Yes
Ask HN: Are books worth it?
91–100 of 407 posts
Re: Ask HN: Are books worth it?
#92I am a fan of Goodreads and their yearly reading challenges. I’ve got about 250 books on my to read and, due to the social nature of the platform, can get new recommendations from my network.
One tip I’ve found is that, for non-fiction, if the average rating is 3.75 or higher, it’s going to be good. I’m prejudice against books lower than that and often cull before I read.
That tip doesn’t seem to apply to fiction.
Re: Ask HN: Are books worth it?
#93Books shouldn't be about absorbing "information." Think of them as intellectual obstacle courses. A good book should challenge you, either with radically new ideas or radically new viewpoints. I basically can't do serious thinking (i.e. not administrative or programming thinking but broader thinking about ideas) without reading. On the other hand, you're not going to get this experience from "Rich Dad, Poor Dad" or w…
> Thinking Fast and Slow
I thought a fair amount of this book was debunked in one way or another?
Re: Ask HN: Are books worth it?
#94The best way to access the ideas of people you cannot talk to is to find the depth in their books. I'm thoroughly enjoying reading a book on Aristotle's work. There's so many well articulated perspectives on the world that challenge and grow my own perspective on the world that I would not like to live in a place without access to hundreds of great people and their books.
The internet is like the Starbucks version of the library. Fun, exciting with lots of sugar and broad coverage but lacking quality and is probably not good to have a lot.
Re: Ask HN: Are books worth it?
#95I mostly read literature, fiction, and classics. Occasionally I read some modern science fiction and fantasy. Very rarely do I read the advice of someone that I don't know.
Fiction (and some forms of non-Fiction) are about our inner life. They help us discover questions to ask, how we feel, guide us in our understanding of others, society, and the world at large.
My favourite books tend to be about outsiders: L'Entranger, Fahrenheit 451, 20000 Leagues Under the Sea, etc... I often find myself at odds with people, with popular opinion, and sometimes even with society. Reading about these figures has given me a lot to think about my place in relation to all of these outside forces, question my own moral compass in relation to other "outsiders," and even work on understanding the nature of otherness.
I've also loved The Nature of Things, The Prince, Days by Moonlight... poetry by Allen Ginsberg, Patti Smith. They all take me places to where I can never go and leave me a different person than I was before.
Books aren't meant to be consumed. They're meant to be inhabited, lived in, worn like a favourite coat borrowed from a friend.
I can't imagine life without books.
Re: Ask HN: Are books worth it?
#96> I have thousands of non-fiction (mostly self-improvement) books in my reading list “An honest bookstore would post the following sign above its ‘self-help’ section: ‘For true self-help, please visit our philosophy, literature, history and science sections, find yourself a good book, read it, and think about it.’” — Roger Ebert ( https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/larger-than-life-1996 )
I feel the same way about education degrees.
Re: Ask HN: Are books worth it?
#97> I assume that the best part of the best books will surface in daily conversations, YouTube videos, CliffsNotes, podcasts, Reddit posts/comments, blog articles, etc
I don't think this is true. In theory, you may be able to find all the information contained in the books, but it's drowning in garbage. The benefit of books is that the information has been distilled for you. Good books distill information better than bad books.
> One issue for me is that books are a very big time investment. I read very slowly and I don't remember everything I read either.
I hardly read books any more, though I do enjoy a day of reading in the sun when it's warm. I listen to audiobooks while I'm traveling, working out, or doing housework.
> I have thousands of non-fiction (mostly self-improvement) books in my reading list on GoodReads, but almost never bother to read any.
Different folks will tell you different things, but for me, the following self-help content covered most of what I've read to date:
* Any Alan Watts lecture series - I listened to "Out of your mind" (listen to the whole thing) * The Book of Joy (Dalai Lama and Desmond TuTu) * Never split the Difference (Chris Voss) * The hard thing about hard things (Ben Horowitz)
And then read (or listen to) whatever strikes your fancy.
The concentrated focus of books makes them stick better, in my opinion, than blog posts, online commentary, etc.
Re: Ask HN: Are books worth it?
#98Books shouldn't be about absorbing "information." Think of them as intellectual obstacle courses. A good book should challenge you, either with radically new ideas or radically new viewpoints. I basically can't do serious thinking (i.e. not administrative or programming thinking but broader thinking about ideas) without reading. On the other hand, you're not going to get this experience from "Rich Dad, Poor Dad" or w…
> Thinking Fast and Slow I thought a fair amount of this book was debunked in one way or another?
I'm aware of the priming studies being debunked, but what else?
Re: Ask HN: Are books worth it?
#99Books shouldn't be about absorbing "information." Think of them as intellectual obstacle courses. A good book should challenge you, either with radically new ideas or radically new viewpoints. I basically can't do serious thinking (i.e. not administrative or programming thinking but broader thinking about ideas) without reading. On the other hand, you're not going to get this experience from "Rich Dad, Poor Dad" or w…
Thinking Fast and Slow came out in 2011. Also there is recent work showing that some of its conclusions may be flawed due to failure to replicate.
Self help books are not all bad. The early ones around cognitive behavioral therapy have been proven to help in scientific studies. I would look to ones that have scientific basis. That being said the placebo effect is very powerful.
Re: Ask HN: Are books worth it?
#100Books are also dangerous. Because the amount of effort you have to invest in a book is quite large people tend to develop biases around a book.
It's a strange phenomena. The more effort someone invests in something the higher their bias towards it. Much is the same for books.
I know of no human who has read every detail of the books war and peace or Moby dick with their own free will and came out saying that the plot was total crap. It's literally because the energy placed into finishing the book is so high that the bias is even higher.
Movie adaptations of said books will likely have terrible plots even when the plots are literally identical to the books. The only thing missing from the movies is your bias.
Note that this does not mean I am saying books are bad. They do offer things that online articles fail to offer. Just wanted to note that almost no one mentioned the dark side of investing so much time into books.