Many people on this forum, and many people I know in the Austrian movement personally are much more widely read than me, something I have tried to rectify, but feel I still am very much lacking. I feel this must come down to reading speed, something which I think I am lacking in, though it could perhaps be to do with my inabillity to conentrate. I would welcome advice from others on improving either.
I average about 15 pages an hour when reading Rothbard's Man, Economy and State, but I think this is too slow. I do make notes summarising the sections I read, what I learned and any ideas I had. I did this with Human Action, which is probably also the reason I'm still only at about pg 600 with that book, when I started reading almost 2 years ago. The notes I've made don't necessarily match the progress i've made, for instance with Human Action I've only made notes up to page 400).
I think this may have a little to do with my background, when I was studying physics, though perhaps I was a litle more literary than my peers, being required to read through texts certainly wasn't emphasized. Indeed I actually find neoclassical econ easier to learn than Austrian, though this has nothing to do with my impression of its scientific merits. Perhaps this is a bit of pointless thread...
In any case, does anyone have advice?
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Perhaps an alternative plan of attack is not how fast you read, but how much you remember after reading! There are many books which I've tried to fly through, only to realize the next day that I can only remember a fraction of what I've read. Props on the note taking - the more senses you get involved with the material, the better your retention usually is.
I can't back up this claim, but I've also been told by an excellent historian that bourbon does wonders, too.
abskebabs,
You have to be careful about the weight you place on amount versus quality. Retention is much more of an indexing problem than a memory problem. Just as individuals cluster around specific vocabulary words, a few hundred at best, within an English language of some 60,000 words. Our knowledge clusters as to what we have indexed the best. Without proper indexing we can’t call upon our readings as well. Given this, I would suggest an optimal note taking, highlighting and storing system of which I’ve been experimenting as of the past six months.
Furthermore, you must be careful as to what weight you place on others knowledge. Studies have shown that the majority of academics have never read the footnotes within their papers; yet, the sheer fact that they list it makes the reader believe they’ve read it. Individuals always look extremely more bright and well read (if not cultured, patient, etc) the smaller the window of interaction.
Read until you have something to write...Write until you have nothing to write...when you have nothing to write, read...read until you have something to write...Jeremiah
Fair points guys. Actually, I would say it's my almost painful attention to detail that also causes me to read very slowly (coupled with my note taking). Reading Mises' Human Action, I would not be able to go past a chapter without reflecting and writing down on the fantastic ideas I was getting thinking about what I just read. Reading Rothbard's MES is like Ice Cream for the brain. I can't go more than a few pages without getting a new idea...(though this is not to say these are all high quality ideas!)
15 pages per hour is not really that slow when you take notes.
I think about 20-30 pages is normal for stories and maybe like 40 for course text book and stuff (note taking and underlining excluded).
Speedreading is a bunch of nonsense in my experience. Sure I read parts of my course books alot faster but I only get a broad general idea of what I read in those sections from it...
To actually digest a text I need to stick to a level where I can keep up with thinking each word I am reading ... especially if it is English which is a foreign language for me. About 40 pages per hour seems to be limit for this.
Since I haven't succeeded getting my reading speed higher then that my advice might be crap. But I read a lot slower then this before I started university.
Basically all I have done is to force myself to read faster. At first you might not understand what you are reading but keep it up and read a few pages as fast as possible anyhow. Practice with some Keynsian nonsese you don't want to remember anyway :)
And also practice with not phrashing the text out in your head at all. Read with your eyes only and move them as little as possible. There should be plenty of speed-reading guides on the internet. The instructions on eye movement and such are useful.
Another useful point from speed reading is that going thru material too slow and carefully is not always the most effecient way to remember it. Cause you forget the first part of the argument before you get to the end...
As I said I don't remember everything at all when I read with my eyes only, just a broader sense what it was about, I am not sure it is possible to be able to do that and digest everything but forcing it seems to help my normal reading speed as well. And it has been very useful for my ability to skim texts.
So basically pick any speed-reading handbook. Do what it says, then go back to your normal reading speed and use what works and forget the rest. Also forget that you have to read faster then 30-40 pages per minute...
Then you take up learning Russian and you drop back down from reading sentences to reading letter-by-letter :)
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abskebabs: In any case, does anyone have advice?
Here's a good post from AJ on this subject.
Basically, I would recommend that you shouldn't worry about reading a lot.
In fact, I used to read a lot (for example, maybe 4+ hours per day, finishing a lot of books over a few months). But I found that it was pretty useless. I would recommend that pick like 2-3 books (for example, "Human Action", "Man, Economy, and State", and something else), and stick with them really seriously. I mean, I have spent probably 90% of my reading time with either Human Action or Human Nature for the past few months. And I haven't even spent much time with that either. I've been trying to stick more to thinking than reading. Really you don't have much of a choice in the matter if you're trying to understand something as dense as those two. Remember, it took Mises like 40+ years to write his magnum opus, and took Hume like 10+ years to write his treatise. You're not going to get everything out of a book like one of those in 2 years, let alone a few months.
(By the way, I'm also 2 years into Human Action, but I've barely understood anything past page 324.)
If I wrote it more than a few weeks ago, I probably hate it by now.
MES and HA are dense and chalk full of information. 15 pages an hour seems about right.
I can read almost 10 times faster when reading fiction, then when reading HA. Getting through this stuff is HARD, take notes and don't let it discourage you. If it takes you a year, don't worry about it. THe fact that your doing it is whats important. Many folks here don't even bother to attempt those two books. I'm glad that you are.
On reading vs. studying I think most regular university textbooks are designed to make reading = studying.
Bet studying a scientific or philosophical work of magnitude is of course a completely different matter then reading it.
Like I have read the entire Thus Spoke Zarathustra. And I didn't gain any insight what so ever except from a handful of sentences.
Actually studying Thus Spoke Zarathustra would be a rather massive undertaking ...
So it depends alot on what book it is. The Antichrist for instance I would say is fine just reading, but that is probably the only one of Nietzsche books worth just reading.
In my philosophy class now we get half a semester of full time studies to get thru one book and it would not be expected to be that thorow if we picked something like HA. HA would probably be more suited for a litterary study theses and full semester ... so studying these works are supposed to take a long time.
I read 1 page/min when reading harry potter. I read significantly slower on meatier texts. Most people here read articles btw, not full books. Even the books I do read I skim for important sections :)
Perfect practice makes perfect.
Practice reading and understanding what you read. Read new books, reread the same books, doesn't really matter. Just read. You will get better at it. For some reason, it seems like people believe that you're done practicing reading once you graduate the third grade, when it ought to be a life-long learning experience.
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krazy kaju: Perfect practice makes perfect.
Very, very true! The other thing I wanted to mention, however, is that reading retention is often accelerated when you've already established a basic understanding of the fundamentals. It's one thing to introduce yourself to a new subject where you need to take the time to let the massive influx of data matriculate into your brain. It's an entirely different story when you have a firm grasp of the basics, so when you study future materials, you can read a bit faster and only concentrate on picking up the occasional, new detail.
krazy kaju: For some reason, it seems like people believe that you're done practicing reading once you graduate the third grade.
Unfortunately, I think a lot of people stop reading entirely after the third grade ....
Something all the speed reading guys say is:
Stop vocalizing or subvocalizing to yourself what you're reading. Do just eye and mind action.
Substitute, at first, numbers or the alphabet in places of the words; to get used to removing this subvocalization.
Avoid reading over stuff over and over or hesitating and going back; this rereading prevents a lot of retention and confuses your brain. It might also bring you back to sounding things out.
Know the type of material beforehand. Technical books need different attention than poetry or novels, obviously. Many things must be read slow, whether for enjoyment or because there is data. But that is not a complete excuse to read slow. All things can be read faster.
Learn to read in blocks which will cause you to be able understand big semantic units. So you can see blocks and what they mean in your mind. Rather than cycling through every word and its meaning in your mind. This step can be taken after removing subvocalizations. It's the next step. I imagine this is what people who read music at a classical level can do with sheet music for a piece by Mozart. The faster people are at high levels, but even lesser experienced pianists understand the concept of music reading and can do it efficiently for most things. Same with reading. People like the Rain Man have no seperation between their right and left hemisphere brain-wise and can read both pages at the same time and big chunks seem easy. But most people can read things like 'the cat jumped over the fence' all at once rather than just each word. And all kinds of similar structures. The faster you recognize structures instead of words you can take on bigger and bigger chunks. Though, all people learn to read in the proper order: syllables, words, phrases, etc. Many people stop at words because they didn't learn proper literacy in school or somewhere else.
I also recommend the Amazon kindle. It makes for a comfortable reading experience that makes reading more enjoyable. Part of this in being able to adjust font size to your eyes quite easily. Plus the clicking between pages makes moving between pages very quick.
"Stop vocalizing or subvocalizing to yourself what you're reading"
That's not possible.It's a natural human reaction to do so.You either make movements as if speaking the words or think them.That is reading.
By the way ,you guys do know speed reading is bunk.It doesn't really work.Humans aren't made that way.
Just read at whatever pace seems right.Taking a long time but seeking comprehension is better than whizzing through and absorbing little.
I don't really want to comment or read anything here.I have near zero in common with many of you.I may return periodically when there's something you need to know.
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Scott F:"Stop vocalizing or subvocalizing to yourself what you're reading" That's not possible.It's a natural human reaction to do so.You either make movements as if speaking the words or think them.That is reading.
It is possible, I can do it and still explain the general content of the page I just read without subvocalizing at all. The reading speed like that is faster then I can consiouly form thoughts...
But it is not as good as thinking the words. I don't remember it as long and not as many details, if I don't write a summary afterward I will forget it right away...
Nothing is particularly innate about reading. Speed or otherwise. But things are in the realm of possibility.
I said that the alternative was 'thinking them' -- so we agree. You want the text to go from eye to the mind. The vocalization is an interuption. And only necessary to reading outloud.
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'Speed reading' is relative. Can people read books in minutes? Maybe not. Can they read at more optimum rates through techniques used by better readers? Yes. It seems logical, since some people read better than others. Ergo, different techniques are used.
I looked up what subvocalizing actually entail and it said people can subvocalize up to 300 words per minute and even while scanning....
How someone can think or emulate 300 words per minute is beyond me ... (maybe they are Spanish, my native language has an even slower word rate when spoken then English which is a pretty slow language already I think)
I guess what I do when I only look at the text would be scanning though. Not associating with the sounds at all impairs the cognative process but suprisingly much still sticks for a short while and more and more.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qpUSpBdQwcs
John Moschitta Jr. (born August 6, 1954 in New York City) is a performer best known for his rapid speech delivery. Before the category was eliminated, Moschitta was credited in The Guinness Book of World Records as the world's fastest talker, with the ability to articulate 586words per minute. Raised with five sisters, he often remarked that he needed to talk fast "just to get a word in edgewise."
Where there is no property there is no justice; a proposition as certain as any demonstration in Euclid
Fools! not to see that what they madly desire would be a calamity to them as no hands but their own could bring
Thanks. My word to page ratio was way of too. Apparently the average is 400, with academic texts averaging 600 words per page.
I guess I could think the sounds of just below one page of academic text per minute but it would be extremly straining and I find myself paying more attention to keep up the pace rather then the content. Actually think I retain more when just scanning and not doing any subvocalization then doing that...
15 pages per hour isn't so bad if you are taking lots of notes.
I, personally, can manage about 50-75 pages per hour, but I skim across pages like a rock skipping across water. I generally just re-read two or three times and I remember it quite well afterwards (but after the first read I usually miss important details)
Actually 15 pages per hour is the speed without including the time it takes me to write notes...(I also go back to the sections and reread them before making notes on each).
Thanks for the responses everyone.
That is a bit slow then, but for a work such as HA I would not aim that much higher.
How fast do you read novels, or stuff that is designed to be educational like a 101 course text book for some stuff without too many graphs and equations? If it is the same rate I think you could quickly improve by looking at some speed-reading introductions, I believe I found most of the stuff that helped me free on the web after the shorty study-technique guide we had when I started university. Just remember that are probably way exagerated about results and you shouldn't aim for what they tell you is possible or normal...
Unfortunally it was a long time ago so I don't have links...
If it is closer to 20-30 you don't need to worry to much about it even if there could still be room for some improvement.
Something that I’ve found helpful as of late is to read 10 books at a time, about 10-15 pages per book per day (when time is available). I’ve actually decided to take 12 months off from academic writing (though I have some articles sitting in queue at TLS) and read/journal.
Ideas come from clustering knowledge. I find that it’s much easier to make connection across disciplines than to be linear in your reading.
Another big area that I want to work on is how to squeeze out small bits of productivity from typically unproductive conversations. You know, like talking to your family, spouse or loser friends.
I must say, that makes a lot of sense Jeremy! In fact I have found moments of my inspiration came so far often having studied or revised something rigorously in physics when I was still studying it and going on to read something by Mises, or another Austrian with everything still fresh in my mind. The inter-relations were dazzling. (One example is realising how prescient Mises was about the limitations of mathematical economics given the importance of having constants relating different variables in order to relate different parts of a system mathematically. This resonated with what I learned when reading classical thermodynamics, and learning the importance of the same idea!)
Similiarly, I have found a lot of inspiration from my current study of neoclassical economics at Birkbeck College, though often in quite a critical direction. I guess one way to further expand the fields I have some experience in would be to get into logic and philosophy too.
Also, about conversations, I must say I often get great ideas from them, whether with friends or family. I've actually had some fruitful ideas from discussions with folks on this forum too (for which I am most grateful). An ex girlfriend once told me I was more of a conversational thinker, keen to debate and figure out the consequences of ideas. I think I misunderstood her at the time, saying that when I really needed to learn, I buckled down to read and make notes. That's more the way I revise and get things finally glued in my head; but now I think more that she had a point.
I agree with Jeremiah. I find that splitting up my reading helps me out significantly. I alway supplement a fiction while reading something dense. As a result I'm often reading 2-3 books at a time. I find myself more productive this way.
I. Ryan writes,
In fact, I used to read a lot (for example, maybe 4+ hours per day, finishing a lot of books over a few months). But I found that it was pretty useless. I would recommend that pick like 2-3 books (for example, "Human Action", "Man, Economy, and State", and something else), and stick with them really seriously.
Why did you find reading a lot useless?
I think that you need to pick a small pool of books to read multiple times over a lifetime (if that's the subject that you plan to spend your life on, that is). For example, an Austrian economist may pick Human Action and Man, Economy, and State (although, more likely than not, we are talking about a larger pool of books). You will never assimilate all information in one pass, no matter how slow you read it. Also, I guarantee that after leaving the book for some time you will begin to forget specific arguments.
However, I think that someone interested in a subject (and that is my caveat; if you are physicist that just wants to get a basic picture of economics then only a few books would prob. be necessary) should get as wide a pallet of reading as possible. If you are an economist, you couldn't get enough out of reading two or three books over and over.
I am a slow reader, because I am lazy and sometimes decide not read for very long periods of time—I also can't read for very long periods of time straight, I get bored. I am currently reading Human Action cover to cover (largely because I want to get the time preference theory of interest down really well before I continue finishing Reisman's Capitalism; so I want to read Human Action and Man, Economy, and State cover to cover), and I'm reading it at about 50 pages a day (which I consider a lot for myself — I was reading Capitalism at a rate of like 10 pages per day). It's been maybe three weeks since I started reading it, and I figure it will take me one more week. I really wish I was a faster reader, because I have a lot of books to read, but like others have seen assimilation is more important than just reading (the purpose of reading, in any case, is assimilation of the information).
I'm surprised no one has said this, but...the secret to reading more is...reading less!
Now that I have made the most radical claim I can, let me take it back and revise my statement.
(Henry Hazlitt has a book, "Thinking As a Science", which has a chapter on suggestions about how to read that I strongly advise. That is where a majority of my thoughts here on this come from.)
Apply Pareto's Principle to reading, the top 80% of material and ideas that you want from a book really only come from 20%. Most of the time you can summarize entire chapters for yourself in your notes in one or two sentences. And, that's perfectly fine, if not the ideal. Of course, what is clear in one or two sentences for you may take chapters for others, and this is why most authors (in my opinion) tend to write more than they need to. Moreover, if you are reading a book about, say, basics of economics, and you really don't care for an introduction to Keynesianism (especially, after a light skimming seeing it is all arguments you've seen before), then why read it? Seriously, I think this impetus to "Finish a book" is a harmful one. And we should take from our books what arguments and ideas we want.
Also, if later on in life we find that there is something important that is missed, then there is no harm done in going back to it! Just as learning happens in concentric circles, so does reading. The reading we do later allows us to gleam knowledge skipped from before.
So, skim, skip, and always read what is new. The key to reading fast is not reading _every single word as quickly as possible_, but rather, in _extracting the necessary information_.
Related to this, becoming an expert in a specific field allows you to read material in that field because, well, at least due to vocabulary, but more importantly because you understand the specific style and ways that similar authors introduce ideas and concepts that allow you to skim up into the relevant and important information. I have noticed that in reading the amount of mathematics that I have, that I now read mathematical texts a lot faster than before, not because I mentally process the new ideas or read word-by-word that much faster, but because I have a much better idea of how information is organized, and how to look up the relevant information that I need.
Related to this is what I think is actually going on when a person 'speed-read's. That is, they don't actually speed-read, but know the structure of a given genre well enough so as to reconstruct the rest of the paragraph by only a few key words.
tl;dr, now the vocabulary and structure to use Pareto's Principle to your advantage and skim to what you actually need to read. Thus, you read faster by reading less. Read in 'concentric circles', and not front to back.
(if you took my advice, you'd only have read the 'tl;dr' section ;) )
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"Even when leftists talk about discrimination and sexism, they're damn well talking about the results of the economic system" ~Neodoxy
Jonathan M. F. Catalán: Why did you find reading a lot useless?
For the same reasons that AJ lined out in this post.
I've decided to start blogging my notes http://libertarianunderlining.blogspot.com/ in hopes to better retain my readings. I hope to blog my notes each day by the first of January. If anyone else is interested in this or starting/joining a book group read post here or contact me. I want to stay really engaged in learning this coming year
I perceive my slow reading as a strength, not a weakness because I retain far more than my peers. If you don't retain your reading, you are passing time instead of gaining education.
Tips for speed:
-Read in a quiet place without distractions
-To lead your eyes to avoid losing your place, put a finger to the left of the next line of the text (or put the sentence your reading at the top of the computer screen).
Tips for retention:
-Do subvocalize
-Relate reading to all the senses (taste, smell, touch, sight, hearing, body positioning, balance)
-Relate reading to your emotions
-Investigate topics of interest beyond the book
-Reread confusing material
-Stop reading or refocus when your mind starts to wander
-Learn Neuro-Linguistic Programming (Bandler and Erickson)
people that say that '' speed reading is absurd'' obviously have not taken the time to learn it... it is very useful and you do remember alot more because instead of retaining words in your short term memory, you retain phrases... obviously, you read slower when you study compared to reading a fictional story for pleasure, but speed reading does work... if you do not have patience for ''speed reading'' then, yes, you should just stick with your way of reading...
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I have not read everyone's responses here so I hope I am not repeating something already said. But as a current college student I find my reading speed to be extraordinarily slow when reading my textbooks. But I also look at my time spent in the textbook as a study time instead of reading time for the sake of reading. What I find is that when it comes time to go over the material again before a test I find it a quite speedy process. In fact, the day or so before any test I rarely study for more than an hour or so because most of my study time can be attributed to my initial reading of the material. I am a finance major BTW so it's not like I am speaking of studying history or art which requires less critical thought.
But I will say that I am glad I am not the only one one here who has this problem :) although I hope you still improve
Sieben:I read 1 page/min when reading harry potter. I read significantly slower on meatier texts. Most people here read articles btw, not full books. Even the books I do read I skim for important sections :)
I read articles, listen to a lot of podcasts, and watch a lot of presentations. I usually watch/listen/read a piece of media multiple times. I have probably read my favorite set of fiction 30+ times. I find repetition helps.
Skip things. Don't sell yourself short. You probably have better things to do than torture yourself with every passage of every page of every book you read.