Right off the gate, while we do have libraries where i live, they are mostly outdated or don’t have books on controversial topics, So how does anyone find reliable information when so much of the internet is slop 🤢 and search engines only give the same top 5 "How to stuff 🤑 " websites.
I have been listening to a couple of podcasts 📻 about debunking popular pop culture misinformed science 🧑🔬 claims(Your wrong about, Maintenance phase, If books could kill) and that got me interested in trying to research my own topics. But where does one start. I understand that there is no universal solution 🧪 , really what it takes, is alot of googling and going beyond the results first page but maybe there are some good sources?
Sharing some of what i found useful here:
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While libraries in my area are not really an option, looking up books online is a good start. I use goodreads to look up different topics and see what the reviews are saying about the quality and reliability of the book. Its also worth fact the citations of books.
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Turns out google is very good with finding pdfs 📄 , so add type:pdf to whatever your searching. you can also add site:.gov 🏢 to search only gov websites ,or site:.ca 🇨🇦 to search websites that label themself Canada in the URL, for example.
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Use before:, A lot people suggest that you use before:2023 to filter out most AI Slop, date before chatgpt came out, but also i have found interesting stuff when going back further like before:2015.
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I have tried alot of different search engines and they all just serve google results. the one good one is Marginalia . Its not really reliable like say, google in certain cases is, but alot of the time will serve me new sources, its focus is on non-commercial websites
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The last one is kinda of mixed bag(and Meta). When you ask people online for suggestions for something, like say some podcasts recommendations, they tend to give you the same five podcasts. Sometimes its something totally different but its a hit or miss most of the time.
P.S: I discovered emoji markdown just now but its kinda of lacking a bit. Still cool though,
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This is not quite an answer to your question, but: Wherever you’re starting, it’s really important to check whether the person behind the information source is qualified to speak authoritatively on the topic and whether they have financial incentives to promote something they’re saying.
Ask questions like: Is there a specific human or HIGHLY respected organization (not a random business) putting their name behind the information? Is that human actually qualified in the field/subject they’re talking about? (“They wrote a book on it” or “They have a PhD in an unspecified field” isn’t good enough on its own.) Are they recommending a product or service that they sell? Those filters aren’t enough on their own, but they will help you avoid a lot of nonsense.
You probably already knew this stuff, but I need to continually remind myself to check these things, and maybe this reminder will help you too.
it depends on what you want to research into? maybe giving a bit of your motivation and background might help? also your location (what country you live in) matters a lot.
also btw i like the emojis. they make the text more colorful and interesting to read.
Hi gibbon ape(I think I tagged you that cuz they were ur fav primate or something).
maybe giving a bit of your motivation
Ego I suppose, I like the aesthetics of academia and would like to feel a sense of accomplishment. Maybe down the line I become enthralled with a field, but for now its just a hobby.
I find that I prefer humanities more over STEM and I live in Egypt(thought I am not sure how that relates)
oh lol yeah gibbons are cute xD
oh interesting. i mostly know STEM stuff but history is also cool. and literature. you could start by looking up the most influential books in your language? for arabian, i remember there’s a book called Book of Kings (Shahnameh) that’s quite interesting. [Edit: nvm that’s persian]. And the One Thousand and One Nights are especially cool as they show how a corrupt ruler can be converted through the art of story-telling.
the main reason to go to a library for research is not the inventory, but the staff. librarians are trained, professional information finders. if you’re just looking on the shelves you’re missing soooo much of what a library can do for you.
also don’t use emojis like that, it makes you look like an llm.
also don’t use emojis like that, it makes you look like an llm.
this is false. i like them, and i do not think that they are LLM because of it.
I don’t think using emojis makes anyone look like an LLM 🤷♂️
i do
Go to Wikipedia go to the bottom of the page and look at the sources.
Go to Wikipedia first.
I’m a fan of academic and Pop-academic sources.
Pop Academic is usually the much easier to read version of a proper academic quality book. I’m a fan of Bart D. Erhman and a lot of his books are pop academia, but they reference his academic works.
The process I was taught for this kind of source finding is 1) Search for a broader topic 2) Find a well referenced book on the broader topic 3) Read book reviews of the book to determine if it has the content you want 4) Read the book or skim the book looking for mention of the idea you want to know more about 5) Check the relevant sources of that section.
If there are no sources listed (or they don’t exist because they’re hallucinations), its probably not a good book for information.
Depends entirely on the topic.
Are you versed in some topics? I could also list some here, if you have sources to point me to.
I’m generally knowledgeable of my field of work, but I’d rather not share that and dox myself. Among subjects I’m more comfortable discussing online, I’m a bit of a Marxism nerd, sources like ProleWiki and Red Sails are usually good starting points for theory, and can help point towards primary sources in a similar way that Wikipedia can (neither are sources themselves, but frequently reference primary sources, books, etc that can be a kicking off point for in-depth study). Those aren’t really what most people on this post are looking for though, I imagine.
discussing online, I’m a bit of a Marxism nerd
I am open to learning about Marxism. I copied a couple of books on my countries Politics from my sister and among them are some communist books. Haven’t gotten around to reading them though
Coming to you as a believer in the inherit problems of Capitalism, but who struggle to imagine a world without it(that isn’t set in the past),do you have anything that’s prescriptive instead of just descriptive? I have seen mountain’s of critics online(mostly YouTube) but no real way forward. I aslo want to know if a communist society is achievable compared to a socialist democracy.
For starters, I compiled a basic Marxist-Leninist study guide and host it over on c/communism. The first section might be interesting for you, it’s intentionally short and punchy, and you don’t need to go beyond it unless you want to.
That all being said, the easiest and most intuitive way to imagine it is as a continuation of the increasing interdependence of humanity as has happened with capitalism, where production has been socialized globally but distribution remains private, into one where the social surplus created by society is controlled and directed by those producing it instead. Essentially, an increase in interconnectedness, and a full collectivization of production and distribution globally.
That’s communism, a global system. However, the process of building that comes from socialism first. Socialism is essentially where public ownership is the principal, ie rising and dominant aspect, of the economy, and the working classes control the state. Socialism is a transition to communism. Socialism begins in each country, communism arises from socialist countries gradually developing advanced production and stitching themselves all together over a long period of time.
Markets essentially “socialize” production, creating an interconnected system. Central planning cannot work without highly developed productive forces at a large scale. In this way, capitalism prepares the ground for socialism. Just as capitalism prepares the ground for socialism, so too does socialism prepare the ground for communism. Most revolutions have happened in colonial countries revolting against colonialism, so this means they have had to take more drastic measures when it comes to creating self-sufficiency, with very underdeveloped productive forces (largely agrarian instead of industrial).
That’s the basics of it! Does that answer your question?
This is an important topic, and I appreciate the work you did compiling this list and starting the conversation.
But oh my fucking god, your emoji use makes me want to punch you
Same here. I literally found them out today, the markdown type. I dont even like emojis that much, but thought it would be funny.
What topic do you want to research? Many topics have specialized sources.
I mostly jump between humanites; geography, philosophy, psychology, sociology and politics and so on. Right now I have a list of loss concepts I want to research
Here are some:
- Alternatives education forms
- STEAM vs STEM
- Journalling techniques
- Color theory in different cultures
- How to fact check
- Why do so many animals have tails
- Diabetes and obesity in the middle east
- Translation science; the role it plays and its effectiveness.
- How to deal with personal biases
- Dysprixa, DID and OCD
For me it all has to do with the search terms, and maybe that I use duck duck go.
Like, if you want to know something use words that would be in the peer reviewed paper about that topic. “Long term consequences of glyphosate use in soil biomes” not “Is glyphosate bad for forests”
Hmm but also most of the papers I find are on science direct (a website), and if it’s pay walled I then go on to sci-hub and see if it’s on there. If I reeeeeeaaalllyyyy want to read it I email the authors directly, and usually they find time to get back to me between begging for grant money and doing actual science stuff.
Use kagi.
Use bookmarks. Ask people here for good websites (I am amzed at the shit people find that I would never ever have seen on basically invisible small websites )
Also yes, search everything before like 2016 ish
Books on the Archive
Kagi seems well regarded as a search engine, dunno I use my own SearxNG which takes hits from multiple engines (Marginalia is one of my mains). Occasionally I fire up a local LLM and pipe it through SearxNG via vane when I’m fighting slop for current issues. (Slop vs Slop, sigh, but at least I get references I can hand check).
For specific interests there is often a specific forum where knowledgeable people gather, if you find it you’ll get good results, e.g. Endless Sphere for eBikes and batteries and such. It may be reddit unfortunately, before: is your friend where useful. There are high quality but still accessible magazines out there, e.g. Quanta for maths and Knowable for more general science.
With academic papers have a look at the impact factor of the journal, high impact is highly competitive and quality is usually higher. If you’re dealing with heavy jargon, translation is something LLMs are actually sot of good at, use them to see if the info you want is actually there before wading through the jargon yourself to check / understand deeper.
IMO Snopes.com is a good source of truth on popular things that may be BS.
Your last point is an example of a statistical phenomena called a long tail. It also applies to search engine results ironically.
Another thing that comes into play is the XY problem where you think you know what you’re looking for, but it’s actually a specific case of a more general problem, and hunting just keeps turning up bad results. Good to let things rest, or ask a question somewhere.
There are useful tools that can help you as well, I like Obsidian for note taking, but there are many, while Zotero for organizing papers and Calibre for books are pretty invaluable. No good finding stuff out if you just forget it in a month, and once you have a large library running grep over your own stuff can often turn up useful info right at your fingertips.
really depends how serious/deep you want to research. start with wikipedia. i catch myself asking the AI for a basic understanding and further sources. if you really want to dig deep try to find universities with public curicullum. They just list the reviewed literature they build their courses on. At last, for scientific research there are peer reviewed papers but i felt like many of them are mixed quality and just a means for graduation of doctorands. So books should accumulate the good ones and their findings in a coherent way after all.
