I agree with your point about degrees. You're right - rituals are important!
I suppose I'd choose a major city with a strong intellectual culture (well-educated population, fine and performing arts). There you will find many colleges and universities; many schools that specialize, such as art schools; and most of all, many people in the community who can teach, who you can share your interests with, learn from, get tutoring from, etc. - communities of people who love this kind of thing.
I guess I'd choose New York most of all. The amount of talent and interest in the things you're interested in is incredible. It attracts people like you. And of course the local resources are unmatched, maybe in the world: Schools (from Columbia and NYU to the New School (I would definitely look them up if you aren't familiar - if they have programs that suit your schedule, they could be perfect), to City College and Brooklyn College, to many more. For the fine arts, there are the incredible museums (which probably offer classes), galleries, and the artist community itself. Also the world leader in theater, in finance, publishing, etc etc. It's a fantasy world for the intellectually curious.
Others: Bay Area and Boston. Philadelphia is affordable and has excellent resources.
It's trendy now to trash major cities, but don't forget what makes them so special; that is unchanged by political winds that blow right and left.
That it is.
It's like many particles contained in a small area. They collide more with each other, and their collisions convert their movement into energy. If the other particles weren't around, the movement would amount to nothing. :)
> In person classes
I think we'd need to know your geographical location?
> in my experience online content suffer from two issues. One is lack of roadmap - hard to tackle unknown unknown. Two is lack of community and interactivity - when I get stuck on a problem, it's hard to get help; there is also no quizzes, homework, and tests that facilitate learning.
Also, there's a lack of access to experts. If I'm learning a new programming language, it sure helps to have an expert in it who can look at my work, see what I'm missing, and send me in the right direction. It's the same with history, philosophy, or anything else.
> I'm just looking to learn; signaling is not important
My thought: If I do enough, or close to enough, for a degree, I might as well get it. If you're focusing on one subject, and if you really want to learn it well, then that's what the degree is - a program where you learn it well. I'd take the piece of paper if I did the work.
And it's not just signaling. The degree is for you too, or most of all; humans need ritual and reward; there's pride and joy and confidence and satisfaction in it. People spend thousands of hours leveling up in a game, and that's not even real!