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RomeoStevens comments on Solved Problems Repository - Less Wrong
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"How do I get stronger?" has been solved and the solution is Starting Strength.
Evidence: The set of my friends who are strong is exactly the set of my friends who do / have done Starting Strength or a close variant. Also, I used to lift with several competitive power lifters (including someone ranked top 100 nationally in the deadlift) and they unanimously advocated it.
These are relatively large N and effect size btw, i.e. I know at least 15 people who've done SS and they're out-benching the non-SS'ers by 20 pounds on the low end, and 100 pounds on the high end (I pick bench because it is the exercise most people are familiar with; the gap for other things like squat is more like 50 pounds on low end, 200 pounds on high end).
Having done SS, I regret doing low bar squat instead of the much more intuitive high bar squat. Of course powerlifters advocate for low bar squats, it's what their sport measures. Other than that it's pretty great. I have friends following the SS program with high bar and it's working out well for them.
Why do you regret doing low-bar squats? Presumably you read SS:BBT and thus his arguments for why they are superior to the low-bar version. (E.g. Better use of the hamstrings.)
The argument boils down to "you can use more weight" and "it involves the posterior chain more." Neither of these supposed benefits are worth the greater chance of injury. Low bar squats place significantly greater loads on the spinal erectors, which is fine if you're an experienced weightlifter and know how to maintain good form. A newbie who lacks proprioception is the worst person to have doing this. I see and speak with many people doing SS at my university gym and most of the ones doing lowbar do it with poor form and rounded backs. In contrast it is much easier to do highbar squats with correct form as they are much more intuitive. Low bar squats took me months and months to learn proper form with and I strained a spinal erector during this learning process. High bar squats took me a few lifting sessions to learn.
All that said, low-bar will work better for some people due to anatomy, but most have an easier time with high bar. You do need weightlifting shoes to do proper high bar squats. And you also need to throw in a few sets of RDL's to hit the hamstrings.