Even a longer online article or news story is very short compared to a book.

Reading a book is a bit more like getting into a "flow" state writing code (although, with LLMs now doing most of the writing, that may not happen any more either). You become immersed in the prose, getting all the characters and the roles they play in the story into your mental context. You tune out the rest of the world to some degree, lose track of passing time, and if you are interrupted it feels like a jolt and it takes a while to get back into that state.

> Is there value in identifying the difference between reading a longer article like this one and an actual book?

Almost every study that looks at this finds that there is. Between the time for deeper contemplation, cognitive load of sustained attention and greater potential information content of a larger body of text compared with a smaller one, someone who reads books is generally going to more competently understand things gestures generally than someone who gets everything from articles online.

I didn't read Peak Mind, but two books that are somewhat in the same vain (based on your description) are:

1. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/59794522-non-things

2. https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/236849376-attensity

First one I highly recommend. Second one I'm reading now, so far it's.. okay. The ideas in the book resonate with me but the writing is poor. The first book (Non-Things) talks about our relation to the digital versus the physical, and it convinced me to stop using my phone as much.

Books are generally far higher quality texts too. The really good articles get republished as books, think about that.

> "Is there value in identifying the difference between reading a longer article like this one and an actual book?"

I know its such a common thing to suggest, but if you haven't, I really would suggest reading Understanding Media by Marshall McLuhan.

tl;dr is that every single medium of communication shapes the message it is trying to deliver. This is unavoidable and once you understand that you begin to see it everywhere (LLMS? yes).

This is a great question. I would love to know the answer to this as well. +1

My favorite part of How to Read a Book is how it classifies books into books worth skimming over, books worth reading each word exactly once, and books worith studying and actively engaging with in depth.

How to Read a Book is definitely worth skimming, but it is quite repetitive and filled with unnecessary volume. It would get the job done at 1/10th the length.

The easiest way to counter it is just leave your phone at home and take a book and go to a public bench and read. You will quickly condition your brain to no longer need to constantly be looking at a screen to be happy.

Your environment is your destiny, if your environment is littered with distractions you will be distracted.

Recapitulating an old comment. Start by quitting all algorithmic, ad-driven social media.

Going cold turkey is never easy. If you're having trouble withdrawing, consider what I did over for Facebook over a decade ago:

1. Turn off notifications for the Facebook (read: your main social media) app on your phone; then

2. Turn off notifications for the Facebook Messenger, Instagram, et cetera apps (read: all other social media) on your phone; next

3. Delete the Facebook app from your phone; then

4. Delete the Facebook Messenger, Instagram, et cetera apps from your phone; and finally

5. Log out of Facebook on your desktop.

It took me 2 years to go through from step 1 to step 5. It has made me happier and more productive. I still have a Facebook account.

But the friction of grabbing my laptop and logging in forces me to consider "is this what I want to do? Or am I thoughtlessly reaching for the crack pipe?" (It's been about a decade since I've cared to log into Facebook. Last time I tried, it felt like trudging through spam in an old e-mail inbox more than anything compelling.)

Set small achievable goals and hold yourself accountable.

Observe the sabbath.

Not in a religious way, just have a no screens day every week, once a month, or just once.

You can get by one day without texting, looking for directions, getting an answer from google, ordering takeout, etc. etc. etc. Set yourself a boundary, no phones unless there's a fire or somebody needs to go to the hospital and stick to it. Make a schedule.

Personally, for any kind of serious reading, I have to go to a place/room with zero opportunities for distraction. No noise, no surrounding commotion, even slightly dimming lights helps. My retention rate drops significantly if there are any distractions. For lighter reading or docs, I’ve got to take almost diagrammatic-like notes. whiteboard, paper/pen, or ipad work best for me - typed notes don’t work well. I may not even revisit the notes later, but actually writing them helps retention. If I’m out of luck and must read in a non conducive environment, just resolving that I’ll have to re-read once or twice is the only way. Not aware of any magic solution unfortunately.

I just speed ahead, and I always retained more than I thought I did. If I keep going, eventually I can reach a kind of flow. It doesn't matter if I missed bits here or there.

Or, you could try the opposite, and slow down. It sounds like torture, but eventually, it will become habitual.

Audiobooks sped up to ~2x or so, but you usually have to build up to that speed.

There are also exercises which help develop short term memory like n-back training for which there are many phone apps.

> Is reading morally superior?

No. Of course not. Someone who can't read due to mental disability isn't morally inferior to someone who can and does.

For a long time learning required a primary attention of a person. Usually a monopoly attention. You can't read printed text and do something else in parallel (fidgeting doesn't count). Radio and TV facilitated background viewing and listening but there weren't many options to personalize those. And then IT revolution happened and humanity discovered that they can do something as a primary attention task and "learn" in background by listening to a narrated educational media. And with the invention of speed-up, those people are now debating is x2 speed-up too slow, and just how fast can they go while still discerning words.

it's my personal hot-take, but I think that a majority of those background listeners are doing performative "learning" and aren't learning anything really. It's just to brag once a year that they have "read" 100+ books in a year and post a wall of covers or a number on their social network feed.

Basically, books aren't morally superior media than anything else really. But focused and monopoly attention dedicated to some media is morally superior to a performative background "learning". Books simply eliminate even a possibility of reading them in background.

>Is reading morally superior?

Yes. Because its less information that "Oral" which is just video content.

Text is raw information. Viewing a person speaking is Information + social and context clues. Clues that humans find it very hard to resist. We are social mammals built to fathom our place in the hierarchy by listening to the noises and expressions of other mammals. People will tell you that they love science or philosophy or something, but often what they actually love is the person telling them about it. With monetised content being the norm these days, people are exploiting these side channels while handing out sub par information. And it works. You only need to look at the flat earth movement, almost entirely built on video content, to see the truth in this. People aren't signing up to be flat earthers because the information is valid, they are signing up because they like the people giving them the faulty information.

No we would absolutely be better off going back to reading. Its much healthier.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48830868