Inspectional Reading - How To Read For Understanding

The way to tackle difficult reading materials that school didn't teach you.

[TheRishijoesanu]

You're a tiny channel but you deserve more views.

[mehes]

It’s like painting. You need to look at the bigger picture to base your details on.

[natasharedmane]

I found your videos on accident and I only watched a handful so far but I absolutely love your content. Really great work!

[hmena]

A thing that has really helped my to understand the topics is to try to solve the problems the book tries to tackle, myself. That way you can see the book as pieces of the missing puzzle of your own model of reality, you share experiences with the philosopher.

[Ianvongrimmify]

I wish I would have seen this before I started my semester in the Philosophy department. The only methods of learning I thought were there available to rely on while learning philosophy was either the rope theory or memorizing. Your method makes so much more sense to follow and I could literally see it in my mind while you were talking about it.

[isaacstovell]

hugely agree with your recommendation of starting with a thorough inspection of the contents page. it gives you such a tantalising-but-cohesive sense of progression of what the book is going to be. as Chidi says on The Good Place, "it's like a menu... but the food is words!"

[misssunshine]

I was planning on reading "The critique of pure reason" and then I land here. Thank you for your insights. I absolutely love your videos. Also I'm learning German and hope someday after reading Kant in English I'll be able to read him in German as well. Your videos are like the supplements that provide with the initial mandatory guidelines. Love from India.

[AA-soxs]

1) Before reading a book cover to cover, to properly understand you need context.
- Do a vast inspection.
- if a book is isolated/stand alone concept then do inspection to the book itself (table of contents, read entire book in an hour- look for themes
- books that require background reading- use secondary resources. Quick inspection of all foundations.

Why?
Because there is too much info to understand in first reading.

2) read entire book very fast eg 2 hrs

3) reread and find details this time
- you attached individual bits back to this existing memory

[Ulynxhi]

This is one of my favourite channels to watch on YouTube

[yellow.]

Great content! I would like to add another thing, I really like putting things "in a nutshell" that's how useful super summarized videos on YouTube and memes are. If you make everything fun not only you will enjoy it, but you will also remember it. And that's how learning should be. Creative, simple, fun, and enjoyable 🖤

[TheDogMotherOfJen]

You are my most favourite person on any online platform.
You are love and joy in a mortal frame. 🥰

[catherinelaurie]

I love this!!! This is one of the single most useful videos I’ve watched in a while. Like so many others I can be very intimidated by “hard” books. I am now looking forward to delving deep into some of the intriguing books I find difficult to understand.

[thayna]

I'm so glad I found your channel. It's the exact kind of content I was looking for, and you're able to explain things in a very simple and easy to understand manner.

[MissNayNay]

R.C. Waldun, have you heard of this author named Peter Hollins? I am reading his book "The Science of Self Learning, " and he has opened my eyes. He talked about the reasons for wanting to become an autodidact, like for purpose, mastery, and autonomy. He gave reasons as to why people struggle with reading anything heavier than fiction. And they all applied to me. Like, I felt like he was speaking directly to me.

In the book, he talks about the SQ3RR method. Now I knew about this method, but he really goes into depth about it, which I love. He talks about note-taking techniques, like the Cornell notes method, the Feynman technique, and self-explanation. And he talked about everything in such a casual way. No heavy jargon or anything. It's like you're listening to a friend.

And the author from "How to Read a Book" that you were thinking of is Mortimer J. Adler. I read some of his book. Mr. Hollins also mentioned him in the book, breaking down elementary reading, inspectional reading, analytical reading, and syntopical reading.

I am sure that everything written in his book you probably already know of, but he has truly opened my eyes to a point that no one else could. I thought about is book when you mentioned "autodidact."

[БабусяХіккі]

I was the best student in class at school, but I had the worst rote memory among my peers. When I read my textbooks, I tried to imagine and visualize everything that I read and it started to come naturally. Everything I read just made sense and was built into my worldview bit by bit. I even 'dropped out' of reality often, meaning I sat down to read my biology and lost the sense of time entirely. The next thing I knew it was late in the evening and I was running out of time to do some other stuff. My classmates often asked me how I remembered so much stuff and I couldn't explain it. Now I can 😅
P.S: love from Ukraine, your channel is awesome

[verociouscaldiva]

We need this to be in the school curriculum!

[lostcloud]

i think im meant to take history courses now after watching your videos, first i was overwhlem, now after your videos i feel excited again, thank you friend

[spiddy]

Similarly with textbooks:
Firstly you flip through a chapter
Then you look at the questions at the end in the "Quiz" section, if there is one
Then read the bold print
Then read the first and last sentence
and then finally, read through the chapter.

[jworne]

When other Youtubers do inspectional reading they have a title of "I read a book a day!"

[RAMUNEsweet]

As soon as you mentioned Hegel, I got flashbacks. haha
I get this strange sense that he has important insights, that’s he’s going somewhere, but then I go back and read him and.... yeah what?