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Taking money seriously
max he10

I would be interested in a post about the cost (time and attention) of building a knowledge foundation in our era of exacerbated complexity and breadth for the average Joe. I wonder if even under great process (ultra learning, or more evolved quick learning), the learned citizen is but an unreachable lie. 

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1cozy
I was writing something like this, like, a list of an order of subjects and reading materials to be basically competent at knowing how to further your understanding and be able to clarify specifics in a subject, any subject, merely from exposure and a wide breadth of surveys. It's absolutely impossible without just broadly missing subtopics and context. For instance, to comprehend the development of mathematics properly, you also need a highly detailed understanding of history. To understand linguistics, you need the same. To understand.. well, to be honest, I think simply studying history and going down rabbit holes is probably the best way for any individual to get a direct shot of Knowledge. HOWEVER, our history is revisionist nonsense half the time and takes even more skill in researching to really aggregate into a reasonable summary with controlled bias.
What posts on finance would your find helpful or interesting?
max he10

I should have been more precise, I fancy a knowledge door of entry to understand finance; not a practical door, nor a career door.

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What posts on finance would your find helpful or interesting?
Answer by max he30

If that offer is still active, I, as an abstract thinker, formalism lover, and mathematical symbols worshipper, would very much enjoy a palatable door of entry into the world of finance. I've read so much, but grew so little, feeling like reading reflections of shadows in muddle puddles in a cave (Allegory of the cave).

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2Alexei
What exactly do you mean by door of entry? Like a way to get into the industry? Or start trading yourself?
Finance - accessibility (asking for textbook recommendations)
max he30

Yes, you are right. I was being a bit flexible saying that I agreed. I only partially agree. I may be too conflict averse.

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Finance - accessibility (asking for textbook recommendations)
max he10

I agree with you.

Somehow, in the end, what matters to me is that in the course of learning:

  • [order] notions and their dependencies are introduced in a topological-sorted manner. Be it through multiple small or large texts, or all together in a fat book.
  • [redundancy] having to read/skim the same notion the least amount of times.

I've had trouble finding small piecemeal contents that do not require a whole lot of background knowledge to be understood.

Large, comprehensive texts, my thought was, have lower such risks. And I agree that the bigger the piece, the higher the redundancy risk.

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3Vladimir_Nesov
Well, my point was that redundancy is not actually a problem because fluency robs it of tedium. So if you see it as a major issue, it's inaccurate to say that you agree.
Finance - accessibility (asking for textbook recommendations)
max he20

Thank you Sir/Madam for your answer.

I mean all of finance. "Introduction to Finance: Markets, Investments, and Financial Management" by Edgar A. Norton and Ronald Melicher mentions and structures the book in three parts: Institutions and markets, investments (trading), and financial management (corporate finance).

I was hoping this would be it, but in 600p, it seems, there is no mention of money issuance, so I dropped it.

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Vladimir_Nesov150

Not sure if this is related to your search for one true textbook, but at some point I found the following error in planning my own self-education. Working through a textbook on an unfamiliar subject is hard, so it looked important to pick a text that covers the right topics, and includes all the right topics, so that I wouldn't be forced to redundantly work through another large text after that. But contrast that impression with reading a 600pp fiction novel! A textbook on a topic you already mostly know is very skimmable, even carefully reading through it... (read more)

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