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How I read books: a guide on how to learn

denzhadanov.com

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Re: How I read books: a guide on how to learn

#61

Post by pxtail »

kungito wrote: post #27
harperlee wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree with your skepticism, and I think it is healthy, but on the other hand what is being said in the post is sensible. The best way to read this, or most of the internet really, in my opinion, is as if he were a friend, a colleague, family or an acquaintance, not as an authority; you listen politely, nod and smile, and reflect/research on your own on what it seems useful. At the end of the day, the web enabled an…

I mean, I'm visiting it because it showed up on HN high enough for some reason. It's not like I reached out to find him. And now he's in my face and I'm annoyed. I guess you could say I have anger management problems but these guys give off such a "punchable" vibe. Big smile, nice suit, lots of self promoting bullshit. And then people start calling it charisma and flock to it and we end up in the realm of populism an…

For some reason all of this induces negative emotions in me as well - it's like everyone and their mother wants to tell you how excellent they are and how you should live. Maybe it's this "write! you need to write! now!" advice which is frequently appearing on HN frontpage, maybe this is the reason why programmers with two years of experience are telling with authoritative tone 'how it should be done' It's annoying to try to filter out "fake it until you make it" lot but I'm afraid that there is no solution besides big dose of skepticism

Re: How I read books: a guide on how to learn

#62

Post by 0x445442 »

Veen wrote: post #29
kungito wrote: post #9

Sometimes I wonder how I would turn out if I did organized people stuff like this. What bothers me is these life advices always feel like bullshit. Like, check this guy out. He has his own website with a title "Den Zhadanov\nTechnology. Productivity. Inspiration.". This is life coaching 101. He writes about how burning man didn't change his life and has pictures of books on beaches. How does one take this person seri…

Your comment reminds me of something Andy Matuschak wrote: > But most people who write about note-taking don’t seem particularly accomplished in their own fields, whatever those may be. In fact, most such writers aren’t applying their notes to some exogenous creative problem: their primary creative work is writing about productivity. These writers offer advice on note-taking to help scientists and executives with the…

Yeah, it's like all the sports and horse race handicapping gurus offering their picks for a fee. If their methods were so good, why not just apply them rather than spending the extra time trying to run the meta business?

Re: How I read books: a guide on how to learn

#63

Post by jkingsbery »

While I think there are some merits to this approach, I think some caution is also needed.

There are numerous times where I've read a lot of material quickly, not really mastering it but making a mental note of where to find that later. It's easy enough to go back and look up facts, reference material, or techniques for solving a particular kind of problem later, you don't need that to change your life.

Another other problem is: it's hard to know what books will change your life. For me, Fermat's Enigma (https://www.amazon.com/Fermats-Enigma-Greatest-Mathematical-...) and The Last Lecture (https://www.amazon.com/Last-Lecture-Randy-Pausch/dp/14013232...) were both life changers, but it would have been hard to know that going in to reading them.

Still another problem is that there are multiple ways at getting repetition. One approach is to read one book really intently. Another approach though is to consume similar related media over a period of time. If you listen to a weekly podcast (like EconTalk, for one example), very often similar themes come up over and over again. Or you can read several books by one author, or a group of related authors.

Finally, and maybe this is a more minor point, the post's author mentions taking down great quotes. One thing I've realized from my reading is that great quotes sometimes help summarize and understand the flow, but pretty often they don't. One of the nice thing about reading on the Kindle app on a phone is that there are multiple colors for highlighting, and I find it helps to highlight differently for "this is an awesome quote" vs. "this sentence is important in following the structure of the argument."

Re: How I read books: a guide on how to learn

#64

Post by sharker8 »

meghdeepr wrote: post #32
mluts wrote: post #10

> Instead of reading 100 books, it’s better to find one that really changes your life. You can't know whether book will change your life or not until you read it. If you treat every book too seriously you just waste your time and kill the pleasure of reading. Everyone should master skimming and their ability to regulate "depth of understanding" based on perceived value.

Alan Kay said that you need to read bad books to know a good book. You need the context to know what makes something good and thus no reading is truly wasted.

Then there's the category "so bad it's good". "Three Cups of Tea" is The Room for books. It is a trifecta of sorts: poorly written, nonfiction, and partially falsified and debunked.

Re: How I read books: a guide on how to learn

#65

Post by Veen »

pps wrote: post #55
Veen wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He is an exception in that he wrote about note-taking from the perspective of someone who used his system to make serious contributions to systems theory and various other fields. But he's a great demonstration of Matuschak's point. Luhmnam wrote dozens of books about a wide range of topics, enabled by Zettelkasten, and then wrote a couple of essays towards the end of his career about how he did it.

> he wrote about note-taking Did he? I though we have his archive and we know how he used it (from some interview, I think). Didn't thought he wrote about it directly in his system. Do you have source on that?

Communicating with Slipboxes

http://luhmann.surge.sh/communicating-with-slip-boxes

Re: How I read books: a guide on how to learn

#66

Post by cafard »

Veen wrote: post #29
kungito wrote: post #9

Sometimes I wonder how I would turn out if I did organized people stuff like this. What bothers me is these life advices always feel like bullshit. Like, check this guy out. He has his own website with a title "Den Zhadanov\nTechnology. Productivity. Inspiration.". This is life coaching 101. He writes about how burning man didn't change his life and has pictures of books on beaches. How does one take this person seri…

Your comment reminds me of something Andy Matuschak wrote: > But most people who write about note-taking don’t seem particularly accomplished in their own fields, whatever those may be. In fact, most such writers aren’t applying their notes to some exogenous creative problem: their primary creative work is writing about productivity. These writers offer advice on note-taking to help scientists and executives with the…

Well, Jacques Barzun was an excellent writer and historian. He wrote a fair bit on writing, and his Teacher in America contains the chapters "How to Read and Be Right" and "How to Write and Be Read", both with sound advice.

Re: How I read books: a guide on how to learn

#67

Post by pps »

Veen wrote: post #65
pps wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> he wrote about note-taking Did he? I though we have his archive and we know how he used it (from some interview, I think). Didn't thought he wrote about it directly in his system. Do you have source on that?

Communicating with Slipboxes http://luhmann.surge.sh/communicating-with-slip-boxes

Thank you!

Re: How I read books: a guide on how to learn

#69

Post by accountLost »

Veen wrote: post #29
kungito wrote: post #9

Sometimes I wonder how I would turn out if I did organized people stuff like this. What bothers me is these life advices always feel like bullshit. Like, check this guy out. He has his own website with a title "Den Zhadanov\nTechnology. Productivity. Inspiration.". This is life coaching 101. He writes about how burning man didn't change his life and has pictures of books on beaches. How does one take this person seri…

Your comment reminds me of something Andy Matuschak wrote: > But most people who write about note-taking don’t seem particularly accomplished in their own fields, whatever those may be. In fact, most such writers aren’t applying their notes to some exogenous creative problem: their primary creative work is writing about productivity. These writers offer advice on note-taking to help scientists and executives with the…

On the other hand these people can sometimes lead you to some more serious material if they share their sources. Seems to be the case here with this link in the post : https://maartenvandoorn.nl/reading-guide/ (changed to the direct link to the author site to avoid medium.com)

Re: How I read books: a guide on how to learn

#70

Post by cryoshon »

cgriswald wrote: post #5

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/How_to_Read_a_Book There are plenty of useful things to learn from others to expand and supplement your approach to reading, but for a total understanding of having a relationship with a book/author, Adler can’t be beat.

i'm a huge proponent of this book. it's not just about "reading books" so much as how you should approach any piece of prose information. it's life-changing.
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