• @niktemadur
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    521 days ago

    Before the internet arrived at my home, I used to read a fair amount of books - maybe about ten every year - but that fell by the wayside, even after I bought an e-ink tablet specifically for the purpose.

    However, I do a lot more of writing than I used to, in these threads as well as messaging friends and family, long chains of text bubbles about whatever’s on my mind.

    Also, thanks to some truly excellent YouTube channels - both from content creators and university lectures - I now understand things like cosmology and physics, math and ancient history, so much better than I used to, better than with any book I ever came across, and it is an exhilarating feeling. To the point that I now prefer binging on knowledge content than watching movies or television series.

    To watch someone who has a way with words get carried away with excitement for an hour or two while describing things like the Michelson-Morley experiment, or the Stern-Gerlach experiment, Feynman diagrams and Penrose diagrams, makes me feel like something about society that used to be remote and flat and black & white, suddenly exploded into 3D and glorious technicolor.

    • @[email protected]M
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      fedilink
      English
      621 days ago

      Unfortunately, most of us who aren’t doing the reading aren’t watching educational content.

      Glad to see that at least some people are using their time productively.

      • @[email protected]
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        fedilink
        421 days ago

        A lot of us are. Lots of us like information rather than amusement (though the podcast playing right now is Probably Science which is as much comedy as science

    • @insaneinthemembrane
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      321 days ago

      Totally agree. I do the same with podcasts. So many interesting topics discussed by enthusiastic people, I love it.