Is reading a waste of time?

[alex123711]

I have noticed a lot of books now containing 'filler' material, same again with a lot of blog posts and youtube videos etc that could be shortened down to a couple of key points. They are paid more to make them longer so instead of getting to the point the incentive is to drag it out. How do you avoid this? Is reading becoming a waste of time?

[AxelHeyst]

Read better books, watch better youtube videos. Gaining the discernment/intuition for material that is value-dense takes investment of time/effort, but the return is worthwhile imo. Also: be more ruthless in stopping to consume anything that isn't worth your time. Turn the youtube video off, end the podcast, return the book unfinished.

One indicator to watch out for is old books that are still in print. Another is to just get to know a field / area of interest more intimately, so you begin to know which authors/content creators deliver high value density.

[Dream of Freedom]

You aren't wrong. There are too many books that would make good essays. One particular pet peeve of mine is when the author bloviates about why the subject is important. Why do they think I'm reading it in the first place?

Still, the knowledge and personal growth gained through reading constantly outweigh the inefficiencies.

[zbigi]

Reading most books is a waste of time. The same for youtube videos. The number of people who have good, original ideas is vastly smaller than the number of people who want to live off of producing content.

[AnalyticalEngine]

Typically the closer you get to an academic source and the less "sexy" the presentation style is, the more it's going to be worth your time. It's hard to read a textbook, for example, and not learn something. Likewise, college lectures posted on YouTube are going to be a lot more meaningful than someone trying to make 10-minute videos for clicks.

[7Wannabe5]

I believe there are diminishing returns beyond the level of about 30 hours per week.

[Seppia]

No, it's one of the greatest us of my time IMO, but:

Read better books
Also: be more ruthless in stopping to consume anything that isn't worth your time.

There is no YouTube video, no tweet thread that has the depth/breadth potential of a book.

[jacob]

I think the best argument against the idea that reading is waste of time is a 5 minute conversation with someone who never reads.

[recal]

For books in particular -- I assume you're referring more to pop psychology, business, etc.. and books designed to make you better by "experts?" (I read a lot of non-fiction history and although they're very long, I don't consider any of it to be filler, sometimes they just need better editors, haha. Not to mention fiction, which never invokes this feeling.)

You're probably getting to the point where your base competency in whatever topic you're reading about is advancing to the point that you're spotting patterns. You'll find that within this, there's tree books (fundamental texts which introduce a myriad of topics) and branch books (deep dives into one topic with many examples and filler). (Idea stolen from this blog post: https://commoncog.com/the-ultimate-guid ... ranchbooks)

When you find yourself amongst a branch book with a multitude of examples, I would generally recommend doing some more classic short reading (decidedly not speed reading) tactics. Read the intro, read the table of contents, read the intro and summary of each chapter, dive in if the example presented in that summary particularly strikes you.

[Dave]

Others have covered it well. There is a lot of fluff out there. As @AxelHeyst said, you need a better filtering mechanism.

Personal reflection on @jacob's comment is pretty compelling evidence against taking the no reading to the limit, but at the other extreme there is certainly diminishing returns to reading. Like everything else it's about finding the right balance.

I'd speculate most people severely underdo it and don't read nearly enough (although there are certainly some that overdo it). The right book can radically change your life, as most of us have experienced. Realizing that there are numerous other books out there that can substantially change your life, but are yet unread, is the motivation. Partial reading of low-quality material and filtering for-quality material is the cost of finding the greats.

My specific tips: stop reading things that are clearly a waste, skim read past the junk (see the classic How to Read a Book, which itself can be skim read as it's pretty commonsensical), spend serious time and effort curating your reading materials (invest 5% of the time of researching a book upfront to research its worthiness to potentially save yourself 100% of the reading time), look at references of things you enjoy to explore further, source reading materials from those you respect.

[macg]

I think the best argument against the idea that reading is waste of time is a 5 minute conversation with someone who never reads.

Agree 100%

[Scott 2]

I think the point of diminishing returns is low. New information often fails the test of actionable change. Filling one's head with trivia isn't all that useful. It can be entertaining and give a false sense of productivity. I say this as someone who listens to 5-10 audio books each month. Guilty as charged.

Hands on experience, guided by an expert, is far more efficient. The book is a cheap substitute for access.


For someone thinking about where reading fits, I like Anders Eriksson's thoughts around deliberate practice. As well as Scott Young's work on Ultralearning. Contextualized within a broader strategy, the return can be much higher. It needs to relieve a constraint within one's overall system.

[steveo73]

If it is I waste a lot of time.

I'm going through a Stephen King phase now. Fantastic books.

How many books do you read ?

[Jean]

Axel heyst summed it up quite well.
The worse is when some empty content manage to catch your attention.
There is an option to tell youtube to never show you something from a channel again.
I activate it on every channel that ever wastes my time with filler content.

[7Wannabe5]

It needs to relieve a constraint within one's overall system.

Unless one of the primary purposes of your system is to free up time for reading

[Hristo Botev]

I think the best argument against the idea that reading is waste of time is a 5 minute conversation with someone who never reads.

This argument could be restated the other way and be just as persuasive: best argument for the idea that reading is a waste of time is a 5 minute conversation with someone who is always reading (and is never doing).

[candide]

This argument could be restated the other way and be just as persuasive: best argument for the idea that reading is a waste of time is a 5 minute conversation with someone who is always reading (and is never doing).

Chesterton would (maybe) be proud of the attempted inversion, but it doesn't work. Even if what you said tracked reality (and in my experience it doesn't), all the inversion proves is that there is an upper-bound somewhere to time spent reading.

So, so, so many books to read.

Well, why? Don't you have things to do? . . .

[Hristo Botev]

Chesterton would (maybe) be proud of the attempted inversion, but it doesn't work. Even if what you said tracked reality (and in my experience it doesn't), all the inversion proves is that there is an upper-bound somewhere to time spent reading.



Well, why? Don't you have things to do? . . .

Touchy

[Lemur]

Definitely not a waste of time but there can be a point of diminishing returns if you’re extremely well read in certain topics.

[candide]

@Hristo Botev. I appreciate you being a good sport. No offense was intended. It's just that we both agree that books, particularly classics, are good.

There was a C.S. Lewis quote I was looking for yesterday but wasn't able to find. Today -- while making a search to try to find something else Lewis said -- I ran across it:

Those of us who have been true readers all our life seldom fully realize the enormous extension of our being which we owe to authors. We realize it best when we talk with an unliterary friend. He may be full of goodness and good sense but he inhabits a tiny world. In it, we should be suffocated. The man who is contented to be only himself, and therefore less a self, is in prison. My own eyes are not enough for me, I will see through those of others. Reality, even seen through the eyes of many, is not enough. I will see what others have invented. Even the eyes of all humanity are not enough.