andymatuschak.org/books
> I had barely noticed how little I’d absorbed until that very moment. [...] The situation only feels embarrassing because it’s hard to see how common it is.
I see the role of books quite differently; books influence before they teach.
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When I read a book, I am introducing fragments and statements into a complex machine of conflicting opinions and worldviews. And the process of recantation, refutation, confusion, re-enforcement, & epiphany are as significant as the training examples which caused them.
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I think we're mostly in agreement, actually. My claim's not that books don't influence you or that the activities you describe aren't useful—just that the medium's mostly making you do the work, and that work is awfully fraught/lossy/taxing.
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Agreed, starting writing an essay to this affect mek.fyi/posts/why-book I'll post back in a few days once I've had time to process and agree more usefully
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