OK, I'd like some advice about what to read and learn in my extra time. I left college as a freshman a few years ago due to chronic illness. I plan on reapplying during the next application cycle, meaning I would go back to college in Fall 2017. This is about 16 months from now. If I studied for 3 hours per day for 5 days a week, we're talking 960 hours.
I'm looking to major in neuroscience (focused on computational neurosci), which is what my major was before. Also, I'm interested in fiction literature and electronic music production. Since these fields are pretty eclectic, I'm wondering what I should study to become well-rounded in them all. And to what extent (e.g. mathematics, but only up to differential and integral calculus?).
>>8019475
I have a Masters in mathematical physics and I'm extremely well-read in literature, philosophy and religion. I was going to say I'm a virtuoso guitarist, but I can just play fast and don't enjoy music enough to dedicate myself to it, so I'll leave that out.
However, I got proficient in all of my interests by spending vast amounts of time on them (i.e. 14 hours weekdays/10 hours weekends during a year off about 5 years ago, I still do the same every break I get).
You might want to increase the amount of time you are going to spend studying if you want to gain a notable level of proficiency; a lot of people here pick up stupid hobbies while they go through an interim period in order to pass the time. The most comical is picking up 'reading', then filling your shelf with Wallace and Pynchon along with an unread Odyssey and Illiad. Don't be that guy.
I'd be glad to help out but you should post more details of what exactly you want to achieve and why you want to do it.
>>8020226
OK, thanks.
I think my end goals would be something like this:
1: PhD in neuroscience or a related field, because I've been interested in it since I was a child and would like a career in an academic or research setting.
2: Better both my literary and academic writing skills; I've gotten a few short stories and online humor articles published online, and I'd like to expand my abilities in prose stylistics. I might want to minor in English or creative writing when I go back to school.
3: My best friend growing up creates electronic music, EDM and dubstep and that sort of stuff, and I'd like to understand enough of it where I can collaborate with him.
4: Some other things I'd like to learn. I have family around the world that speaks Norwegian, German, Farsi, French, and Spanish, but not English, so I'd like to at least have a slight grasp on some of those languages so I can hold conversations with my family over Skype and when they visit. Also my minor in college the first time was German studies.
I figure I'll be working full-time until I go back to school, so the time I spend studying these things would be limited. Let's say I sleep 8 hours, work 8 hours, and spend 2-3 hours per day maintaining myself (eating, cleaning, etc). That would leave about six hours max per day to study. I figured three, because I'd probably spend half my spare time working out and playing vidya.
>>8020577
>3: My best friend growing up creates electronic music, EDM and dubstep and that sort of stuff, and I'd like to understand enough of it where I can collaborate with him.
Just get a small usb keyboard, download Ableton or FL and fiddle around with it.
>>8020583
I already have FL. I have no idea where to start.
Bump plz
Bump.
I'm interested in what the "educated" people on here would consider a good time investment regarding hobbies
>>8020577
I didn't factor in that you'd be working full-time, sorry.
I can't advise you on electronic music since I know nothing about it, I just like a little vapourwave and that's it lol
As far as literary study goes, I'd advise a brief course of the really exceptional literary works and then some of the few good modern writers in order to see how the classical grandeur of prose translates into our slightly more muted modern English. This shouldn't take excessively long and it will be a good overview of the whole field of literature.
So, briefly in order:
The Odyssey, Ovid's Metamorphoses, and Virgil's Aeneid are great as an introduction to the Classical/Roman era. I could add all the philosophers but that would take a long time.
Dante's Divine Comedy (not just Inferno) and The King James Bible (Old and New Testaments) are the keystones of the era of Christendom.
With the reformation period you want to focus on Shakespeare. Try reading Hamlet, Macbeth and King Lear first. If you want to read more I'd recommend The Tempest, Antony and Cleopatra, and Love's Labour Lost.
Paradise Lost by Milton is another big one, but if you are not a very literary individual I think you can overlook it since it's a lot of work.
From the same period you have some exceptional essayists. Try reading a selected volume of DeQuincey's, Montaignes or Hazlitt's essays. A few years later you have Johnson. Again, try to pick up a volume of his selected essays. They are a great education.
Now, I think you might get most out of the Russians. So try reading Anna Karenina and Crime and Punishment for a start, and --if you like it-- read as much more of Tolstoy and Dostoevsky as you can.
Now is the important modern era. You can overlook a lot of this since it is mostly literary fireworks, but I'd especially recommend:
i.) The Magic Mountain by Thomas Mann.
ii.) Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison.
iii.) The Man Without Qualities by Robert Musil. (very similar to the Russians in a strange way)
>>8022478
Languages and literature.
>>8022478
In order of importance:
0. Nutrition and Fitness; Pretty simple, your health and mind are really the only true assets. Lose them, and there is no point to living. It doesn't take much to maintain them, exercise regularly, eat moderately, sleep on time, avoid fast food and soft drinks. Head over to the /fit/ wiki for more info, but really it just comes to: eating vegetables and regular, intense, exercise coupled with a regular sleep schedule.
1. Personal Finance, learn how to read an income statement and how to do cashflow analysis
2. Social Psych/Behavioral Psych; I recommend Kahneman's book to start (Thinking Fast and Slow). I also rec Tao Te Ching by Lao Tzu, but if that's too "religious" for you, stick to Kahneman. Its really the same thing though (and then some), told in simpler words.
3. A foreign language to intermediate level proficiency (i.e you can get around in the country without a dictionary or a friend). I rec Michel Thomas since you want to learn german (you can pirate or borrow from your local library) to refresh. Since you have family that actually speak this language, you should start speaking from day 1. That would probably be the best/most efficient path for you (though there are others, e.g Listening-Reading method).
4. A programming language. I'll probably get flak for this one but the fact is the 21st century runs on code and there is no task that cannot be made cheaper, faster and easier with a computer program. I recommend learning python since it is popular (i.e has many libraries on a variety of topics), easy to learn and has many, many resources. The best way to learn this would probably be to create a personal project (which has some use, not just a calculator) and then learn-as-you-go. You can also use anki here to memorize common methods/functions/tricks. Another idea would be to go through the MIT intro lectures (which concludes in a personal project); make sure you watch them at 2x speed!
(1/2)
>>8022552
Now, that's a broad overview of the whole field. I'd be all day listing everything that you should read, but you NEED to read these to get a beginner's grasp on the topic of literature. After all of that you can make informed decisions on what to read next.
However, if you want an overview of intellectual thought, it might be best to start with Alan Ryan’s On Politics. Its main topic is politics, but it is written in an exceptional style and covers figures such as Dante and the Greek Philosophers. As an overview of the history of thought I can’t think of anything better.
A quick note on mathematics: don’t waste your time self-studying it unless it is entirely necessary. You’ll pick it up fast as it is if you have to study it when you start uni. Self-studying before you have a big overview of the subject can be overwhelming. I tried it and I ended up learning a minimal amount for the effort I expended. Stick with literature and your languages.
I also picked up Italian to read the Divine Comedy in it’s native language and the formula that worked was:
i.) A good quality ‘beginners’ book.
ii.) A site named forvo for pronounciation.
iii.) A site named wordreference to check translations.
iv.) Upgrading to whatever book is the ‘intermediate’ book of the series you started with, and repeating the exercises and checking pronounciations.
Takes time though, learning a language is tough.
As a final -- and perhaps contentious – note, try reading a summary online of Covey’s 7 Habits of Highly Successful People. It essentially contains a bunch of common sense, but you can learn a lot by employing methods like a ‘Mission Statement’ and weekly reviews. I’d recommend getting a pdf of it if you think you can learn something from it. It’s not so much a self-help book as it is a book of reminders of principles.
>>8022478
I like traveling and connecting with locals, or at the very least making a point of meeting new people in my area. A diverse network of friends and contacts can always come in handy. You never know when a sound engineer that you met in a bar in Milwaukee might be able to do a favor for a KSU prof who sends you a free spectrometer in return.
>>8022560
(2/2)
5. Cooking. Pretty self-explanatory really, impresses the opposite sex and helps with #0 and #1. Get a good set of knives and a decent cookbook and just work through it.
6. The Arts. Here I am going to differ from the other posters and say that you should choose a practicing art over a passive one. That is, sculpture or painting or drawing or music etc. over just reading literature. By all means read the books others have listed >>8022552
especially (I might also add Dickens, Tim O'Brien, and Melville to the list, as well as Gerard Hopkins' poetry), but you may find more joy in active creation than just passive interaction. Drawing/Painting is cheap with a graphical tablet (You can get a good one that will last you 5+ years for ~$100) and can even earn you money if you git gud enough (though this shouldn't be your purpose to start). Also learn about all the arts, but choose to practice only a few. Better to be proficient in a few things than deficient in everything.
>>8022589
A few addendum:
1. Please please please, learn about economics as well (I recommend Basic Economics by Sowell to start) so you can understand the world beyond what politicians shill
6. Forgot to mention writing, also I recommend "Perspective Made Easy", "How to Draw" by Scott Robertson, and either Hampton, Loomis or Vilppu for learning figure drawing, in that order.
>>8019475
> social "sciences"
kek
>>8019475
>social
>science
>>8022589
Specific recommendation for a graphical tablet?
What a great thread
>>8022880
It's pretty great all right.
Just when I thought it was all animal and Musk posting.
>>8020664
YouTube videos dude. They may not give you the best theory or even techniques, but you'll learn how to use the software the quickest, then you can go from there. I've learned that when I want to learn something quick to just go to YouTube
>>8022608
Also, if anyone wants to shoot the breeze/discuss more about this stuff, without all the autism of /sci/, you can join my discord server: https://discord.gg/0lqbvcXEubNdVcQp
Lets say that I know what should I study in my free time. The problem is my lame time-managing skill. Can you guys give me any clues how to efficiently manage my free time, stop procrastination and how to study?
>>8024001
In the end of my final post I mention this:
>>8022569
>As a final -- and perhaps contentious – note, try reading a summary online of Covey’s 7 Habits of Highly Successful People. It essentially contains a bunch of common sense, but you can learn a lot by employing methods like a ‘Mission Statement’ and weekly reviews. I’d recommend getting a pdf of it if you think you can learn something from it. It’s not so much a self-help book as it is a book of reminders of principles.
That's a good start, a book I've also read is Getting Things Done by David Allen. When I was starting work at an insurance firm my supervisor or mentor recommended picking it up, I did to humour him, but it's fairly helpful. The big idea behind it is to get everything written down and accounted for in appropriate folders. Make daily lists of things you want to accomplish in the morning to enforce perspective, and do a weekly review where you evaluate how you done and what you wish to do next week. A pdf is readily found online. Again, the best self-help is just a catalogue of general principles that you've forgotten about written in an encouraging style. Most of it's garbage, but I'd recommend those two books as essential to getting your shit together and getting organized if you have no idea where to start.
>>8020226
Is this pasta?
>>8023093
Update on the link: https://discord.gg/0lqbvcXEubMWHE9f
