Is it cringe to want to larp as an 18th century polymath by learning all the things that they would learn? For example, I would like to
>learn Latin, Greek, French, German, Spanish, Italian, Russian, Chinese, Japanese and Arabic
>know physics, chemistry, biology and mathematics
>know how to play an instrument decently well
>be well-versed in history, literature, philosophy, theology
>know the Western Canon like the back of my hand
But the only reason I can think of justifying all of this is larping as an 18th century polymath
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The reason doesn't matter, only that you are willing to learn more and better yourself.
The only problem is that with a reason superficial as that you will probably lose motivation quickly.
The idea of being a recluse scholar appeals to me, along with these topics. It matches my dispositions well. Is that superficial?
Then you don't want to larp, you want to be a scholar. Either way it's something good.
You were built for it. Now it's just a matter of choosing what to do in a day.
You will never do any of these things, you will make charts and shitpost about being a polymath
That's just what the schizophrenia does to a man
Reason is all that matters. Reason and will is what makes you human. You are not bettering yourself by doing random shit you read about online. You turn off the noisebox, go outside, and make a person of yourself
Even fricking IQfy, the butthole of the internet is enshittified to death, and you are just another brainwashed moron, your soul essence scattered by the static of noise that you bombard yourself in to escape the dread of your non-being
Why so many haters? I literally posted proof I'm "half-way through learning German", like the other Anon said
>Why so many haters?
where do you think we are right now?
I check all those boxes.
Gawld dawlg, you know all those languages? Real quick: ya some kinda genius, b?
How on earth would that be cringe? That's just awesome and intelligent.
No, you don't.
not cringe at all. it's specially helpful with science, if you set yourself a date where you don't study past so you don't have to deal with later advancements.
and if you read only literature from that time and before, your vocabulary will expand greatly. so go for it if you have the energy.
>if you set yourself a date where you don't study past so you don't have to deal with later advancements.
That's not really my intention
I mean most polymaths were probably larpers themselves who enjoyed the feeling of being (or being known as) a guy who knows about a lot of different shit.
>I mean most polymaths were probably larpers themselves who enjoyed the feeling of being (or being known as) a guy who knows about a lot of different shit.
keep suckling that 200 year old wiener you're almost at the milkdust
If only he knew how bad things were going to get.
>Spaniards, Italians
Yup
>French
I mean, I guess some are kind of..
>Russians
.. uhm, what?
>and Swedes
WHAT??
It’s reflective of the sad statement of modern education that these are seen as lofty ambitions when in ancient times they were the norm.
Thank you, anon
>it was the norm to learn 10 different languages, have expertise in 8 different disciplines, and be well read in fiction, poetry, and drama on top of it
No it wasn't you fricking melvin, even when these fields were far less complicated than they are today. Having expertise in even one field of science now entails way more education than it used to.
That number of languages was never the norm and wouldn't really be maintainable at a high level. Japanese, Russian, German and probably Spanish are droppable imo, but you'd have to add in Sanskrit and Persian in their place to really be versed in world classics (Bronze Age stuff can be considered a niche option).
>Japanese, Russian, German and probably Spanish are droppable
>Sanskrit and Persian in their place
Clinically insane. Russian or German alone are worth more than both.
The former are valued for ideas, the latter for poetry. Poetry is greater and more important than ideas; and ideas translate, while poetry does not.
Learning a language for poetry is stupid, but we're speaking English and if any lnaguage has good poetry it is English. You're leaving out science, math, and histories. Sanskrit has almost nothing on these compared to Russian and especially German.
These languages are mostly just following my inclinations, but I do believe that an even higher amount of languages is doable and maintainable. There are people alive right now who know more than that.
Knowing a topic well doesn't mean having PhD-level knowledge of it. And just by having read most of the Canon, one knows more than 99% of PhD students in the humanities and social sciences. The standards aren't as high as you think and you're (falsely) assuming that knowledge == absolute mastery.
Well your inclinations will probably change as you learn more about literary history and the aesthetic ideals of the period you are so enamored with, but that aside, I just think you'll always be atrophying in one or the other of your languages. The people who know that many, if they truly maintain them, probably do not have other significant pursuits. Anyway you're just engaging in manic fantasies. Apply yourself to something specific for a while and then see how you feel.
I'll let you in on two things: (1) the reason I put languages in the first place is because I want to read books in them, so the languages will be maintained/improved as I read about philosophy, history, theology and all sorts of literature in them. It's basically killing two birds with one stone. The second thing is that I've already been studying the languages I've listed for years now (expect Chinese, Japanese and Arabic) and have reached a decent level in all with Greek and Russian lagging a bit behind, since I started them later. So I don't think it's just a manic phase.
Those are all genres that translate well enough though, hence why I recommended the more poetry-heavy languages. But it’s your time to spend as you see fit. Good work with the languages, although there’s a lot of overlap with the Romance family, but that just makes the maintenance goal more attainable. With more than 5 non-closely-related languages it just seems like you’ll have a hard time jumping into a text with your sixth-most-used one, and you might end up spending time re-doing a lot of vocab memorization. Maybe that’s not the case, I have similar interests and would love to be able to keep up 10 different languages, I just don’t think you should get your hopes up too high.
Anon, were there by any chance a lot of factories near the water supply where you grew up?
>I just don’t think you should get your hopes up too high
That's why I'm waiting until I reach proficiency in all the European ones before I branch out, in order to see how feasible they really are. In any case, I do believe that learning all the European languages I mentioned and maintaining them at a high level is very feasible.
That seems doable. Feel free to post about it as you keep acquiring new ones, as long as you’re actually doing it and not trying to fake it with the bare minimum. Success stories are good for inspiration.
Argue you're points. You can't. Sanskrit is a throwaway language. Persian is D tier in utility at best. German and Russian are easily S tier by all accounts.
Math and science writings are dry and factual and thus translatable, same applies to academic history. Is it really possible that this isn't obvious to you?
>Math and science writings are dry and factual
Brainlet confirmed.
Oh my god yes I get it theories aren't literally "factual" and it's not "dry" because the ideas are interesting but the (natural) LANGUAGE used is always going to be as straightforward as possible and the more dependent it is on some aspect of the original language the worse it is as math/science, which is the exact OPPOSITE of the case for poetry, because one of them is supposed to EXPLOIT the features of its original language while the other is supposed to TRANSCEND them.
It's very clear, since you don't understand what languages are and aren't useful for, that your interest in learning them is based entirely in narcissism. I can only imagine that's also the reason for your interest in (being known as being interested in) STEM.
>ancient times they were the norm
your average person in the 18th century couldn't even read, moron
Go for it. Maybe start a substack or something and regularly write essays on your thoughts and observations.
Not the OP but I've learnt a lot with my lifelong voracious reading habit, yet it always has coincided with a severe case of imposter syndrome where I feel I don't "know enough" to make any statement which forces me to just read more. I wish I could break this curse.
The thing I most like about other people is that they are constantly thinking things I don't think, and saying things I wouldn't think to say. I can guarantee a lot of people would find what you think and what you say very interesting. And it's more about what you think about something instead of your knowledge of the thing itself.
you've already overcome it by writing anonymous posts. The next step is to just not care about writing anything at all, even if your name is on it, because you have no obligation to ever read a response. Simply write a book and throw it to the wilds. If you were looking for success, you shouldn't bother with books anyways. Books are just a way to temporarily slow down insanity.
I actually started doing something similar not too long ago...Its been enjoyable even if my parents don't understand. Go for it OP
My parent's keep asking why I learn dead languages. They're on the stage where instead they ask "who speaks that?" and I just explain the history of how the language developed. They want me to learn Spanish but it is disgusting to me.
>Is it cringe to want to larp as an 18th century polymath
No, Ezra Pound recommended you do it.
This all sounds fine except for trying to learn ten pointless languages, what a massive waste of time.
You can't be a polymath without knowing many languages
>Chinese, Japanese, and Arabic
What 18th century polymath would know these? Nobody gave a shit about asia then
Portuguese horn dogs cared about Japanese ports.
wikipedia
wikipedia wikipedia wikipedia
wikipedia wikipedia wikipedia wikipedia wikipedia
Isn't power a reason? Inventing or writing something that changes the world, along the principles that you want to live by? I don't think you can make some crazy paradigm shifts in our day and age, but surely you could invent something.
>languages
Sure. Go for it.
>science
Science back then wasn't as deep and wide as it's today. You can get to the same level with basic undergraduate courses.
>music
It's fun to play an instrument, yes, go for it.
>history
How much history books they have back then? I doubt you need more than a few dozen of modern books to cover the same things.
>Western Canon
all aren't that worth reading, consider it as a side dish if you have time to read them.
Ok so how far are you? Oh you can do zero of those things? Why bother making this fricking thread then?
people make these lofty goals and have reading lists of 100 books and then end up doing none of it, you're a loser and you'll remain a loser. if you actually had polymath potential you wouldn't ask anons on the internet for their permission, you'd be already halfway through learning German
>you'd be already halfway through learning German
Here's the novel I'm currently reading in German and a German textbook I have lying around
based op. keep studying, pay no attention to vile, mentally challenged loser anons with a deep-seated inferiority complex.
Thanks, anon.
Based. Don't let the gay naysayer dissuade you.
You are a homosexual.
That wasn't me 🙁
>I do know Latin, Greek, French, German, Russian and (currently learning) Japanese.
Incredibly based. How long have you been learning them? French is my best one and I've been doing it for nearly 4 years.
I think your overall approach is too STEM-based for my liking. I'm more of a humanities guy, so I like my conventional history and literature.
Only thing here that's "cringe" is you caring about whether people think your ideal is cringy or not. You do not need to make some sort of excuse for your desire to do this, if you want to achieve all of these things then start now. They are all good and interesting things that will refine your knowledge and soul and there's no reason you shouldn't be doing them. Also, chances are your alternative to doing these things is jacking off to shitty NTR porn and spending your days crying about nogf.
>I'll do anything to not get a job
I think it’s impossible to become a polymath in a contemporary sense simply because the sciences are too narrow and divergent. Furthermore, modern humanities are highly speculative and schools of thought in contradiction with each other. How would you even begin to master a topic like economics? It can’t be done. If you wanted to do this, you’d have to focus on philosophy and history of science rather than science itself, as well as philosophy generally, all of liberal arts, theology, law, and medicine. The languages are all secondary in my opinion. The renaissance man, who dabbles in many different things, is far more realistic than the polymath, who masters many things. Keep in mind, these people weren’t even appreciated in their own time. Cellini is largely forgotten in both art and literature. The most significant polymath is Dr. Faust, who isn’t even real. Jack of all trades but master of none was always a tendency we’re supposed to suppress.
>The most significant polymath is Dr. Faust, who isn’t even real
The most significant polymath was Dr. John Dee, who was very much real.
>ayo bruh I heard you was talkin' that shit wuss poppin'
He wasn’t a polymath.
If you write off half of the fields, you’re not a polymath. We don’t recognize liberal arts, philosophy, law, theology, and medicine as the only faculties anymore. Science blew the lid off and now there are hundreds if not thousands of topics of study. Economics is in Aristotle as well, but go ahead and skip it because it’s “gay”, you mouth breathing buffoon. Are you sure you even have the intellectual horsepower to pursue something like this? My guess is no…
>He wasn’t a polymath.
Yes he was, you fricking moron.
moron
If you actually think that the current day social sciences and humanities are at all viable, you are beyond saving. They've been utterly corrupted. Humanities used to be a single pursuit under the name of philology and now it's fractured into a bunch of corners where little bugmen can be specialized and talk about how Shakespeare was a gay troony. And the social sciences are basically all bullshit.
It's sad, because we have people dismissing things like psychology and sociology whole-cloth, because they're so utterly corrupted by moronic homosexuals that we'd almost have to start from scratch to make them legitimate scientific fields again.
>because we have people dismissing things like psychology and sociology whole-cloth
It's just empirical reality. Both disciplines have terrible replication rates, so why bother with them?
>Both disciplines have terrible replication rates, so why bother with them?
Because, should our understanding of them advance to a certain point, both the human mind and society as a whole could become wholly scientifically quantifiable.
>Furthermore, modern humanities are highly speculative and schools of thought in contradiction with each other. How would you even begin to master a topic like economics? It can’t be done.
Modern humanities are worthless and economics is gay. You're making things appear way harder than they are.
>18th century polymath by learning all the things that they would learn
>Russian
As long as you’re interested and such. It takes a lot of deferred reward to be so “lone-wolf”..
This is almost word-for-word my fantasy. Not necessarily to larp as an 18th century polymath, but to live as a reclusive scholar
>Languages: Quranic Arabic, Classical Chinese, Greek, Latin, Sanskrit, Biblical Hebrew
>Sciences: Extreme deep level of mathematics, also with physics, chem, electrical engineering, psychometrics
>Deep knowledge of western canon, its philosophy, literature, poetry.
This is one of those things that appeals to a 16 year old but reads like pure cringe to an adult.
No, you're just gay.
Oh shit
Interesting! You should go for it.
if you are doing it for LARPing you probably won't get even close, those people were genuinely autistically interested in all those things(and had the time to also spend their life on it)
You will get burned out. Instead, you ought to study the parts of that list you're actually interested in and not worry about being a master.
Sounds like a great way to end up unemployed or working at starbucks
Frick these naysayers, all you you have to do is read and contemplate some shit, you or whomever can make it
18th century is way too late for being a polymath
1. your boss (assuming you are a cleric or a courtier) can readily be chased around with cannons and other modern shenanigans... and the "middle class" is hasn't yet become wealthy enough to buy your services... so what will you do with all that knowledge? not to mention that books & travel cost money...
2. linked to the previous point, people are beginning to read mass-market literature, so your value is diminished in the eyes of anybody willing to commercially publish
>know physics, chemistry, biology and mathematics
3. science has become a full-time job after Newton & Leibniz so unless you dedicate yourself 100% to it and say "frick philology" you will just waste your time
the golden age for what you want spanned from 1200 to 1600 (or 1100 to 1700, with a little indulgence)
the best thing you could to in the 1700-1900 time period is either be a thief or a police officer :3
what instrument?
Theremin
>Arabic
Nah, thanks.
op is a lost cause, it doesn't get any more pretentious than theremin
Latin, Greek, French, German, Spanish, Italian, Russian, Chinese, Japanese and Arabic
I do know Latin, Greek, French, German, Russian and (currently learning) Japanese.
On a reading-comprehension level, that is. Probably piss-poor at actually speaking them.
>justifying all of this
Memorizing vocab is just good for your brain. Same as jogging.
>>know physics, chemistry, biology and mathematics
Physics, biology, mathematics - yes. At some point, philosophy gets heavily interdisciplinary, so you'd better.
>>be well-versed in history, literature, philosophy, theology
History - yes. But we are talking about "deep history" approach. Hence, once again, biology, primatology, evolutionary psychology and neurobiology.
Philosophy - yes. Anything interdisciplinary, basically, IS philosophy. (Wanna talk about similarities between sociology and biology methods? Historical aetiology and embryology stages? Yep, now you know where.)
Frick theology ("comparative religion" and "cognitive science of religion", on the other hand...)
Frick literature.
>>know how to play an instrument decently well
I was planning to delve into some black metal, but never had time.
>>know the Western Canon like the back of my hand
Just googled what that shit is. But, yeah, apparently I've already read muh Aeschylus, Aristophanes and Shakespeare. Useless waste of time, could have skipped that entirely.
>Is it cringe to want to larp as
Funny thing is, I never even realized I am "larping as a polymath". I just kinda did naturally.
you do not know physics biology and maths at graduate level
The sad thing is I'm sure you have actually learned all those languages, meaning you must be over 20. Jesus.
This has been a big goal of mine since I was 12 but I keep getting sidetracked by things that are more enticing. There simply are not enough hours in the day.
>There simply are not enough hours in the day.
Yeah, it fricking sucks