131–140 of 310 posts
Two: I think the internet is shortening everyone's attention span. Reading a whole book helps address that. At least for me, its helping.
I have an almost-four year old child and not a lot of downtime. I used to listen to podcasts when I was doing dishes, cleaning the house, walking the dog, etc. I've mostly abandoned podcasts in favor of audiobooks. It didn't feel like they were benefiting me in any meaningful way—almost like they were just empty calories for my ears. I finally made it all the way through The Power Broker recently, which I've wanted t…
My problem has been that once I started doing the audiobooks/podcasts, it has been really hard to reclaim my focus to read. I used to be able to power through books. Now, there always seems to be a distraction at hand.
This is actually one of the best ways to reinforce knowledge, if that's what you're reading for. Especially if you are reading about different, but related, topics. The idea is that you do a little bit of forgetting between reading sessions of a book and then have to force some recall of where you were at when you pick up the book a few days later, which reinforces the memory of what you've read.
WRT reading multiple books on different but related topics, you're giving yourself more material to build a working mental model of something, so if you're trying to teach yourself calculus, you'll probably learn it much better when you're reading it along with, say, a book on the history of rocketry, and/or a book on astronomy. The topics reinforce and integrate nicely with one another because of the big overlap with the mental models used -- learning something in rocketry or astronomy gives you a place to tie in something you learn from calculus, for instance. They're also different enough to give your mind a break so you have to practice some recall of what you've already gone over when you pick up your calculus book again.
Also from personal experience, rotating through a few books helps to keep you reading constantly. When I used to focus on a single book I'd put off reading if I was in an especially dry spot. Being able to pick up another book allows me to avoid the dry section for a while, while also preventing me from doing something less worthwhile like look at my phone.
- Why to read?
- How to read (from a literary / skills perspective)?
- What to read: authors, topics, books, etc?
- How to read (practice / technology)?
Mortimer Adler's How to Read a Book addresses most of the first three questions, and ... would be a good book to read itself. For an overview of it:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/How_to_Read_a_Book> (Wikipedia)
https://archive.org/details/howtoreadabook1940edition/page/n...> (Fully online copy, 1940 edition).
Adler starts of with the whys: entertainment, information, understanding, and syntopical (mastery). I'd add to his list reading for reading, whether that's to build the habit itself, or to increase your own skills in your first or additional languages. To which I'd only add: understand why you want to read, or are reading, and if you wish to remain with that motivation or seek others.
In how he discusses the different types and levels of reading, from skimming to deep analysis. These both suit different goals (whys), and demand very different levels of intention and attention.
For both these sections I'd strongly recommend you read Adler's own discussion, though there's a good overview in a Farnham Street blog post on the book: https://fs.blog/how-to-read-a-book/> (itself discussed briefly at HN https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26450303>).
As to what to read, beyond the extent to which that's addressed in the "why" and "how" discussion, Adler includes a list of 300 or so significant works which would make a good starting ground for general background.
For myself, I've used various sets of recommendations, including literary awards and recommendations at websites, as well as starting with a question, looking for books on those topics, and then heavily mining bibliographies and citations (the former: works cited by what I'm reading, the latter citations of the work I've read) for further exploration. Past a point, finding material worth reading actually does become a challenge, despite the tremendous volume of published works (hundreds of thousands to a million or more books through much of the 20th century and beyond).
On how to read: I'm fond of physical books, but a bookreader (e-ink if possible) is an excellent way to carry a large (thousands or more volumes) of books, and audiobooks are quite accessible. I've had mixed experiences with Onyx BOOX --- the displays are wonderful, but as with most e-book readers on device organisation of a large library is ... poorly supported. Physical device reliability and support through the vendor have been more recent frustrations. And I'm increasingly not a fan of Android in any form (the BOOX devices run a de-Googled Android). I'm not aware of anything markedly better, unfortunately. I would recommend the largest device you can comfortably carry, with 8--10" probably being the sweet spot. Smaller devices are more portable, but really don't support written material particularly well.
For audiobooks, Librivox (https://librivox.org/), public library apps such as Libby and Hoopla, and government-supported programmes such as the US Library of Congress National Library Service for the Blind and Print Disabled (NLS/BARD: https://www.loc.gov/nls/> and https://www.loc.gov/nls/services-and-resources/catalog-and-b...>) are all excellent options. The NLS/BARD service is free to qualified individuals, and includes not only over 300,000 audiobook titles (plus Braille), but free apps (iOS, Android) and physical e-book readers. If you or someone you know has visual or reading disabilities, and you live in the US or a territory, do check it out. A medical professional (doctor, optometrist, nurse, or other) can provide an eligibility statement. See https://www.loc.gov/nls/services-and-resources/catalog-and-b...>.
Upshot: figure out why you want to read and what. Adler's a good source on the how (there are other guides, including similarly titled ones). Books are all over, in meatspace, libraries, online, etc. Figure out how you prefer to (or need to) read. And then just get into it.
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I gave up on podcasts because of the excessive insertion of commercials, and the execrable user interface of the iphone podcast app.
This is a frustration for me as well. A few useful tricks, and some areas I'm looking to explore: - AntennaPod (Android: https://antennapod.org/about/ ) doesn't specifically block ads, but does make skipping them fairly painless. I'm not familiar with the iOS app space. - Seek out, and add a classification tag for ad-free podcasts. When you're not in the mood for dealing with ads, play these. - Protip: if you learn,…
Other national English-language broadcasters (NPR, PBS, CBC, ABC (Australia), etc.) have podcast channels, but most have succumbed to advertising. That isn't to say they don't have good programming, but don't expect ad-free listening. For a number of cultural reasons, Germany seems to have incorporated the idea that advertising itself has deep costs and its avoidance strong benefits.
The above is obviously personal. Also is only related to fiction for me. If I'm learning something I prefer a physical book everytime.
I have an almost-four year old child and not a lot of downtime. I used to listen to podcasts when I was doing dishes, cleaning the house, walking the dog, etc. I've mostly abandoned podcasts in favor of audiobooks. It didn't feel like they were benefiting me in any meaningful way—almost like they were just empty calories for my ears. I finally made it all the way through The Power Broker recently, which I've wanted t…
Audiobooks are just a different medium. I don't think people should pretend that an audiobook is a book. You process the two in completely different ways. This doesn't imply one is better than the other either. For me I don't like audiobooks because its very slow and spoken stories should have a different cadence, velocity, set of dynamics, and diction than a book should (check out "the moth" to see what I'm talking…
Is this attitude a holdover from encouraging small children to read for themselves? I don't know if this is quite the right framing but are you... hearing-illterate to some degree?
Some voice actors definitely add a layer of interpretation, and some are distractingly bad, but otherwise it could not be any more of an equal experience absorbing a book through my eyes or my ears. Unless there was a need to physically interact with the book, quickly flipping between sections or keeping notes in the margin, which I rarely do.
"I didn't really get the full experience until I read it on the page instead of listening" is an absurd statement to me, but maybe people's brains work differently.
There are things missing from text that can be conveyed over audio or with body language in person certainly so those experiences can't be directly translated from real life to the page.
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Audiobooks for me as well. I read voraciously when I was young, but never seemed to be able to when much older. Simply listening to an audiobook while driving to work let me "read" a lot more than I thought it would. At the time, my commute was only 10 minutes, but I still managed to read a book per month and listen to my favorite podcasts! Definitely would not recommend higher speed for fiction, though. For fiction,…
That's funny because for some shows with a lot of filler I do watch them at higher speeds, not movies though. I disagree fiction audiobooks at high speeds are the same as movies at high speeds though, once you acclimate to the narrator it doesn't matter whether it's fiction or not, there's no timing like there is in movies.
Depending on the novel, there definitely can be timing in the movies.
Furthermore, there's a reason the narrator performs voice acting. It adds to the experience. Speeding it up takes some of it away.
As for watching shows at high speed ... meh. If I feel the urge to do it, it's a sign I shouldn't be watching it anyway.
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This "serious reader" expression makes my skin crawl. Like if it was something of a sport with olympics where people compete in their own weight and it is measured in the end to the hundredths of seconds in front of spectators in a stadion shaped library cheering READ, READ, READ! Quality is mentioned, remotely, through selection, but still, the mental picture remains the same. The post smells like a training guide f…
I don't think serious reader is a cringe term. Reading is a skill like any other and we use terms like "serious golfer" or "serious painter". The flip side of serious is causal. It's okay to structure your life so that reading is a big part of it.