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PaperclipPerfector  2d ago (text post)   2121 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for August 17, 2025

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.

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Do you have any strong flashbulb memories from a fictional media experience? A video game, a book, a movie?

Flashbulb memories are memories for the circumstances in which one first learned of a surprising and consequential (or emotionally arousing) event. Hearing the news that President Kennedy had been shot is used as the prototype case. Almost everyone can remember, with almost perceptual clarity, where he was when he heard, what he was doing, who told him, what was the immediate aftermath, how he felt about it, and one or more idiosyncratic and often trivial concomitants

Some major realizations about culture when I was a teen reading The Diamond Age on lunch at the job I had then. Just looking at the cover takes me right back even though I've read that book at least ten times now.

Follow-up small scale question: what is the motivation for you (or indeed anyone) to read a book more than once?

I am a fairly voracious reader-for-pleasure but I have never had any desire to re-read any book ever in my life. It seems not just pointless but actively opportunity-costly because you could be reading a new book?

I read (some) books more than once because I love them and enjoy them just as much the second time. Sometimes more, because I will notice new things about the text I hadn't previously. It's not pointless to me, because I read for the enjoyment of the book, not just for novelty. Novelty is nice, but not a requirement. It doesn't even necessarily enhance the experience, as there are plenty of books I enjoyed reading the first time less than I would have enjoyed rereading something else.

I would also say your argument about opportunity cost can easily cut the other direction: if I read a new book, and I dislike it (which certainly happens), I have paid an opportunity cost versus just rereading a book I already liked. So either way, it seems to me that there is an opportunity cost to be paid.

Ten years ago, I read a lot of books multiple times, because I found them to be highly enjoyable experiences and finding new stories that interested me (mostly on fanfiction.net) took a lot of effort. For example: IIRC, I read Time Braid six times and The Three Musketeers four times.

Nowadays, though, I feel obsessed with novelty (mostly on royalroad.com) and re-read books only rarely. I don't know why my tastes have changed.

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