How do I learn, well, everything?
January 4, 2018 12:01 PM Subscribe
When I was a kid, I thought that if I knew everything, I could do anything. So I read the encyclopedia. The whole thing. When I was 6. It's all lost to the sands of time, now, and I want it back. How do I learn everything?
I don't need to have in-depth knowledge of every topic under the sun. I'm more than happy to go in-depth into things I find interesting. (When I was 7, I could tell you every detail about how to tell if someone was a witch or not. I was a weird kid.) I'm more looking for a passing familiarity with a little bit of everything.
You know the phrase "Jack of all trades, master of none"? That's kind of what I'm after here. I don't need to be fluent in German, but it'd be nice if I could recognize what I'm seeing as being German. (And maybe some more useful phrases than "Wo ist der spiegel?" under my belt would be nice, too) I don't want to engineer nuclear reactors, but some level of understanding of the basic physics would be great.
How do I go about achieving this? Do I start on Wikipedia at aardvark and keep going until I've read all 5,544,379 articles in English? Do I want a physical encyclopedia? Is there some book (or series of books) that gives a brief overview of the entire body of knowledge of man?
I realize this is ambitious, and will probably take the rest of my life, but I want to know all the things.
I don't need to have in-depth knowledge of every topic under the sun. I'm more than happy to go in-depth into things I find interesting. (When I was 7, I could tell you every detail about how to tell if someone was a witch or not. I was a weird kid.) I'm more looking for a passing familiarity with a little bit of everything.
You know the phrase "Jack of all trades, master of none"? That's kind of what I'm after here. I don't need to be fluent in German, but it'd be nice if I could recognize what I'm seeing as being German. (And maybe some more useful phrases than "Wo ist der spiegel?" under my belt would be nice, too) I don't want to engineer nuclear reactors, but some level of understanding of the basic physics would be great.
How do I go about achieving this? Do I start on Wikipedia at aardvark and keep going until I've read all 5,544,379 articles in English? Do I want a physical encyclopedia? Is there some book (or series of books) that gives a brief overview of the entire body of knowledge of man?
I realize this is ambitious, and will probably take the rest of my life, but I want to know all the things.
I don't particularly see it this way, but more people than I expected have referred to me as a "polymath". Based on that, the things that I think help me:
posted by straw at 12:21 PM on January 4, 2018 [25 favorites]
- Take copious notes. Put those notes in a searchable form. I use my blog for this. In almost 2 decades (next month!) I'm approaching 25k entries. Some of them are completely silly, but a lot of them are references to papers so that when someone says "they say that..." and I have this vague inkling of having read on the topic, I can go back and remind myself of the original authors.
- Don't miss an opportunity to tell someone "I don't know, can you elaborate?". I've never done any RF engineering, but when a potential employer said "you know what a Smith chart is?", rather than BSing my way through, I said "no, teach me", and I got a great intro.
- Chase things back to their original sources. When you see an article claiming some breakthrough, go find the press release that article was based on. Then go find the papers that article was based on. You don't have to read the whole thing, but at least read the preface and the results pages and maybe find a critique or two. Not only does this help you figure out what the story was before the journalist spin got put on it, this is a good place to find other things to learn more about.
- Don't discount a discipline. Ages ago I spent the better part of a day operating a drill press beside a guy who owned a machine shop. I learned some really cool things about metallurgy and temper and metal color.
- The best education is informal. The person who put it in a book abstracted it. A lecture is nothing compared to being an assistant. Conversations help way more than reading.
posted by straw at 12:21 PM on January 4, 2018 [25 favorites]
Start with what you're already interested in, and move out. Wikipedia is great for this. Follow links out from your extremely narrow interest until you find yourself in somebody else's extremely narrow interest. (Dumb example: I had no interest in cooking until I became interested in the weird subculture that's sprung up around cast iron pans. From there—well, obviously I need to know about other kinds of pans, to see why cast iron is the best. And the science of cooking, that would be useful. And I should probably learn about American domestic history, to see why everyone's grandma has a beautiful cast iron pan. And a little bit about mass-producing iron goods wouldn't hurt—hey, did you know Lodge still manufactures pans in its small-town US factory? Wonder what the decline of US production in other industries was like, and how they managed to avoid it. And so on.)
If you start with the encyclopedia—at least, if I start with the encyclopedia—you're not organizing the material to your own advantage. The encyclopedia is arranged alphabetically so that people don't have to read the whole thing; they can just find the page they need. If your goal is to "read the whole thing", the alphabet has absolutely no value for you. Set your sails and let your interests carry you along.
posted by Polycarp at 12:22 PM on January 4, 2018 [3 favorites]
If you start with the encyclopedia—at least, if I start with the encyclopedia—you're not organizing the material to your own advantage. The encyclopedia is arranged alphabetically so that people don't have to read the whole thing; they can just find the page they need. If your goal is to "read the whole thing", the alphabet has absolutely no value for you. Set your sails and let your interests carry you along.
posted by Polycarp at 12:22 PM on January 4, 2018 [3 favorites]
I had similar designs as a child and still do today!
Check out Khan Academy - they've got free online courses in a wide variety of subjects and they go pretty in-depth. When I find a subject I'm particularly interested in, I seek out additional lectures on youtube, questions and discussions on stackexchange, etc.
posted by stinkfoot at 12:24 PM on January 4, 2018 [3 favorites]
Check out Khan Academy - they've got free online courses in a wide variety of subjects and they go pretty in-depth. When I find a subject I'm particularly interested in, I seek out additional lectures on youtube, questions and discussions on stackexchange, etc.
posted by stinkfoot at 12:24 PM on January 4, 2018 [3 favorites]
On the subject of note-taking, you might find inspiration in Cosma Shalizi's Notebooks http://bactra.org/notebooks/.
posted by waninggibbon at 12:24 PM on January 4, 2018 [4 favorites]
posted by waninggibbon at 12:24 PM on January 4, 2018 [4 favorites]
It is not available any more, but DailyLit used to have a "book" called The Grand Tour that was actually 918 wikipedia articles and they would send you one each day. I found this similar service: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/daily-article-l, which gives you the daily featured article.
There is going to be a lot of info on Wikipedia that is not very useful to you, so I would start at the Contents page with its list of twelve broad topics.
posted by soelo at 12:31 PM on January 4, 2018 [2 favorites]
There is going to be a lot of info on Wikipedia that is not very useful to you, so I would start at the Contents page with its list of twelve broad topics.
posted by soelo at 12:31 PM on January 4, 2018 [2 favorites]
One place to start: The New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy: What Every American Needs to Know (and yes, it leans on the traditional side, so the 6,000 entries may not cover the 6,000 topics someone else might have chosen).
posted by Mr.Know-it-some at 12:34 PM on January 4, 2018 [4 favorites]
posted by Mr.Know-it-some at 12:34 PM on January 4, 2018 [4 favorites]
I've found Wikipedia editing helpful in increasing my general knowledge. If you start with an area you know about and try to improve coverage, then move out from there (eg by looking at what other people who edit the same articles as you are also editing), you can try to understand and improve (by looking for better citations etc) articles on an area which you didn't initially know much about. For me, there's something about less passivity when actually being involved in editing that means I retain more of what I read on Wikipedia.
You might also enjoy A World of Curiosities: Surprising, Interesting, and Downright Unbelievable Facts from Every Nation on the Planet, by John Oldale, previously published as Who or Why or Which or What. The linked review gives a good sense of it.
PS Needs polymath tag!
posted by paduasoy at 12:36 PM on January 4, 2018 [1 favorite]
You might also enjoy A World of Curiosities: Surprising, Interesting, and Downright Unbelievable Facts from Every Nation on the Planet, by John Oldale, previously published as Who or Why or Which or What. The linked review gives a good sense of it.
PS Needs polymath tag!
posted by paduasoy at 12:36 PM on January 4, 2018 [1 favorite]
Since it sounds like you're interested in using Wikipedia as a starting point, I'd recommend heading over to their Portal pages that categorize topics together. For example, their Science Portal divides into the natural sciences, social sciences, behavioral sciences, and applied sciences with their own respective subdivisions. At the top of the page it also links to the other topic portals, like culture, history, mathematics, religion, etc. That way you can start building an internal concept map that may eventually link many of these topics together in an interdisciplinary way. It's generally easier to remember concepts by seeing how they relate as a system or how it all maps together, since that allows you to integrate the knowledge into your own worldview and your own unique personal experiences.
Besides the fact that you will have to work your way through exposing yourself to all these topics, you will also have to grapple with the decay of unused information in your memory over time. Humans usually naturally recall knowledge best when they use that knowledge for something in their lives, or when the knowledge connects together in a recognizable pattern. So unless you intend to use spaced repetition to memorize topics one by one, you should try to learn each topic in the context in which in connects to other topics.
Sometimes when we forget things, it's not exactly that they just disappear--it can be that we misattribute or misremember a fact. So that's another pitfall to be wary of as you go along, since I assume you also want your knowledge to be mostly accurate.
You can keep a notebook to write down your notes as you learn new topics, and perhaps draw a concept map to link subjects together. I realize you might not want to delve deeply into all of the topics, but I think that if you find a particular topic interesting, reading a book on it will give you entire swathes of information that might further solidify in your mind. Lastly, many topics will have associated physical activities you could do! You could read a little about music theory and then try to write a few bars of music, or read about CNC mills and go to your local makerspace to try out the equipment, or read about linear algebra and multiply matrices, or read about yeast and brew your own beer, or read about gardening and grow your own mint, or read about physical therapy and do some self-massage, or read about colors and mix some paint, or read about C++ and write a program...
It's awesome to want to try to learn a little bit of everything. Best of luck!
posted by Iron Carbide at 12:37 PM on January 4, 2018 [2 favorites]
Besides the fact that you will have to work your way through exposing yourself to all these topics, you will also have to grapple with the decay of unused information in your memory over time. Humans usually naturally recall knowledge best when they use that knowledge for something in their lives, or when the knowledge connects together in a recognizable pattern. So unless you intend to use spaced repetition to memorize topics one by one, you should try to learn each topic in the context in which in connects to other topics.
Sometimes when we forget things, it's not exactly that they just disappear--it can be that we misattribute or misremember a fact. So that's another pitfall to be wary of as you go along, since I assume you also want your knowledge to be mostly accurate.
You can keep a notebook to write down your notes as you learn new topics, and perhaps draw a concept map to link subjects together. I realize you might not want to delve deeply into all of the topics, but I think that if you find a particular topic interesting, reading a book on it will give you entire swathes of information that might further solidify in your mind. Lastly, many topics will have associated physical activities you could do! You could read a little about music theory and then try to write a few bars of music, or read about CNC mills and go to your local makerspace to try out the equipment, or read about linear algebra and multiply matrices, or read about yeast and brew your own beer, or read about gardening and grow your own mint, or read about physical therapy and do some self-massage, or read about colors and mix some paint, or read about C++ and write a program...
It's awesome to want to try to learn a little bit of everything. Best of luck!
posted by Iron Carbide at 12:37 PM on January 4, 2018 [2 favorites]
If I, personally, were to do this, I'd start by using the Dewey decimal system as my compass. I'd start by going through each class, and identifying the subclass in each that seemed most immediately interesting. Then I'd research books recommended by experts for interested laypeople in those subjects and read one per subject. I'd then go through the process again, either by going deeper down the classification system or choosing a different subclass.
Some suggestions for some of my own personal interests:
Great blog post on books to learn math on your own- I especially recommend Measurement, which is a terrible, misleading title for an amazing book
Great moviemaking reading list
You could read fifty billion books on food, or just read On Food and Cooking by Harold McGee
Also, take advantage of college syllabi, a ton of professors/universities post them online publically and they're a great source of beginner-friendly reading suggestions.
Finally, remember that learning everything isn't possible. A lot of knowledge simply isn't accessible to you- because it's in a different language or was never written down in the first place or... Don't be one of those people who assumes that all knowledge worth knowing is in Wikipedia or a western library.
posted by perplexion at 12:40 PM on January 4, 2018 [1 favorite]
Some suggestions for some of my own personal interests:
Great blog post on books to learn math on your own- I especially recommend Measurement, which is a terrible, misleading title for an amazing book
Great moviemaking reading list
You could read fifty billion books on food, or just read On Food and Cooking by Harold McGee
Also, take advantage of college syllabi, a ton of professors/universities post them online publically and they're a great source of beginner-friendly reading suggestions.
Finally, remember that learning everything isn't possible. A lot of knowledge simply isn't accessible to you- because it's in a different language or was never written down in the first place or... Don't be one of those people who assumes that all knowledge worth knowing is in Wikipedia or a western library.
posted by perplexion at 12:40 PM on January 4, 2018 [1 favorite]
If you're a fast reader and can devote a chunk of time every day to it, a good RSS feed can be a godsend in getting a handle on "what's happening now", and getting a handle on that can be a good way to provide more research k-holes to chase down like Polycarp suggested. I use Feedbin to follow about 500 sites that post at wildly varying frequencies. A bunch of them are themselves aggregators, like Metafilter or HackerNews. I use TwitRSS to follow some individual Twitter feeds (some for specific people I find interesting, some for organizations that don't offer RSS feeds for their sites).
posted by protocoach at 12:42 PM on January 4, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by protocoach at 12:42 PM on January 4, 2018 [1 favorite]
No joke: I'd skim through TVTropes listing of UsefulNotes pages. It gives thorough, informal overviews of hundreds of topics, from history to language to geography to politics, all in the site's funny, conversational style. Not exactly a college course, but still genuinely informative, and much more interesting than reading Wikipedia.
posted by Rhaomi at 1:29 PM on January 4, 2018
posted by Rhaomi at 1:29 PM on January 4, 2018
An enjoyably random approach if you have time is to browse the library stacks. I like to scan the 500's (science), 600's (technology-including primitive stuff like paper making and textiles, and 700's (art and architecture). I have better luck in history (900's) if I look for a particular period or place. I can't help if your library uses Library of Congress categories but maybe someone else can.
posted by Botanizer at 2:31 PM on January 4, 2018 [2 favorites]
posted by Botanizer at 2:31 PM on January 4, 2018 [2 favorites]
Check out a book called "An Incomplete Education," by Judy Jones and William Wilson.
posted by ethical_caligula at 7:22 PM on January 4, 2018 [2 favorites]
posted by ethical_caligula at 7:22 PM on January 4, 2018 [2 favorites]
Make a "curiosity" list on your phone or a notepad and the minute you see or think about something in the street, shop, restaurant, etc that you want to learn more about, write it down and follow up by researching it later. For example, you see an interesting type on a sign, follow up by reading all about types and fonts on Wikipedia, YouTube, and book recommendations. That may lead down even further paths of learning.
This can turn into a fun little nerdy obsession and lead down interesting rabbit holes, believe me. It may become a habit and have this sort of positive feedback loop where you're more consciously on the lookout for curiosities in this crazy world.
Have fun!
posted by hexaflexagon at 7:33 PM on January 4, 2018
This can turn into a fun little nerdy obsession and lead down interesting rabbit holes, believe me. It may become a habit and have this sort of positive feedback loop where you're more consciously on the lookout for curiosities in this crazy world.
Have fun!
posted by hexaflexagon at 7:33 PM on January 4, 2018
First, I'd recommend reading the novel Bouvard and Pecuchet
Personally, I second the idea of using existing library categorizations as these are attempts to classify human knowledge. Wikipedia has this as well.
Of course, with this method you will be precluding most practical skills. For example, you can read about Bryology on wikipedia all you want, but you still wont know how to use a hand lens to quickly identify most types of common mosses. Same is true of most field knowledge. Or, using your German language example, you can read up on the syntactical structure of German but you won't easily find the most practical phrases for navigating in Germany. You can study foods but won't know what they actually taste like.
For both examples above, you probably need to supplement with field manuals and 'How to survive...' type things or How Stuff Works type things or else stay at the theoretical level of knowledge
posted by vacapinta at 5:37 AM on January 5, 2018 [1 favorite]
Personally, I second the idea of using existing library categorizations as these are attempts to classify human knowledge. Wikipedia has this as well.
Of course, with this method you will be precluding most practical skills. For example, you can read about Bryology on wikipedia all you want, but you still wont know how to use a hand lens to quickly identify most types of common mosses. Same is true of most field knowledge. Or, using your German language example, you can read up on the syntactical structure of German but you won't easily find the most practical phrases for navigating in Germany. You can study foods but won't know what they actually taste like.
For both examples above, you probably need to supplement with field manuals and 'How to survive...' type things or How Stuff Works type things or else stay at the theoretical level of knowledge
posted by vacapinta at 5:37 AM on January 5, 2018 [1 favorite]
I'm on my Ipad, so I am not linking, but you might like the book The Practical Cogitator.
posted by wittgenstein at 7:11 AM on January 5, 2018
posted by wittgenstein at 7:11 AM on January 5, 2018
- Wikiwand makes Wikipedia's interface more convenient and attractive.
- Very Short Introductions is also available online for free if your library has a subscription.
- How Stuff Works also has a Stuff You Should Know podcast. NPR has an Everything Explained podcast. The Complete Guide to Everything calls itself Wikipedia in podcast form.
- Introducing Graphic Guides is a series of introductory comic books. Larry Gonick does cartoon histories and guides.
- Surface Languages and ielanguages cover the basics of multiple languages.
- Highbrow and Curious deliver short daily lessons to your inbox.
- Here's a list of 10 books (including The Intellectual Devotional series) to teach you a little about a lot. And here's a list of quiz bowl references.
- There are almost too many free online resources and courses of varying levels to choose from: Canvas, Crash Course YouTube videos, Lifehacker U, No Excuse List, ThoughtCo (which has a daily newsletter), 100 intro open courses, 250 courses, 40 educational websites (including OpenCulture), etc.
- You could play trivia games like QuizUp in topics of your interest.
- If you use social media, you could follow your favorite sources to get their posts in your newsfeeds, e.g. Wikipedia's Facebook page.
- Consider taking 101 survey classes at a local community college or center or checking out textbooks/primers or even exam material reviews (e.g. AP, SAT Subject Tests, Schaum's Outlines) from the library.
posted by eyeball at 9:25 AM on January 5, 2018 [3 favorites]
Check out this book. It was published less than a year ago by the guy who replaced Richard Dawkins as the chair of Public Understanding of Science at Oxford.
Learning everything is gonna be tough, maybe start from the opposite direction to get a hold on the problem, what can't we know? In the first 20 pages the author talks about how he dealt with having almost the exact same problem that you're asking.
posted by laptolain at 8:23 PM on January 6, 2018
Learning everything is gonna be tough, maybe start from the opposite direction to get a hold on the problem, what can't we know? In the first 20 pages the author talks about how he dealt with having almost the exact same problem that you're asking.
posted by laptolain at 8:23 PM on January 6, 2018
There's an app called Endless Quiz that basically strip mines Wikipedia for general knowledge trivia questions. They can get rather technical ("What is the study of cochains, cocycles, and coboundaries?"), but after the answer is revealed you can click a button and see the relevant Wiki article. You could treat it as another alternative to Wikipedia browsing with game modes and stat tracking attached.
posted by Iridic at 11:14 PM on January 31, 2018
posted by Iridic at 11:14 PM on January 31, 2018
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The "Very Short Introductions" series from Oxford University Press has a cult following and might be what you're after. Godspeed.
posted by waninggibbon at 12:17 PM on January 4, 2018 [19 favorites]