Part 8
A few general requirements in a main text have been implied in stating the purpose of having one. The book with the best reputation is not necessarily the best for you. In economics Adam Smith’s _Wealth of Nations_, though easily the most famous book on the subject, would hardly be suitable as a main text because it has been superseded. But though recency is always an asset, this does not mean that the most recent book is always or even usually the best. The common idea, though it is usually but vaguely formulated, is that the writer of the more recent book has had all the previous books to draw upon, and has therefore been able to extract the best from all of them and add to this his own thoughts. The fallacy of this has been pointed out in the trenchant language of Schopenhauer:
“The writer of the new book often does not understand the old books thoroughly, and yet he is unwilling to take their exact words; so he bungles them and says in his own bad way that which has been said very much better and more clearly by the old writers, who wrote from their own lively knowledge of the subject. The new writer frequently omits the best things they say, their most striking illustrations, their happiest remarks, because he does not see their value or feel how pregnant they are. The only thing that appeals to him is what is shallow and insipid.”
The value of recency will depend on the subject; while it would be essential in aviation, its importance would be far less in ethics.
It is not well to take as your main text a book presenting a number of different and conflicting viewpoints. One purpose of a main text is to avoid confusion. Do not start the study of psychology, for instance, by reading a history of the subject giving the views of different thinkers. Begin by taking up one definite system.
Finally, be sure to select a book covering the entire field. Do not, for instance, take a volume on the tariff to begin the study of economics.
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We pass now to the third step advised—to read critically. By this I do not mean that we should read skeptically or to confute everything an author says. I mean simply that we should resist our natural tendency to have our minds swayed by every opinion he expresses. I mean that before allowing an idea to slip into our minds we should first challenge its truth; we should examine its evidence.
Perhaps you have listened to a debate. After the affirmative had made his impassioned plea you were all for the affirmative. When the negative came forward and presented his case, you found yourself favoring _him_. . . . Why do debaters always try to get the last say? Why is it that in a formal debate, the affirmative, which usually has the last say, is most often the side that wins? I could state the reason bluntly. But if I did the honorable judges of such controversies would not feel that their critical powers had been complimented.
The tendency to absorb the opinions of others manifests itself to just as great a degree in reading. I have held debating up as an example merely because it brings out more strongly, more strikingly, the effects of such a tendency. But how can it be resisted?
If we have thought out a subject thoroughly, if we have acquired a stock of clear and definite ideas on it, criticism in reading will largely take care of itself. By dint of our own thinking we will know what is relevant and what is not; we shall be able to judge the truth and importance of the various arguments offered. The chances are, however, that we shall not have given much previous thinking to the subject, and that even if we have we shall not have gone as far as the author, who doubtless availed himself of other books. Consequently certain problems which he takes up will not even have occurred to us, and hence will not have received our consideration.
But where our thinking has not helped us, and even where it has, we should look critically upon every statement of an author, instead of lazily acquiescing in it. The difference between critical and ordinary reading, is that in the former we look for objections, in the latter we wait until they happen to occur to us. Even then we do not hold our objections steadily in mind; we are as likely as not to accept later arguments based upon one we have previously objected to. In order to avoid this perhaps the best we can do when we object to any statement or believe we have found a fallacy, is to make written note of it in the margin. To some extent this will prevent forgetting it. Too few or too many marginal notes are both extremes to be shunned. If we make too many we shall be apt to lose a true sense of proportion and fail to distinguish essential criticisms from nonessentials. The only way we can keep clear of this extreme is to avoid quibbling and hair-splitting, making only such written criticisms as we feel we could unblushingly defend before the author himself. Often however we may feel that a statement is untrue, or that an argument is fallacious, and yet be unable to point out just where or how it is so. In this case perhaps the best plan would be merely to put a question mark in the margin in order to remind ourselves that the statement has not been fully accepted.
We ought to make sure what we object to because it is a peculiarity of the human mind that it does not require evidence for a statement before accepting it; it generally accepts any statement which has no evidence against it. Unless we reject a statement and know why we have done so, it is liable to insinuate itself in our reasoning, and the longer it remains the more difficult it is to get rid of it. This is why it is so important to avoid as many pitfalls as possible at the beginning of a subject.
The reader may find that even when he reads critically he will accept a certain statement at the time; and then perhaps much later, say a month, an objection to that statement will occur to him, or he will see that it at least ought to be qualified. For an explanation of this we must go back to an analysis of the thinking process. Every idea which enters the mind, either from independent thinking or from reading, is accepted as true if it is in full conformity with our past experience _as we remember it_. In all thinking or reading, the new idea arouses associates on its entrance. An hypothesis or principle, for instance, arouses in our minds past experiences of particular instances. If all these conform it is accepted. But in ordinary uncritical reading or thinking, only a few associates are aroused. In critical reading, we look for as many associates as possible, especially those which do not conform. It is this purpose kept in mind which helps to recall and awaken these associates. No matter how critical our attitude, however, we cannot at any given time recall every relevant associate, though later a “non-conforming” associate is likely to occur to us by pure accident.
While you are criticising a book line by line, and after you have finished reading it, you should note the importance and relevancy of the arguments accepted and rejected. While an author may make a statement with which you disagree, its truth or falsehood may not affect the rest of what he has to say, or it may affect merely a few corollaries drawn from it. In other cases the truth of his entire conclusion may depend upon it. Again, an author may incontrovertibly prove something—which is entirely without bearing on the subject. This means that you should keep the precise question constantly before your mind.
Often you will find an author making a statement which really amounts to nothing more than a mere airing of his prejudices, or at best the bare statement of a conclusion. If he says, “Socialism is the greatest menace of our civilization,” and leaves it go at that, not telling how or why, you should mentally note this as a statement, as a statement merely; you should not allow it to influence your opinion either way. Finally, remember that though you may be able to refute every argument an author brings forward in support of a conclusion, his conclusion may still be correct. It is possible for a man to be right for the wrong reasons.
While I believe all the foregoing suggestions are judicious and necessary, I am willing to admit that their wisdom may reasonably be doubted. But there is one practice about which there can be no controversy—that of making sure you thoroughly understand every idea of an author. While most people will not verbally contradict this advice, their actual practice may be a continual contradiction of it. They will be in such haste to finish a book that they will not stop to make sure they really understand the more difficult or obscure passages. Just what they hope to gain it is difficult to say. If they think it is wasting time to try to understand every idea, it is surely a greater waste of time to read an idea without understanding it. To be sure, the difficulty of understanding may be the fault of the author. It may be due to his involved and muddled way of expressing himself. It may be the vagueness of the idea itself. But if anything this is all the greater reason why you should attempt to understand it. It is the only way you can find whether or not the author himself really knew what he was talking about. To understand thoroughly the thought of another does not necessarily mean to sympathize with it; it does not mean to ask how that other came by it. It means merely to substitute as far as possible concrete mental images for the words he uses, and analyze those images to discover to what extent they agree with facts.
Better to carry this out, you might follow another practice of immense value. Whenever you are puzzled as to an author’s meaning, or whenever you do not care to accept his solution of a problem but are undecided as to what the solution is, or whenever you want to carry an idea further than he has, or above all, whenever an original and important relevant thought is suggested to you, you should take your eyes from your book—shut it if necessary—and let your thinking flow on; give it fair play, even if it takes an hour before your vein of suggested thought exhausts itself. Of course this practice will prevent you from finishing a book as soon as you otherwise would. And if finishing a book be your aim, I have nothing to say. But if your end is to attain true, sound knowledge, knowledge which you will retain; if your object is to become a thinker, the practice will prove of unspeakable benefit. It will not interfere with concentration. Remember your object is to concentrate primarily on the subject, not on the book; you intend to become a thinker, not an interpreter or a commentator or a disciple of any author.
And there are two reasons why this thinking should not be put off until after you have finished a book. The first and more important is that after you have finished reading, most of the ideas will have unrecallably dropped out of mind. The second is that when you are undecided about the solution of a problem, you will often find later arguments depending upon that solution. Unless its truth or falsity is decided in your own mind you will not know how to deal with these later arguments.
I have spoken of feeling that an argument is fallacious, and of being unable to point out just where it is so. To cease reading for a while, and to endeavor to make these inarticulate objections articulate, is excellent practice for training analytic powers and developing clearness of thought.
Another way of reading a book is what I may call the anticipating method. Whenever a writer has started to explain something, or whenever you see that he is about to, stop reading and try to think out the explanation for yourself. Sometimes such thinking will anticipate only a paragraph, at other times an entire chapter. School and college text-books, and in fact formal text-books generally, often contain lists of questions at the end of the chapters. Where you find these, read them before you read the chapter, and where possible try to answer them by your own thinking. This practice will make you understand an explanation much more easily. If your thinking agrees with the author’s explanation it will give you self-confidence. It will make you realize whether or not you understand an explanation. If you were not able to think the thing out for yourself you will appreciate the author’s explanation. If your thinking disagrees with that of the author you will have an opportunity to correct him—or be corrected. In either case your opinion will rest on firmer grounds. Not least of all you will be getting practice in self-thinking.
After reading and criticising a book, it is a good practice to study one taking a different viewpoint, or written even in direct opposition. You will doubtless find that it points out many fallacies and controverts many statements in the first book, which you allowed to pass unchallenged. Ask yourself what the trouble was. Was your attitude too receptive? Did you swallow words without substituting clear mental images? Did you fail to trace out the consequences of a statement? All these questions will help you do better the next time.
Because of your ignorance of the facts, your failure to refute a conclusion will sometimes not be your fault. But even here, though you cannot contradict an author’s statement of facts, you can criticise conclusions drawn from those facts.
Take an instance. In making an inquiry into the causes of fatigue, Professor Mosso of Turin selected two dogs as nearly alike as possible. One he kept tied, and the other he exercised until it was thoroughly tired. He then transfused blood of the tired dog into the veins of the rested one, and produced in the latter every sign of fatigue. From this he concluded that fatigue was due to certain poisons in the blood.
Now we cannot contradict the fact of this experiment: that the rested animal was made to look tired. But we can question the inference drawn. The truth of the conclusion aside, was the evidence sufficient to establish it? Might not, for instance, similar results have been produced upon the rested dog if blood of another rested dog had been transfused into it? Had Mosso made such an experiment? Other objections should easily occur to one.
Questions which admit of treatment by studying both sides are too numerous to mention. The literature of philosophy furnishes particularly good material. Examples which at present occur to me are Sir William Hamilton’s philosophy versus Mill’s _Examination of Sir William Hamilton’s Philosophy_, and Herbert Spencer’s _First Principles_ versus William James’ essay, _Herbert Spencer’s Autobiography_ and Henri Bergson’s criticism of Spencer in his _Creative Evolution_.
Uncritical students of the history of philosophy often find themselves agreeing with each thinker in turn, no matter how much he contradicts previous thinkers, and end by acquiescing in the last system they read about. I remember a philosophy class which completed its studies with Pragmatism. Of course it was merely a coincidence, but at the end of the course fully nine-tenths of the students declared themselves Pragmatists!
It is almost needless to remark that an author who pretends to point out fallacies in another is not necessarily right. There are men who pride themselves on “reading both sides of a subject”; but unless they have been critical, their knowledge is not half as clear or as likely to be true as that of a man who has read only one side, but who has read it critically.
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We have now to consider the next step outlined in the suggested plan of reading—“written note should be made of the problems taken up which you do not believe have been adequately treated, or the solutions of which are in any way unsatisfactory. These you should think out for yourself.”
When reading a book you will often come across a statement, perhaps an entire chapter, with which you disagree. This disagreement should be recorded in the form of a question; as for instance, “Is such and such the case?” You may doubt whether an author’s explanation really explains. You may have a vague inarticulate suspicion that he is sliding over facts, or that his solution is too superficial. This suspicion should also be recorded in the form of a question. Often again, while reading, a problem connected with the subject will occur to you which the author has not even considered. This too should be recorded.
All these questions should unfailingly be written, either in the margin or on a piece of paper or notebook kept always at hand. You should then set aside a definite time for thinking and attempt to solve the questions for yourself.
And in thinking for yourself you should not make the author’s remarks the basis of your thinking. You should deal with a problem almost as if it had never occurred to any one else but you. Simply because somebody else has been satisfied with a certain solution, that is no reason why you should be. You should deal directly with the facts, data and phenomena under consideration; not with the opinions of others about those facts, data and phenomena. You should not ask yourself whether the pragmatists are right, or whether the nominalists are right, or the socialists, or the evolutionists, or the Democrats, or the Presbyterians, or the hedonists, or what not. You should not ask yourself which “school” of thinking you ought to belong to. You should think a problem out _for yourself_, in every way that phrase implies. At the end you may, incidentally, find yourself agreeing in the main with some school of thought. However, this will be only accidental, and your thought will be much more likely to be true. But you should never agree with a school of thought any more than independent thinking leads you to.
Of problems dealt with in this manner, some will take ten minutes, others a week. If you encounter a particularly obstinate problem it may be best to leave it for a while, say a week or two or even longer, and go on with other problems. When problems are thus recurrently treated it may take months, even years, before a satisfactory solution is reached. In such cases you should be willing to give months and even years to their solution. If a problem is not important enough to devote so much time to you may be forced to abandon it; but you should constantly keep in mind the fact that you have not solved it, and you should be willing to admit to others that you have not solved it. Never allow mere intellectual laziness to stifle your doubts and make you think you have solved a problem, when you know in your heart of hearts that you have worked yourself into the state of belief merely to save yourself mental discomfort.
When most of your problems have been solved and your views made definite you may resume your reading. You may proceed to other books on the subject.
As to the suggestion that another book on the subject might be dealt with in the same manner as this first one: this will depend largely on the individual subject. It will depend on just what books have been written on that subject. If none completely or adequately covers the field, or if there are two or more good books representing radically different viewpoints, more than one book probably ought to be studied in this comprehensive manner. But this must be left to the reader’s discretion.
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We come now to the last part of our plan—“after that all books may be read ‘hop, skip and jump’ fashion, for the new problems or solutions they suggest.”
I have already implied the necessity for this in formulating the law of diminishing returns. After we have read several books on a subject it would be manifestly foolish to continue reading books on that same subject _in toto_. We would merely be going over again knowledge already in our possession, instead of using our time more profitably by entering new territory. But any good book will contain _something_ unique; some facts or principles to be found nowhere else; or perhaps merely an unusually clear way of explaining some old principle, or a new light on it. This we should endeavor to get without wasting our time by plowing through the entire volume.
Theoretically our problem is difficult; on its face it would seem impossible. We are to read all the important parts of a book; that is, the parts most important _for us_, and nothing but the important parts. But until we read it how are we to know whether any given part of a book is important? In practice, however, our difficulty is not so formidable.
We can eliminate the greater mass of the relatively useless part of a book by a glance at its table of contents. If we see there titles which suggest subjects or aspects of subjects in which we are not interested, or that we feel we already know enough about, or that are simply outside the particular purpose we have in consulting that book at all, we can omit those chapters and confine ourselves to the others. . . .
When we were children first learning to read we had to look at every letter in a word, then spell it out. Finally its meaning dawned upon us. As we became more proficient we did not have to look at every letter; we could read words as wholes with the same rapidity as the separate letters. Accurate psychological tests have determined that a man can read such words as “and” and “the” with even greater rapidity than any single letter composing them. We finally reach the point where we can read short phrases at the same rate as we formerly could single words.
But the secret of the scholar who can cover efficiently much more ground than ordinary men is not so much that he reads _faster_, as that he reads _less_. In other words, instead of reading every word he glances down a page and sees certain “cue” words or rather “cue” phrases, for the eye and mind take in phrases as wholes. If he is familiar with the subject (and he is not to employ this method unless and until he is) he knows immediately, by “a sort of instinct” as Buckle called it, whether any new or valuable thought is on that page. When he finds that there is he involuntarily slackens his pace and reads that thought at ordinary reading pace or even slower. Sometimes indeed he will read whole chapters slowly, word for word, if the contents are sufficiently novel and important to warrant it.
Read by this “hop, skip and jump” fashion a book the size of the present volume might take an hour or even less. But it is almost impossible to give even an approximate estimate of the time such reading ought to take. Of course the longer you spend the more you will get out of a book, but the return per time invested will be less and less. On the other hand if you read the book too fast you may be wasting your time altogether; you may end by understanding nothing at all. Much will depend upon the originality and depth of the book, upon the reader’s familiarity with the subject, and upon his native mental qualities.