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.

[–] dresden@discuss.online 5 points 1 week ago (1 children)

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.

[–] psud@aussie.zone 3 points 1 week 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@lemmy.world 2 points 1 week ago

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