Welcome to Septivium
Welcome to this new site.
What’s it all about? I’ll describe the two thoughts that combined to lead me here.
First, I’m all too often aware of the gaps in my knowledge of the world. Like you, I’m reasonably well educated but we all suffer from our limited time in school coupled with education’s narrowing of our focus as we progress. At age fourteen I stopped studying history, biology and chemistry. At sixteen, geography, physics and English literature. And these are only areas of knowledge that fall within conventional school subjects — some topics aren’t on conventional curriculums.
Of course, like yours, my knowledge has increased since I left full-time education but only in a haphazard manner, picking up bits and pieces through newspapers, books, magazines, TV, etc. This is better than nothing but it lacks the structure that even the most vaguely organised learning provides. New facts and concepts land in a void dotted with clusters of random bits and pieces picked up over the years, rather than contributing to a coherent view of how the world works.
On to the second thought. A possible solution occurred to me when I came across The Personal MBA. The site provides a reading list of business books which, along with some real world business experience, aims to give people an education similar to an MBA without the huge cost. The books and other topics can be discussed in the online community. This really excited me — I wanted to start reading and I’ve never previously wanted to do an MBA.
And then I thought… couldn’t something like this work for a broader topic than business? A topic as broad as… everything?
How about a reading list featuring the very best books on dozens of topics, allowing readers to fill in the gaps in their knowledge, connect the dots between disparate subjects, and discuss these ideas with fellow readers around the world.
Get a degree in everything.
So that was, and is, the general idea. In the next few posts I’ll elaborate on some of the related thoughts I’ve had, and discuss some of the many unresolved problems and questions involved.
If this idea intrigues you I’d love to hear your thoughts at any point. And if you know someone else who might be interested, please point them this way. Thanks.
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