I have never read a book in my life. I might as well be illiterate, and most people around me might as well be too. Most libraries are vacant, and bookstores are gone. But all these people are doing fine - we put anything down on paper, and despite its incoherence it seems fine by standards that have stooped for reasons I do not know. I can turn in something that makes absolutely no sense, and an instructor from a decent school will tell me that he enjoyed it. Or an instructor won’t enjoy it, but since most people don’t write anything comprehensible anymore I’ll still be fine. I can cruise through my education and get a job while barely having read much at all. Everyone frequents some variant of flimsy entertainment - cable news, cartoons, social media - so why bother trying to read anything worthwhile anyways if nobody else is? Does reading actually make you more curious, more intelligent, more human?
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Notes -
TheMotte is filled with users who get personal enjoyment from learning information for its own sake, even when it has no tangible benefit to their lives. So you’re going to get pushback due to this natural bias.
I essentially agree with you that reading is overrated. But “reading” is a large category. The question I think is, what is the best way to experience great things? Books have competition: real life experience, music, listening to speakers, art. The words we read in a sense can only refer back to our previous experiences, and so a life filled with reading and little experience is lesser than the opposite.
But in order to experience great things we must know what the great things are. So there are some reads that are worthwhile, philosophy and theology, psychology, and some great literature, which provides us a map for great experiences. Philosophy tells us what provides lasting good, and homes our reason. Theology helps to organize the mind around this good and to feel it on a deeper level, and good literature fleshes out these truths in a story. Books are necessary for these topics because we have to take our time going back and forth over the sentences to understand the truth deeply.
Every other type of book? I’m not persuaded on their inherent value. Reading stories that aren’t brilliant has no benefit. History has no benefit unless it is motivating great actions. Learning facts has no benefit unless they are necessary for great things.
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