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> why should I read?

Because reading is not just a utilitarian activity. Reading widely—things that may not be immediately useful, things that may be against your belief, things that may just turn out to be completely wrong—is an important step towards forming a critical appreciation of anything you may encounter.

Personally, I've long come to realize that much of my attitude towards everything from work to politics has been shaped by reading materials that often covered wholly unrelated topics. More importantly (and much to my chagrin), it seems that many crucial lessons came from works that I outright hated and was forced to drudge through against my will.

I don't mean to discount your conclusion: Almost always, almost everybody doesn't know what they're talking about. But almost always, almost everybody is a little right, and bits and pieces you pick up from the most unusual places will inform your solution to a problem many years down the road, or at least remind you that every story has more than one side.

To reinforce:

You'll usually not be led too far astray if you read works (fiction, poetry, philosophy, non-technical nonfiction) that are widely agreed to belong to some kind of Canon. Odds are if you think one of those books is crap, you're just not ready for it.

(There are definitely truly great books that don't often make those lists, though.)

Reading (non-technical writing) well is a skill (just like reading technical works is) and it may take time to develop it. Pretty much no-one starts off their reading career getting more than a fraction out of most books they read than they might when they've had some more practice—practice, not just thoughtless experience.

If you want a utilitarian reason to read: reading improves one's writing.

One widely-agreed-upon effect of reading good writing is expanding one's sense of empathy. A good book will often give it a workout. Books can also reduce feelings of isolation and loneliness by exposing us to others' intimate thoughts about life, some of which will match up with things the reader may have thought were unique to them—and here's proof that those thoughts and feelings aren't just not unique, they're probably not even rare!

Books can be a mirror to one's self. A gut-punch just when we need it. Inspiration when we're down. Something human to hold on to when nothing else is there.

But they don't give you all this for free.

> Books can also reduce feelings of isolation and loneliness by exposing us to others' intimate thoughts about life, some of which will match up with things the reader may have thought were unique to them—and here's proof that those thoughts and feelings aren't just not unique, they're probably not even rare!

I had this happen reading this book: http://en.wikifur.com/wiki/Waterways

The main character described the experience of watching all his friends vanish as they started dating, feeling abandoned, wondering if something was wrong with him. It felt like a sick joke everyone was playing on me. I mentioned experiencing the same on Twitter (referencing the book), and the floodgates opened.

Apparently that's a very normal experience for gay people.

> Apparently that's a very normal experience for gay people.

Not to invalidate this but I was under the impression that this is normal for a large majority of people in general, not just gay people.

A non-gay person probably interprets their isolation differently. It'd be "why can't I get laid like all my friends?," not "why don't I want to get laid like all my friends? Am I broken?" I had lots of offers, but I didn't want it from the people offering.

But that's my limited perspective as someone who's not hetero or bi. I could be wrong. I spent my first 29 years thinking everyone was making up the whole concept of attraction before I figured out what all those feelings I had for guys were.

I readily admit it is probably different in the details but as said I was under the impression that the feeling of isolation and friends moving on etc was pretty normal across the board.

A person who rode a roller coaster and a person who survived a hungry lion experienced fear, but the details are what make the story. Being gay in the rural south is like facing a hungry lion.

From what I've read and heard, heterosexuality is like riding a roller coaster with a good safety record, and bisexuality is like riding the same roller coaster, but the other passengers are lions.

>Personally, I've long come to realize [...]

I specifically quoted that part because I think it actually shows what rayiner is talking about and it seems like you missed his point.

What's happening is that you sense a benefit from reading and because it feels true, it seems perfectly logical to project that benefit out to everyone else who is not you. But it's a post-hoc explanation instead of scientific research.

It's the same as someone noting that Einstein played violin so therefore, we promote the idea of learning musical instruments to help with creative thinking. Play piano to help unlock the mysteries of universe or write that next novel!

Or an ex-soldier that was forced to make his bed every morning is advising that everyone should make their bed because "the feeling of accomplishing something small snowballs into productivity for the rest of the day". Well, that sounds plausible but it's also post-hoc reasoning instead of something scientifically proven.

A lot of writing about history, diets, self-improvement, hiring, etc is like those examples above. Take an idea that feels true to me and therefore, it must also apply to everyone else. Some computer people do the same thing... we find that our knowledge of loops and IF/THEN statements is helpful to us outside of programming domains so we think everyone should learn to code. However, if we apply scientific rigor to that advice, we must be willing concede that forcing a child to write loops in elementary school may have zero measurable changes to the adult fireman or ballet dancer. (I'm not saying we shouldn't try it but let's not be seduced by post-hoc reasoning.)

People had long predicted that in a world full of competing ideas, many will just take the easy way out and declare that the truth is simply unknowable, and no one knows what they are talking about. Your comment is a perfect example of that.

Yes, the world is still a mystery in many ways and no one has cracked the code. But the ideas put forward by kooks like Trump, anti-vaxxers and creationists are still idiotic and vastly inferior to the general mainstream ideas advocated by serious scientists and researchers. Just because there's a possibility of being wrong, isn't a reason to succumb to defeatism or paralysis-by-analysis.

There is a wealth of knowledge out there that can help you better understand the world and live your life. Yes, finding and vetting this knowledge is hard work, but it sure beats watching The Jersey Shore.

I think you should read for the exact reason given in your last sentence: we are utilitarian and unromantic. Our lack of romanticism is a direct consequence of our lack of reading. Instead of spending our time reading great works of literature, we spend all our time reading data and analysis. I know that I spend enormous amounts of my day reading journal articles, blog entries, news reports, etc. I am very "informed" and entertained, but it seems to reduce my overall experience of the world. I don't feel as deeply about things, I don't daydream, I barely even dream at night. I agree with you that reading a book just for information is somewhat ridiculous. In this time period, I can find several articles by several authors that excerpt the information I need, provide bullet point analysis, and bring me up to speed much faster than a multi-chapter book would. However, I can't consume something like Wendell Berry or Jane Austen that way because for their work, the form connects directly with the content. So for that reason, I would say that you should read, but only read because it frees you from your utilitarianism. Otherwise, save yourself the trouble. Read books to feel human.

The author also talks about reading literature.

I feel that I'm cynical about facts like you are, but quality fiction is an amazing view into the world of the past or of different people. The thing about fiction is that it's not trying to convince you of something, its not true or false, its a story with some historical and cultural backdrops.

Read some Camus, Hess or Hemingway. Read literature that wasn't originally written in english like Season of Migration to the North, The yellow sofa, I am a Cat or something by Naguib Mahfouz.

Reading physical books is a great way to maintain your focus, you think differently when you are digging into a real book. It encourages you to think deeply and avoids the surface thinking that we are so used to with all our modern technology.

I'm totally with you on the absurdity of 'facts' these days, but good literature is something else all together.

You are right that most theories are pretty wrong. It goes beyond soft sciences though; even physics has mostly been off on a crazy tangent for the last 40 years or so.

That being said, reading is still invaluable, you just have to be thoughtful about what (and how) you read. Don't pick up a book without something you want to learn that has real value ahead of time. If the book isn't leading you towards your goal, stop reading it and find another book.

Additionally, look for books that enlarge your picture of the world. Occasionally, pick up a book written by someone with a very different viewpoint from yourself and try to take the author's perspective. Find books that draw connections between disparate ideas.

The problem is that since you use stuff you read from one source to help you evaluate stuff you read from another source, the more and the more disparate the sources the better. If you don't do that, than what you believe just tends to be what you want to believe, and what you want to believe tends to be the things that allow you to do what you want to do, and things that validate your past decisions (to fight guilt and regret.)

Millennials are growing up in an environment completely filled with a lot of paid for bullshit information, and can only find culture that isn't venal dishonest marketing controlled by Baby Boomers in the cracks between commercials. I get why they hate information. I'm from Gen X - I've had to walk for a half-hour to get to a payphone to call someone who may or may not be home (depending on if someone I ran into the day before told them that I would call, for which they remained home and near the phone.) Space was limitless back then. Millenials know they've been robbed, and that makes me happy with them and hopeful.

I think the question should be "what should I read?".

Sure most of what's written is bs. But I really like books as a medium , reading inspires a reflexive form of cognition. Even if you read the same content,online you're more likely to just alt-tab away and forget about it while reading will kinda force you to understand things slower, to digest information in a different way. I think good romances are like transformers, there's more than meets the eye.

I think that writing books about why people don't read books quite possibly is a bit of a self-congratulatory exercise.

It's a bit like holding seminars on why people don't exercise at a gym, or about how bad it is that people don't learn to code at a developer convention, right?

“I have a second book out this year that says to young people ‘for god’s sake, you are educated, why don’t you read!’”

Knowing what you're talking about is not a binary proposition. People's internal models of reality have varying correspondences with actual reality; the fact that all of them are inaccurate does not preclude the idea that some are more accurate than others (and almost certainly in different areas).

> why should I read?

I find this an odd idea given that you're a lawyer. And an appellate lawyer at that. You have to have read to understand how to frame your cases, how to argue effectively by being knowledgeable about other relevant cases and law. Did you learn these things by osmosis?

Imagine writing an article about how the Linux thread scheduler works. You have to "read" to do it, but you're reading source code, not big ideas in books. Practicing lawyers read a lot, but almost all of it is reading the "source code" of the law (cases, statutes, legislative records). And you'd never write a legal brief the way you'd write a history book--connecting a few facts with big sweeping ideas.

> as the web makes information more available, we realize nobody knows what they're talking about.

When I realized this, I stopped feeling guilty about pretending to be knowledgeable about topics I truly know nothing about. Outside the realm of the hard sciences, where objective data are sovereign, the experts are pretty much just better bullshitters than everyone else.

In a world where "might makes right" is still the deepest foundation stone of civilization, convincing the mighty to agree with you makes you right. While being technically correct is still the best kind of correct, being believable gets you paid more.

What really chaps my backside now is reading my kids' textbooks.

The thing is, if you stop for a moment, spend a considerable amount of time of studying hard sciences, and apply that worldview to almost any "hard science" .. most of the hard sciences haven't been or are not that hard. Still, step by step (and misstep) and luck we have progressed forward.

The "objective data" isn't some inherent peculiarity of hard sciences. It's a feature of long tradition of aspirations towards intellectual honesty, distilled in the usage of mathematical methodology.

You can get a good data softer sciences, but this demands lots of work and paying attention to proper statistical methodology.

It gets more difficult less you can apply mathematics, but there's nothing in particular that makes bullshitting acceptable. Even in non-mathematical fields such as history and archeology, there's still possibility of hard evidence; it just requires lot of humility what you reasonably can infer from it, and sometimes you have to accept that there's not enough data for making conclusions.

The possibility of knowledge requires that everybody does their best to pay the necessary respect to the gods of science that enable its existence. Science is a social project that can't function unless participants believe in it and demand intellectual rigour of each other, work to reduce bullshitting. Giving up and joining the bullshitters does not make you more knowledgeable; it just amounts to treason.

But bullshitters get paid more. As long as charisma moves more dollar bills than actual, tangible, measurable results, there is a significant financial incentive to massage pieces of the truth into a more attractive form.

If you want the BS to go away, you have to put an end to the entire world consistently rewarding it. Good luck accomplishing that with nothing more than reasoned, logical arguments.

Are millennials so desperate for whats-old-is-new content that they're now reaching back to the 19th century for nihilism?

This is because you are being closed minded. Guess what, most books are crap but there are great ones out there. Just like any other media you have to go out and look for them and the ones being fed to you are crap. They represent many thousands of years of collected intelligence and wisdom many written by the intellect that created the ideas underlying today's society. Check out Origin of the Species by Charles Darwin or Relativity by Albert Einstein.

There is value in understanding the history of a thing if the goal is to maintain. A lot of people get paid a lot of money to maintain a thing. At some point the thing becomes obsolete or less valuable and somebody gets paid to patch the thing.

I think we have seen so much more value created by people thinking perpendicular to the norm. Do you need to know the history of the taxi industry to create Uber? Do you need to know the history of the grocery industry to create Blue Apron? I would argue that knowledge of the history can bog you down and influence your approach to solving problems.

Do you need to know the history of monarchies to understand that the person who was born into power is not representing your needs? Knowing the history doesn't help you decide that being governed by somebody who you and your peers are able to elect would more effectively represent your needs.

I would argue that ideas aren't born out of a historical perspective, but that they're born out of current need and that the historical perspective only serves to tell you why you can't do something.

A good book is a great form of escapism, and mostly cheaper and less self-destructive than getting drunk or high.

Sounds like you might appreciate reading Journey to the End of the Night by Louis-Ferdinand Céline.

To be honest I'm pretty sure that young people do, on average, read more than their forebears. They might not read much classic literature, but we are involved more text-based communication than at any other point in history by a very wide margin.

Read poetry: you will find wisdom, not science. Truth, not facts. Beauty, not data.

Go to museums.

Which summons that quote from The Big Short: The truth is like poetry, and most people fucking hate poetry.

Thanks for the comment. Haven't watched it, guess I ought to.

I would recommend the book first.

Read poetry: you will find wisdom, not science. Truth, not facts. Beauty, not data.

People writing nice-sounding words does not in fact necessarily constitutes wisdom.

Poetry is a lot less about form than most people think. It's actually the opposite if you think about it, poetry is to write freely.

If you can't analyze your wisdom then it's not worth discussing, facts and data are objective - I don't perceive the the things you mentioned as smart but pretentious.

> facts and data are objective

Sure -- it's just a pity neither you or me or anyone will ever come in contact with them. Everything we think/write/read is based on assumptions/axioms. You don't even have to "dig" to realize that, you just have to scratch the surface.

Analyzing means breaking into parts. Not everything can be broken into parts.

You hit the nail on the head with that last sentence.

> we realize nobody knows what they're talking about.

And here is precisely why you should read, because you obviously don't know what you're talking about.

Sure, nobody's omniscient, nobody can have perfect knowledge of even one subject. But not everyone is equal - there are some people who know more than others. Typically, those who know more are those who read more, and it's not just by reading better material (here's where paying for content is really a good idea), but by reading all sorts of stuff, including the bad and just plain wrong, and being able to recognize it for what it is.

And yes, I know the inevitable comeback will be "but how do I know the bad from the good?" and the answer is again reading, but also being humble and taking advice from those more knowledgeable than you, and reading what they recommend. Hell, one of the best recommendations I ever had was to read Rippetoe's "Starting Strength" and that came from HN. I've also found that if I get a lot out of a book, the best thing to do is follow up on it's sources. Bibliographies are highly under rated.

And then there's the other standard reply that gets trotted out: "I don't have enough time". Really? How much time do you spend watching TV (including streaming)? How much time do you spend playing video games? How much time do you spend reading "free" content that's only written to sell your eyeballs instead of reading something you paid for, written by a knowledgeable author?

Not all content is created equal.

> Not all content is created equal.

Sometimes I wish HN had a highlight function like Medium.

> because you obviously don't know what you're talking about.

Please make your points without stooping to personal attack. Your comment would be much better without the first sentence, which is just a slap.