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Today people need youtube tutorials to show them how to edit a 10 line configuration file. A (video) tutorial explaining to them how much time they lose watching videos instead of reading would be more appropriate.
Repetition and flashcards will help you remember the content, but it won't help you understand it. That's only done by actively engaging with the content and connecting it to and comparing it with other facts and ideas.
The summarising, keeping lists of questions, and writeups will help you understand the content, and I think is the only valuable part of this process. Why rote memorise when you have lovely writeups you can refer back to.
I find Luhmann's Zettelkasten method, as described in 'How to Take Smart Notes' more persuasive. As you read make bibliographic notes in your own words (on page X it says Y), store these in one place for everything you read. Also note down key ideas as you read with cross references to the bibliographic notes, and to other key idea notes that are relevant; store all these notes in another place. When you're filing a key idea have a look for similar ideas already noted; is this the same? Supporting? Contradictory? These questions help engage with the content. Over a lifetime you can amass a treasure chest of ideas that you can refer back to at your leisure, as Luhmann did.
Inability to recall what you have read maybe is not that all is lost. Reading changes your brain; in brain connections are continually created while synapses that are no longer in use degenerates. Or in other words you are a very different person today just by reading all those books in all those years, that you don't remember anything of now.
Just like what Ralph Waldo Emerson said: "I cannot remember the books I've read any more than the meals I have eaten; even so, they have made me."
Trying to improve my own knowledge management, and looking into how regular people who specialize in this area (people who read tons of non-fiction books) handle this stuff, extract and conserve knowledge, I've stumbled upon methods like "Zettelkasten". Does anybody here have experience with it?
Another huge problem was that I read everywhere, anywhere and anytime. Maintaining a zettelkasten required me to be at home, near my desktop.
I've tried many, many, many things, and have written like 5 different note-taking programs over time, nothing ever really worked for me. Even keeping a notebook with me at all times wasn't working out well, I always lost my pen, realized too late that my notebook was full, etc (adhd forgetfulness ;c)
Now I own a remarkable tablet, and while it's not the perfect note-taking system, at least I I always have the pen with me, it has all my notes, and it's this weird mix of being simultaneously sort-of analog and digital.
Now, I did take notes and we did write papers but I think the key to it is really: I explained it to other people. Either in class or socially (probably some people considered it boring but it was a nerdy school and it wasn’t uncommon.)
I don't want to remember more of what I read; I want to have access to a breadth and depth of ideas I can justify with evidence. Repetition and flashcards will help you remember the content, but it won't help you understand it. That's only done by actively engaging with the content and connecting it to and comparing it with other facts and ideas. The summarising, keeping lists of questions, and writeups will help you…
I use flashcards in a very similar fashion to that described in the article, and what I have found is that it is something of an art form. Done poorly, it's an exercise in rote memorisation. Done well, with well phrased and thought provoking questions, it helps you understand. Moreover, it periodically engages you with the content and key ideas.
Trying to improve my own knowledge management, and looking into how regular people who specialize in this area (people who read tons of non-fiction books) handle this stuff, extract and conserve knowledge, I've stumbled upon methods like "Zettelkasten". Does anybody here have experience with it?
I've tried maintaining a zettelkasten (zettelkasten?) Using software, but all available software just seemed overly convoluted and weird. Another huge problem was that I read everywhere, anywhere and anytime. Maintaining a zettelkasten required me to be at home, near my desktop. I've tried many, many, many things, and have written like 5 different note-taking programs over time, nothing ever really worked for me. Eve…
> What use is it to read [hundreds of books in my life] if I remember so little from them? [...]
> Reading and experience train your model of the world. And even if you forget the experience or what you read, its effect on your model of the world persists.