[iugtmkbdfil834]

<< And history absolutely is valuable and can be accessible to everyone.

Shrug. Little knowledge is a dangerous thing. Giving someone tools to create black hole does not ensure that they will be able to utilize that knowledge in a manner that.. is useful.

In other words, it may not be absolutely necessary, but it is.. not helpful to suggest accessibility is key. If anything, accessibility makes it dumber; not completely unlike systemD in linux. It serves a purpose, but it dumbs things down.

[johngossman]

Are you seriously suggesting that one can't learn Roman History without learning to read Latin? That it is better to be ignorant of history than read a few books?

[iugtmkbdfil834]

I am suggesting exactly what I am suggesting and I opened with those suggestions in the very first post.

By that I mean:

- learn to think critically - learn to apply logic

After that, the world is your oyster, but if you actually want to learn.. and not just.. consume what someone else throws at you, then it will be worthwhile to, you know, learn a thing or two: like, for example, language of the primary sources. I know. I know. There I go gate keeping again.

I will try to narrow it down a little:

"Reading a few books gives you a sketch of an idea someone else had."

Does that help?