Comment by mahogany | Hacker News Reader

Comment by mahogany | Hacker News Reader

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> My suggestion: Go to a news stand instead and grab a copy of The Economist. One who does that will learn much about the world. About countries one rarely hear about in other media outlets. About advances in science and technology.

To play Devil's advocate, why is it useful to spend time learning about these types of things -- world politics, economics, even current scientific developments? Is it mainly because it's interesting (so that it's primarily entertainment)? Or is it to better yourself in some way? I think a lot of people implicitly think that this type of knowledge falls into the "bettering yourself" category, but I wonder if it's mostly for entertainment. Of course, if you are actively involved in international politics, then things look different, but I'm mainly talking about the "everyperson".

I bring this up because I go through phases where I get really into world "happenings" as described above, but then after a while I feel as though I have gained little or nothing, except emotional responses and opinions about these things, which causes no noticeable positive effect in my day-to-day life (and in fact, often affects my mental state negatively, given the amount of fear-mongering in media). Instead, I have the suspicion that all of that time would have been better spent focusing on things local: myself, friendships, family, hobbies.

I pointed out that the Economist isn't that great in another comment, but turning around and leaping to its defense:

It tends to give an overview of geopolitical events that do have some meaning. For instance, your entire idea of the Philippines may be that it's a US ally, has a lot of beaches and happy people. The Economist (or something similar) may then clue you in that no, actually, the country is on the edge of falling to dictatorship and in bed with China. That info is slanted, and may not be useful for you taking any substantive action; but on the other hand, it gives you a starting point if, say, you ever had a Filipino coworker. It also tells you something about the broader world, such as the fact that a lot of democracies are starting to look fragile enough that you might want to consider learning enough to decide whether that could actually be a local problem. (This isn't a screed, just an example; the Philippines may be fine and your local democracy may be strong!)

If you already knew a decent amount about the situation -- well, maybe just skip that particular article, or give it a quick skim and move on. Maybe look at the Economist as a sampler, rather than something to read cover to cover. It also has stuff like the Technology Quarterly, which actually covers a much broader range of tech concepts than, say, HN.

My reason for reading in-depth articles and books is to increase my learnings on all these topics.

Partly for entertainment. But mostly because our world is hyperconnected. A looming war in Eastern Europe, combined with supply-chain shortages, apparently has a giant effect on stock prices. So, in order to understand why my pension is at risk, what I can do to secure it, or whether I should wait with buying a new car or house, , I need to know about 1) Russian Geopolitics, 2) Natural-Gas usage, 3) Supply-chains of, mostly, computer-chips, 4) inflation and then, 5, how all this ties together.

We live in a hyperconnected world where every butterfly has profound effects on my daily life. For me, that means I try to avoid reading about every butterfly or wing-flapping (i.e. the daily news) but I try to learn as much as possible about underlying mechanisms and issues.

If you like to understand things, understanding things is its own reward.

However, there is also voting.

Understand things like, "what is in shampoo", to take an example from the article? I like to understand things too, but there there's plenty of things to learn, and I think one can benefit from being choosy.

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