“Self-education is, I firmly believe, the only kind of education there is.” – Isaac Asimov
What do Bill Gates, Ray Bradbury, Abigail Adams, Richard Branson, and Benjamin Franklin all have in common? None of them received higher education; they’re autodidacts.
Sir Richard Branson is best known for his Virgin brand, a banner that encompasses a variety of business organizations, ranging from mobile telephony to transportation, travel, financial services, media, music and fitness. He left school at sixteen. Now he’s one of the richest men in the world and is even making plans to fly passengers to the moon aboard Virgin Galactic.
Ray Bradbury is one of the world’s most prolific and best-known science fiction writers; he’s written more than thirty books and has published more than 500 works. He graduated from high school but achieved his advanced education through reading. Bradbury explains that he couldn’t afford to go to college, so he would go to the library three times a week. He adds that he graduated from the library.
Abigail Adams–wife of the second president of the United States and mother of the sixth–never attended school. She was tutored by her maternal grandmother and encouraged to read. Her letter correspondence with her husband, John Adams, chronicles an important part of American history and is clear testimony of how intellect can be developed through self learning (she’s best known for her phrase “remember the ladies”).
If you want to read more about autodidacts that have made a difference in the world, visit “The Autodidact Hall of Fame”.
All of this brings us to the point of this blog post. Today, with the Internet, self-education has become easier than ever. In fact, several of the world’s best universities have put some of their most popular courses online so that everyone can have access to them, for free.
Please note that what I’m advocating here is that you commit yourself to life-long learning, and that you don’t allow a lack of knowledge in a particular area to stop you from pursuing your dreams, not that you drop out of college. In the words of B.C. Forbes: “Vitally important for a young man or woman is, first, to realize the value of education and then to cultivate earnestly, aggressively, ceaselessly, the habit of self-education.”
Below you’ll find ten fabulous resources for free self-education.
Harvard University: Justice
Harvard University’s “Justice” with Professor Michael Sandel is the first Harvard course that has ever been made available to everyone online. “Justice”–which aims to make viewers more critically minded thinkers about justice, morality, democracy, and citizenship–is one of the most popular courses in Harvard’s history. Now, you can watch the entire course, just as if you were sitting in Harvard’s historic Sanders Theatre. (I’m in the process of watching the 12 episodes and they’re fabulous. 
).
Here’s some of what you’ll find inside:
Is There a Moral Side to Murder?
Suppose you’re the driver of a trolley car and your trolley car is hurtling down the tracks at 50 miles per hour. At the end of the track you notice five workers working on the track and you try to stop, but you can’t. Your brakes don’t work.
You feel desperate because you know that if you crash into these five workers, they’ll all die. Then you notice that off to the right there’s a sidetrack. At the end of that track there’s one worker working on the track. Do you turn the trolley car unto the sidetrack killing the one, but sparing the five?
The Case of the Queen v. Dudley and Stephens
In this case, which was decided in 1884, the court had to decide whether necessity is a defense against a charge of murder. A yacht with a crew of four–Tom Dudley, the captain; Edwin Stephens; Edmund Brooks; and Richard Parker, the 17 year-old cabin boy–was capsized in a storm and the four crew members climbed aboard a tiny life boat.
After days of floating in the middle of the vast ocean without any food or water, the three men decided to kill Parker, who had drunk sea water against the advice of the others and had gotten ill, and eat him and drink his blood so that they could survive (this is a true story). Their reasoning was that it was better for one of them to be killed than for all four of them to die. Was this murder justified?
For more moral quandaries like the two above, head on over to Harvard University’s “Justice”.
Academic Earth
Academic Earth was named one of the top 50 Web Sites of 2009 by Time Magazine. I stop by there all the time and have found lots of great stuff. Audit classes from the best universities (Stanford, Berkeley, Princeton, and so on) from the comfort of your home.
How about taking a course on game theory from a Yale Professor? What actions should you take in a setting in which the outcome depends not only on what you do, but on the actions of other players? Game theory applies in economics, politics, legal cases, negotiations, and many other areas.
MITOpenCourseWare
MIT OpenCourseWare offers free lecture notes, exams, and videos from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).
Literature.org and Project Gutenberg
Literature.org brings you the full and unabridged texts of classic works of English literature. Fiction from authors like Lewis Carroll, the Bronte sisters (Anne, Charlotte and Emily), Jack London, Mark Twain, Charles Dickens and many others, and classic scientific works from Charles Darwin and Rene Descartes. I’m on chapter three of “Agnes Grey” by Anne Bronte.
Project Gutenberg offers free electronic books. As of December 2009, Project Gutenberg claimed over 30,000 items in its collection.
Yale University
Yale University has decided to put several of their courses online so that the whole world will have access to them on their site Open Yale Courses. One such course is Listening to Music, in which the musical novice is introduced to the ways in which music is put together and is taught how to listen to a wide variety of musical styles, from Bach and Mozart, to Gregorian chant, to the blues.
Three More Universities that Offer Free Online Courses
Here are three more universities that offer free online courses:
Smarthistory.org: Art History
If you love art history visit smarthistory.org; you’re in for a real treat. It’s a free multi-media web-book designed as a dynamic enhancement for the traditional art history textbook. Here’s an example of what you’ll find at smarthistory.org:
- Learn about the Baroque Period (1600 – 1700) by listening to a 12 minute comparison between Peter Paul Rubens’s Elevation of the Cross, oil on canvas, 1610-11 and Rembrandt van Rijn’s Anatomy Lesson of Dr. Tulp, 1632. (Here)
Your Self-Education Plan
Now that you know that there are so many fabulous web sites out there that you can visit to get a free self-education, how do you create a self-education plan? There’s an excellent blog called “The Self-Made Scholar”, which is all about self-learning, and they have a great post on how to create an independent scholar resource plan.
You can read the post here: How to Learn on Your Own: Creating an Independent Scholar Resource Plan.
Conclusion
There are literally hundreds of web sites you can visit for free self- education. Here are some lists I hope you’ll find useful:
- 100 Terrific Self-Learning Sites to Boost Your Resume During the Recession
- 100 Incredible Lectures from the World’s Top Scientists
- Self-Education Resource List
- 100 Best Self-Education Sites for Switching Careers
And, of course, I hope that you consider this blog to be a fabulous self-education resource.
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I Recommend:
My ebook “How to Be More Creative – A Handbook for Alchemists” explains that creativity is not the sole domain of the arts but is important in any field. Whatever you do, creativity helps you do it better. Discover practical advice on how to be more creative in every life endeavor by reading my ebook.
The Sedona Method is a simple, powerful, easy-to-learn technique that shows you how to let go of any negative, unwanted or painful feelings you may be experiencing at any particular moment. It consists of a series of questions you ask yourself that lead your awareness to focus on what you’re feeling in the moment and gently guide you toward letting it go. Read my review of the Sedona Method here.
