Cross-posting a 2023 Hacker News thread:
Everyone has different perspectives and values, so what do you personally think is the most important problem in the world right now? Is it something that one, or a group of early enthusiasts, can work on?
The original quote is from Aaron Swartz:
Life is short (or so I’m told) so why waste it doing something dumb? It’s easy to start working on something because it’s convenient, but you should always be questioning yourself about it. Is there something more important you can work on? Why don’t you do that instead? Such questions are hard to face up to (eventually, if you follow this rule, you’ll have to ask yourself why you’re not working on the most important problem in the world) but each little step makes you more productive.
And for the sake of completeness, what resources would you recommend to a beginner?
I started by asking myself, who have the capitalists revealed, through words and deeds, to be their greatest enemies? Then I started trying to understand those conflicts which made me realize that some of the people I was scared to listen to are actually intelligent, well-read, and earnest.
Ah, David Harvey’s Seventeen Contradictions and the End of Capitalism is very good for beginners. Alternatively, there are also some good videos. For example, Richard Wolff - The Game is Rigged.