Reading is often Actionless

[todo: add a link to this to the what should be read list. Add a link to lateral thinking post. Also written late night.]

and writing feels actionless
cone of learning
philosophy of action

Or, reading is often passive, merely consumption.

I consider research as action. For example, when one reads a concept of something in Wikipedia.

But I consider reading an entire book a passive experience. What parts of that book were necessary for one’s research? Could it have been skimmed? What is lost in skimming?

I feel in skimming (directed reading, action) one maintains their direction. If I were to write a book on a specific part of psychology, only those things that relate to that specific part are necessary.

One has ignore a great amount of knowledge. This is normal [find vocab].

A digression: Outside of books, the brain does this all of the time to rationalize the world.

But what I’ve come to recently understand, is that, while one does take action efficiently, there is a possibility that, ignoring some knowledge, one actually doesn’t an understanding of it, perhaps losing an opportunity to gain foundational long-term knowledge [link to why read the western philosophy canon] or, misunderstands it, and this leads to anti-intellectualism: action without sufficient knowledge.

As a highly empirical person whose read few books, and plans to write more blogs with large generalizations based on my empirical knowledge, I must understand that these are just generalizations, and the understanding is beyond me, and the amount of time to research and make a good argument is something I will likely value less and prioritize less than some other action.

I shall only write what I, up to current knowledge, understand, and live a normal life, without veering it toward research to write a big book to prove it.

Perhaps this is being lazy, but I value and therefore prioritize other actions more because reading does not satisfy [that feeling].

[missed the whole argument about reading is not social, a way communication, and I find it difficult to inquire. And the argument of reading being at the bottom of the cone of learning]