Python Programmer - Smartest People Read Books Like This (you can too)

Short Summary

Main recommendation: Read to understand rather than to memorize, by actively interrogating the text with questions and relating ideas to what you already know, which the speaker says leads to remembering almost everything on the page. The speaker argues that rereading and passive skimming fail because working memory is limited to about seven items for 15 to 30 seconds, and that reading is an active dialogue with the author. The main tools recommended are semantic encoding, annotating texts, and taking handwritten formal notes.

Key Points

• Semantic encoding, which means focusing on meaning and context, is presented as the most important type of encoding for remembering reading.
• Chunking, which groups information, can expand working memory; the speaker demonstrates it with 12 letters that were easier to recall when grouped.
• The method of loci (memory palace) combines long-term memory and visual imagery and is effective for memorizing lists, but the speaker says remembering what you read requires engaging with ideas, structure, and questions instead.
• Passive note-taking, meaning transcribing text, leads to forgetting, while notes should record your own thinking, interpretation, and questions.
• A 2014 study cited in the video found that students taking longhand notes performed better than laptop note-takers, with shorter and higher-quality notes that prompted better encoding.
• Higher-order thinking on Bloom's taxonomy (analyzing, evaluating, creating) is said to be where you remember nearly everything on the page.

Details Worth Noting

• Concrete instructions:

  • While reading, ask yourself questions such as "How does this relate to what I already know?" and "What real-world applications exist for this idea?"
  • Use analogies for abstract ideas and construct your own understanding of them.
  • Informal notes: annotate the margins with brackets around sections to find quickly, underline phrases that link to other ideas and add brief notes, note confusing logic, and summarize difficult concepts in your own words.
  • Formal notes, taken by hand in a separate folder:
    1. Skim the chapter: read the first paragraph, any headings, and the final paragraph.
    2. In your own words, write what you think the chapter is about, how it fits your existing knowledge, and what you expect to find difficult.
    3. Read the chapter in sections, pulling out main points, and write secondary points underneath in a nested hierarchy.
    4. Write as little as possible, capturing only key ideas and arguments.
    5. Question the argument, look for exceptions, and connect everything to what you know.

• The speaker says notes should be taken by hand, not on laptops, citing the 2014 study.

• Marginalia examples: Isaac Newton, Machiavelli, Oscar Wilde, and Sylvia Plath annotated their texts. Pierre de Fermat's margin note about his proof took 358 years to resolve, with Andrew Wiles producing the first successful proof in 1994; the story is covered in Simon Singh's Fermat's Last Theorem.

• Working memory holds about seven items for 15 to 30 seconds, which the speaker uses to explain why reliance on it causes forgetting.

Bottom Line

Forgetting comes from passive reading; remembering comes from engaging with ideas through questions, annotations, and handwritten notes that record your own understanding.