5 ms·

Re-reading is good, but shouldn't we remember that time is also limited? What I'm saying is: all books are not equal. Hamlet == Jeeves? Also, there are differe

by nsomaru 12y ago

Re-reading is good, but shouldn't we remember that time is also limited? What I'm saying is: all books are not equal. Hamlet == Jeeves? Also, there are different kinds of reading. Sometimes I'm just "consuming content," and others I'm actually reading. In the former case, I get a dull sort of continuous pleasure. In the latter, it's more like I'm engaging on a journey with the author, which happens in fiction a lot, but the best kicks come from philosophy. A single paragraph from Schopenhauer[] may contain such high signal (to me), the it requires careful scrutiny and thought. This kind of reading is engaging with the text, but I'm not sure that it would be worth it in the case of Jeeves. Why go looking for water in the (relative) desert when you can visit the ocean? [] See: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8915729 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8915729 for Schopenhauer's essay /On Thinking for Yourself/. It's a great read for anyone who wants some well presented thoughts about reading itself and its relation to thinking. Highly recommended!

bathMarm0t 12y ago
That essay seems far too hardlined. "Reading is nothing more than a substitute for thought of one’s own." -S Really? I'm going to agree that your "consuming content" fits this bill (in all mediums mind you. Mindlessly doing anything fits this bill), but I've taken to reading used books with red pen, and scarring the pages with excerpts, thoughts, counterpoints, interpretations, etc. I view that as an absolutely critical part of reading now. "and it may sometimes happen that he could have found it [some great truth] all ready to hand in a book and spared himself the trouble." -S You don't FIND these truths in books. The books bring out and expose the truths that lie in your experience. Take, for example, reading the classics in high school (Heart of Darkness, Gatsby, Crime and Punishment, etc). Those books meant notheng to me. My experiential quorum was unmet. I couldn't even vote on whether these topics were relevant (let alone true). It was only after I experienced, felt, lived. Only after being could the books show themselves. The authors feel the same way you feel, they just put it better. More succinctly. We all have the ingredients, they just know how to simmer things. Compare Schopenhauer with Hemingway (Death in the Afternoon) "People in a novel, not skillfully constructed characters, must be projected from the writer’s assimilated experience, from his knowledge, from his head, from his heart and from all there is of him. If he ever has luck as well as seriousness and gets them out entire they will have more than one dimension and they will last a long time. A good writer should know as near everything as possible. Naturally he will not. A great enough writer seems to be born with knowledge. But he really is not; he has only been born with the ability to learn in a quicker ratio to the passage of time than other men and without conscious application, and with an intelligence to accept or reject what is already presented as knowledge. There are some things which cannot be learned quickly and time, which is all we have, must be paid heavily for their acquiring. They are the very simplest things and because it takes a man’s life to know them the little new that each man gets from life is very costly and the only heritage he has to leave. Every novel which is truly written contributes to the total of knowledge which is there at the disposal of the next writer who comes, but the next writer must pay, always, a certain nominal percentage in experience to be able to understand and assimilate what is available as his birthright and what he must, in turn, take his departure from." -H
- bathMarm0t 12y ago
  I'm in agreement with you, but that essay you linked is... virulent. Easily misinterpretted. "There is no pure thought but those you come up with" type stuff. This reminds me why I need to stay off these aggregator sites, why I now write letters to my friends instead of messaging strangers online. While the novelty of the discussion is welcome, I prefer [need] time to stew things over. Basic things. Really chew them. See now I'm sounding like Schopenuaer. Things are complicated. Damned complicated. More complicated than the 6 hour time window the obsolescence of this comment section allows for.
- nsomaru 12y ago
  They way I read you, you are in complete agreement with S. -- That essay expounds thinking for oneself over "much reading". That, or you're trolling. The line you incorrectly quoted is: "It may sometimes happen that a truth, an insight, which you have slowly and laboriously puzzled out by thinking for yourself could easily have been found already written in a book; but it is a hundred times more valuable if you have arrived at it by thinking for yourself. For only then will it enter your thought-system as an integral part and living member, be perfectly and firmly consistent with it and in accord with all its other consequences and conclusions, bear the hue, colour and stamp of your whole manner of thinking, and have arrived at just the moment it was needed; thus it will stay firmly and for ever lodged in your mind." Please quote correctly, your quotes are just gibberish. Also, there is a "secret sauce" comprising humanity's prized possessions. Would it were, eh?
  - bathMarm0t 12y ago
    Not trolling. My thoughts are spastic and impulsive. I'm working on it. Modern take on being presented with answers: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PQ4o1N4ksyQ&feature=youtu.be https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PQ4o1N4ksyQ&feature=youtu.be

by nsomaru 12y ago

bathMarm0t 12y ago

That essay seems far too hardlined. "Reading is nothing more than a substitute for thought of one’s own." -S Really? I'm going to agree that your "consuming content" fits this bill (in all mediums mind you. Mindlessly doing anything fits this bill), but I've taken to reading used books with red pen, and scarring the pages with excerpts, thoughts, counterpoints, interpretations, etc. I view that as an absolutely critical part of reading now. "and it may sometimes happen that he could have found it [some great truth] all ready to hand in a book and spared himself the trouble." -S You don't FIND these truths in books. The books bring out and expose the truths that lie in your experience. Take, for example, reading the classics in high school (Heart of Darkness, Gatsby, Crime and Punishment, etc). Those books meant notheng to me. My experiential quorum was unmet. I couldn't even vote on whether these topics were relevant (let alone true). It was only after I experienced, felt, lived. Only after being could the books show themselves. The authors feel the same way you feel, they just put it better. More succinctly. We all have the ingredients, they just know how to simmer things. Compare Schopenhauer with Hemingway (Death in the Afternoon) "People in a novel, not skillfully constructed characters, must be projected from the writer’s assimilated experience, from his knowledge, from his head, from his heart and from all there is of him. If he ever has luck as well as seriousness and gets them out entire they will have more than one dimension and they will last a long time. A good writer should know as near everything as possible. Naturally he will not. A great enough writer seems to be born with knowledge. But he really is not; he has only been born with the ability to learn in a quicker ratio to the passage of time than other men and without conscious application, and with an intelligence to accept or reject what is already presented as knowledge. There are some things which cannot be learned quickly and time, which is all we have, must be paid heavily for their acquiring. They are the very simplest things and because it takes a man’s life to know them the little new that each man gets from life is very costly and the only heritage he has to leave. Every novel which is truly written contributes to the total of knowledge which is there at the disposal of the next writer who comes, but the next writer must pay, always, a certain nominal percentage in experience to be able to understand and assimilate what is available as his birthright and what he must, in turn, take his departure from." -H

bathMarm0t 12y ago
I'm in agreement with you, but that essay you linked is... virulent. Easily misinterpretted. "There is no pure thought but those you come up with" type stuff. This reminds me why I need to stay off these aggregator sites, why I now write letters to my friends instead of messaging strangers online. While the novelty of the discussion is welcome, I prefer [need] time to stew things over. Basic things. Really chew them. See now I'm sounding like Schopenuaer. Things are complicated. Damned complicated. More complicated than the 6 hour time window the obsolescence of this comment section allows for.
nsomaru 12y ago
They way I read you, you are in complete agreement with S. -- That essay expounds thinking for oneself over "much reading". That, or you're trolling. The line you incorrectly quoted is: "It may sometimes happen that a truth, an insight, which you have slowly and laboriously puzzled out by thinking for yourself could easily have been found already written in a book; but it is a hundred times more valuable if you have arrived at it by thinking for yourself. For only then will it enter your thought-system as an integral part and living member, be perfectly and firmly consistent with it and in accord with all its other consequences and conclusions, bear the hue, colour and stamp of your whole manner of thinking, and have arrived at just the moment it was needed; thus it will stay firmly and for ever lodged in your mind." Please quote correctly, your quotes are just gibberish. Also, there is a "secret sauce" comprising humanity's prized possessions. Would it were, eh?
- bathMarm0t 12y ago
  Not trolling. My thoughts are spastic and impulsive. I'm working on it. Modern take on being presented with answers: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PQ4o1N4ksyQ&feature=youtu.be https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PQ4o1N4ksyQ&feature=youtu.be