The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness

by Eric Jorgenson

The problem with saying “just read” is there is so much junk out there. There are as many different kinds of authors as there are people. Many of them are going to write lots of junk. I have people in my life I consider to be very well-read who aren’t very smart. The reason is because even though they’re very well-read, they read the wrong things in the wrong order. They started out reading a set of false or just weakly true things, and those formed the axioms of the foundation for their worldview. Then, when new things come, they judge the new idea based on a foundation they already built. Your foundation is critical. Because most people are intimidated by math and can’t independently critique it, they overvalue opinions backed with math/pseudoscience. When it comes to reading, make sure your foundation is very, very high quality. The best way to have a high-quality foundation (you may not love this answer), but the trick is to stick to science and to stick to the basics. Generally, there are only a few things you can read people don’t disagree with. Very few people disagree 2+2=4, right? That is serious knowledge. Mathematics is a solid foundation. Similarly, the hard sciences are a solid foundation. Microeconomics is a solid foundation. The moment you start wandering outside of these solid foundations you’re in trouble because now you don’t know what’s true and what’s false. I would focus as much as I could on having solid foundations. It’s better to be really great at ...