Purely anecdotal, but most of the kids in my son's cohort, early 20s, have received what would be considered by most to be a good education, but don't read for pleasure. I find that worrying.
That said I mostly agree with this and think for one, if foreign language was appreciated more here, maybe people would read more
Why surely?
The reason I'd push back on that simplification is it's much easier to simply absorb--without engagement--information from video. The struggle that comes with reading not only measurably increases retention. It also increases the chances that you're going to notice you're not dealing with a quality source.
There are far fewer dumbfuck textbooks on almost any topic than negatively-informative videos on YouTube, for example.
> I could read a 200 page academic work and if the work is poorly written then I haven't gained much
Could you give an example? Not of a work that's wrong. Just poorly written.
Plenty of classical sources are, by modern standards, incredibly poorly written. Yet there isn't a substitute for reading the originals.
One can learn from videos as well as from written sources. But it's harder to do right. Easier to do wrong. And you'll have put yourself in a silo from experts, who tend to communicate via and thus reference writing.
It is an exercise in cognitive flexibility and challenge. It builds the capability to understand complex ideas and challenging contexts. These are important skills in navigating a world that is in fact complex and nuanced.
If someone can only understand short sentences and bullet lists, they will struggle in the real world and be vulnerable to manipulation.
Thanks for the nice reply. I think it's harder to skim a video and say you understood than it is to skim a long book and say you understood, and I know countless people who do this. So if I watch a video on a topic and someone else reads a paper on a topic, but they may have skimmed, I see merit in watching videos because of this. I would think blind people feel similarly. Can you even skim videos at all?
And yes, I do agree, Youtube can have false info. On the other hand, it can also have info that hasn't been written about yet, and I think there's a lot to say about the fact it covers stuff that otherwise might not get written about, but of course that's a separate topic.
To be honest, there are lots of bad books. I guess we'd have to measure what types a book a person reads, not just how often or how much they read. A local bookstore to me has a ton of westerns. Even if I read them all I'd be worse off. In fact I have read some, lol.
And now for an example!
https://figshare.mq.edu.au/articles/thesis/Deterritorializin...
Sorry to throw raygun under the bus, but I think her paper is a fantastic example.
And you're right, many classical works are by modern standards bad. I have read some of the norse sagas. And I do agree with you, it is important to read the originals!
Harder to do right? Again, uff. I don't know. Books certainly are more informative and more thought out, and more detailed. I think I agree there, and I too hate that people don't read for entertainment.
But reading generally, outside a certain type of books / texts, I think there is still risk. But I do agree, there's lots of bad video / podcast content.
Sorry for the disorganized answer.
Everything else would be better read if you care about learning (being able to recall information and put it to use at a later stage).
Video essays and podcasts just provide a "trust me bro" level of understanding for the viewer, that is useless apart from arguing on the internet.
It depends on the material
> trust me bro
For what it's worth, we all know books can be this way too. I am just saying it can be productive to get information over video / audio, and I am not trying to say necessarily that Youtube for example is as reputable