You might be able to get larger quantity of information, but on the other hand the exclusive footage HBO had(I'm not 100% sure it was exclusive, but I read it was on a news site) is also a different form of education. You can read and imagine things in your head, but until you see it for yourself, you can't truly grasp certain things.

Basically I'm saying there are different forms of education. Like if you read that book and someone saw the documentary. You probably have the upper hand in terms of facts and number of eye-witness accounts and stuff, but they have the upper hand in terms of the visualization of certain aspects of how things unfolded. Both two seperate kinds of education and both important in their own right.

and that book would be something I'd be interested in. Like I said before, it isn't that I never read, but I prefer to do other things.

If you count books you've STARTED reading this year, but didn't finish (which you don't), I've probably read about.. 3? Like Chaotic, I'm not much of a reader. I do have periods where I'll read a shitload of books in a week or so, then won't read another book for six months. Frankly, I don't have enough leisure time to read books (although I do seem to fit in video games somehow).

Last book I read was about seven years ago, it was a Tom Clancy book. This is a warning to others who are thinking about reading a Tom Clancy book, watch out!

Do books?

I dunno, as long as they are, I think watching the Lord of the Rings Trilogy is a much faster method of obtaining the essentials of the novel than trying to trudge through 100000 pages of the blandest writing this side of Brady's LJ.

Do you seriously think I was including fiction in my calculation, or are you just trolling me :(

More so than the internet, I daresay.

I guess he could go to a library and access a database but, UH, LOTS OF BOOKS IN THE LIBRARY. :gonkmelt:

More so than the internet, but not nearly as much as a peer-reviewed journal. I think the Time Cube guy has a book, but last I checked he hasn't been published in Nature.

Even if you don't, it still matters what kind of learner you are. Some people are visual, some people are auditory, some people have to write material in order to learn it, and some have to do something in order to learn it. A person that is best at learning through hearing isn't going to be getting a whole lot out of books.

To me this feels kinda like the argument that some people I've met seem to believe that unless you listen to classical music then you can't actually be that smart.

Reaver, the argument is here because I think DragoonKain is trying to troll but failing miserably and showing his idiocy while doing so.

I find it fairly despicable that most people my age have some kind of aversion to picking up a book. In my entire circle of friends (numbering maybe 25), I can think of two who actually enjoy reading.

Literature's always been an integral part of my life. If I don't have the free time to lay back and pick something engaging up, then god dammit, I will make time. It's a priority.

'sup audio books

Seriously, while it's all fine to learn-through-doing (or through-hearing, through-seeing, etc), that isn't Kain's problem. He's perfectly capable of reading the sports page for information that he wants from it. He just doesn't read books, arbitrarily. I've never heard of learning-by-reading-newsprint-only. We could probably fool him into reading Crime and Punishment if we disguised it as the Sunday Times and sprinkled pictures of basketball players here and there.

Technically I read every day. I read news articles online and forum posts.

However, in my entire life, I have never read a book from start to finish. I just don't have the patience to sit down and start reading something I can't finish in one sitting. Does that make me stupid? Try having a conversation with me sometime and find out for yourself. I'm not incredibly smart, but I manage to get through the day-to-day with no problem.

It's unfortunate that you need to judge people by how much they read. It doesn't mean shit in the big picture.

So, do you actually have a point here or are you just trolling?

I think it's pretty obvious that I'm not referring to 9/11 The Big Lie.

Hey, thanks for your eyewitness report that failure to be literate does not cause Instant Death Cancer, Ikky. Obviously a person can be very successful without reading anything more advanced than My Pet Goat; that doesn't make it an admirable trait.

Man, what a thing to break a lurk for. "HEY, I DON'T READ BOOKS, AND I DON'T THINK I'M DUMB".

A lot of high school "literature" is a bunch of crap, but then you get the occasional awesome teacher who thinks that reading something interesting AND educational is important. (Charles Dickens WHAT THE FUCK)

At the same time, a lot of people have to read a bunch of bullshit throughout their educational career. It comes with the territory sadly. You're not going to like the majority of what you read in a academia, or so I observe from pretty much everyone I know.

However, I'm surprised that you don't distinguish between "pleasurable" reading" and "this is bullshit" reading.

Frankly, reading a GOOD book is sometimes better than going to the movies or whatever. I think it's the matter of finding a style that you can really get into. Which I admit is extremely hard on occasion.

Vonnegut. 'Nuff said.

I read all the Halo novels last year. :)

and a few Steven King novels and shit, I guess

I've read probably 2 books in the past year,not counting magazines and manga. ;p I haven't had that much time to read sadly. ;( But I do tend to read atleast 1 or 2 books a year since I have trouble falling asleep at night alot. So I sit in bed reading until I get sleepy. ;p

I suppose this whole thing might be how I've never actually felt satisfied after I finish a book even though I read a ton. I'll usually get a good way into it, finally start to enjoy it, then the ending happens and I'm all "ok that was kinda weak." Of course, I also don't like most long books because I've found so few authors actually have 600 pages of worthwhile material to write.

I don't even know why I bother reading all of the books I do.

His Dark Materials. Also 'nuff said.

Maybe The Dark Is Rising.

Unless a book interests me intensely, I almost never read actual books anymore. Last year, the only real books I've read are all of Dan Brown's works. This year, I've read nothing but Harry Potter 7 and a couple of Michael Moore books. I always look for cultural interest books on the shelves like Freakonomics and such but I never end up buying them and thus never get to reading any. My reading is primarily internet articles, and textbooks don't count.

I am beginning to think you guys don't like reading books because the only books you've ever read are shitty ones. It's like your parents taking you to see your first movie, and it's Troll 2. The medium becomes suspect.

out of all honesty, i haven't set a leisurely finger on a book since elementary school. i would certainly have to say that school has really spoiled reading for me (this is not to mention all of the bitter tales and bland historical documentation having weened me far from it).

i really don't think that school does well enough to encourage people to read or utilize public libraries as resources. there's plenty there for everyone, but outside elementary school, libraries are primarily used for a few key books to help with research for papers. its hard to remember times when reading wasn't objective.

having to wade through the swell of authors was a feat that i did not want to put myself through. i wasn't willing to dig around to find a book among the labyrinth of shelves only to find that it was just short of appealing.

i also happen to appreciate videogames more than reading. with all the time i could spend reading a book, i could be finishing one of the hundreds of games left in my collection...

I like to read for entertainment and sometimes education. How many books I read a year depends on how interesting I find a particular series. I started the Dresden files by Jim Butcher a few months ago and have reached book 4, so at a rough guess I read at least a novel a month but can get up to one a week if I'm feeling the need to read. I'm always willing to try new authors since I go to the public library (free books = reading lots of books).