I love donuts, and so also the people who make donuts. (Krispy Kreme is tops.) Donuts can be “part of a balanced diet” as they say; eaten in moderation, donuts can make your life better overall. Nevertheless, if I made donuts I might worry sometimes that I was tempting folks away from a balanced diet, to eat too many tasty donuts.
Whilst I agree with your advice on reading, I absolutely, utterly beseech you to ditch the donuts.
How can you eat them? Don't they leave a sludge in your mouth that BP would be proud of? How do they even qualify as food? They're UFOs (unidentified FRIED objects)!
The social science topics you blog about are more horizontal than vertical, meaning there is not much prerequisite knowledge for understanding any given post.
Additionally, most popular nonfiction books I've read had a ton of filler. Blog authors are incentivized to produce posts that people will share and comment on. But in addition to these incentives, book authors are incentivized to produce a thick tome that will have a greater perceived value on the bookstore shelf and therefore command a greater price. Blog writers have a better set of incentives and on average the best blogs tend to be better than the best books.
Plus, a "diet" is totally the wrong metaphor for consuming information from a given field. The obviously right question to ask is what info source in the field will give me the most value for a marginal hour of reading.
If you're worried about folks' attention span decreasing as a result of reading a lot of blog posts--yes, it is plausible. But the brain is plastic. You can train yourself to focus on books again. It's an uphill struggle, but it's possible. However, you wouldn't want to do this for social science anyway (see paragraph 2). Books are probably best for math, physics, and econ, but your blog isn't about econ. (Or at least it's not making use of any econ prerequisite concepts like fixed and variable costs, second degree price discrimination, elasticity, etc. BTW can anyone recommend a good book for solidifying my understanding of these topics?)
As a regular reader of OB, I've noticed a strong bias in my own thinking that tends towards unconventionality, expert-shunning, and counterintuitiveness. This unhealthy gravitation towards "sexy" subjects makes me less of a good thinker than I could be.
Classic literature aside, I just recently (well, a few months ago) had the pleasure of reading a translation of Euler's original Bridges at Koenigsberg paper. Quite fun, actually. Reads better than Euclid's Elements, but doesn't have quite the historical significance.
These posts are perfectly consistent. Robin Hanson doesn't mean "classic" in the sense of preferring original works over modern treatments; he just means you should read all the foundational work necessary for understanding current research.
And if it had not been for the blog world I would probably not have been inspired to read the classics - Nash on game theory, Bastiat's wonderful "Candlemaker's Petition". And actually reading Wealth of Nations and many many more...
One of my favorite philosophers - Paula Dean had this to say about a balanced diet....
"A balanced diet is a cookie in each hand!"
So I guess we could extend Robin's initial thought to a "donut in each hand"
And thinking about how this might work in the blog world I would never think of spending time on Robin's blog - without doing a bit of exploring on places like CD, MR and CH - and even the dreaded Krugman...
I learn best by having my conventional wisdom tested and challenged. Robin plays a very important role in my blog portfolio...
You can’t get a feel for how awesome Elizabethan lit is by only reading history of lit books. You have to crack open some of the originals.
But why would you care how awesome Elizabethan literature is? Why is it vital that you know this? What if it turns out that, upon reading these works, you actually don't like them and find yourself to have been misled by experts' characterization of their merit.
Disagree wrt. Closing of the American Mind. It's a classic reactionary work, not a classic original. The mind that wrote it had already closed.
Whilst I agree with your advice on reading, I absolutely, utterly beseech you to ditch the donuts.
How can you eat them? Don't they leave a sludge in your mouth that BP would be proud of? How do they even qualify as food? They're UFOs (unidentified FRIED objects)!
They're even shaped like a UFO.
Yech!
Which is the more serious and important read, signaling aside: Crime and Punisment or Madame Bovary? Or are they equally sublime?
Having planned work periods and taking planned breaks works insanely well for me when I'm doing work I don't enjoy.
The social science topics you blog about are more horizontal than vertical, meaning there is not much prerequisite knowledge for understanding any given post.
Additionally, most popular nonfiction books I've read had a ton of filler. Blog authors are incentivized to produce posts that people will share and comment on. But in addition to these incentives, book authors are incentivized to produce a thick tome that will have a greater perceived value on the bookstore shelf and therefore command a greater price. Blog writers have a better set of incentives and on average the best blogs tend to be better than the best books.
Plus, a "diet" is totally the wrong metaphor for consuming information from a given field. The obviously right question to ask is what info source in the field will give me the most value for a marginal hour of reading.
If you're worried about folks' attention span decreasing as a result of reading a lot of blog posts--yes, it is plausible. But the brain is plastic. You can train yourself to focus on books again. It's an uphill struggle, but it's possible. However, you wouldn't want to do this for social science anyway (see paragraph 2). Books are probably best for math, physics, and econ, but your blog isn't about econ. (Or at least it's not making use of any econ prerequisite concepts like fixed and variable costs, second degree price discrimination, elasticity, etc. BTW can anyone recommend a good book for solidifying my understanding of these topics?)
This blog post by Eric K. Drexler is relevant: http://metamodern.com/2009/...
As a regular reader of OB, I've noticed a strong bias in my own thinking that tends towards unconventionality, expert-shunning, and counterintuitiveness. This unhealthy gravitation towards "sexy" subjects makes me less of a good thinker than I could be.
Classic literature aside, I just recently (well, a few months ago) had the pleasure of reading a translation of Euler's original Bridges at Koenigsberg paper. Quite fun, actually. Reads better than Euclid's Elements, but doesn't have quite the historical significance.
These posts are perfectly consistent. Robin Hanson doesn't mean "classic" in the sense of preferring original works over modern treatments; he just means you should read all the foundational work necessary for understanding current research.
well done, TGGP.
Let's not forget:
1963 JFK: "Ich bin ein Berliner." (transl. I'm a jelly doughnut)
Why do you say that like it's a bad thing?
And if it had not been for the blog world I would probably not have been inspired to read the classics - Nash on game theory, Bastiat's wonderful "Candlemaker's Petition". And actually reading Wealth of Nations and many many more...
One of my favorite philosophers - Paula Dean had this to say about a balanced diet....
"A balanced diet is a cookie in each hand!"
So I guess we could extend Robin's initial thought to a "donut in each hand"
And thinking about how this might work in the blog world I would never think of spending time on Robin's blog - without doing a bit of exploring on places like CD, MR and CH - and even the dreaded Krugman...
I learn best by having my conventional wisdom tested and challenged. Robin plays a very important role in my blog portfolio...
Is composing your blog *work*, or *leisure*?
Calling for people to read classic texts instead of your blog posts?
I'm guessing you are one of the academically accepted contrarians.
You can’t get a feel for how awesome Elizabethan lit is by only reading history of lit books. You have to crack open some of the originals.
But why would you care how awesome Elizabethan literature is? Why is it vital that you know this? What if it turns out that, upon reading these works, you actually don't like them and find yourself to have been misled by experts' characterization of their merit.