zsjdanny
Dec 18, 2009
Undergraduate / Brown supplement: Education and what don't you know [3]
French novelist Anatole France wrote: " An education isn't how much you have committed to memory, or even how much you know. It's being able to differentiate between what you do know and what you don't." What don't you know?
In middle high school, I studied in a lower-level class. It was convenient for me to ask questions because when the teacher asked 'Are there any questions?' only several students would raise their hands. However, when I attended the best gifted class in high school, I found I couldn't always have the teacher's attentions to myself. Every day I had to queue in order to ask questions, because almost all of the fifty-four students had questions. I realized that only the students who learned well found questions and knew what they didn't know. Although today I know more than I did in the past, I still have so many questions.
Last week I got fever, and I felt pain in my eyes. I asked the doctor about it, discussed it with my biology teacher, and searched on the Internet for the cause. Finally, I found the explanation in a book in a university library. There are many reasons, including bacteria and conjunctivitis. Although I still want to ask how bacteria hurt my eyes, a college professor at the university told me that due to my limited knowledge I cannot understand the mechanism. Seeing my struggle to find the answer, my mother asked me why I wanted to know the cause. In fact, I don't know either. Up until now, I have had fevers at least 20 times in my life, but I have never thought about why I felt pain in eyes when I had fever until I had deeper knowledge of biology. Now that I know more about biology, I ask why, and I have the ability to differentiate between what I know and what I don't know.
I used to think I had enough knowledge to answer other people's questions. However, the more I know, the more I find unknown. I cannot list what I don't know, because there are countless questions that I cannot answer, and even I don't know what the questions are. I also believe that I can never know everything, even if I absorbed knowledge without stop. What is important to me is to find out what I want to know. There is still so much I want to study. Because of this, I have been motivated to explore for the sake of exploring and to study for the sake of studying.
Is it too common?
French novelist Anatole France wrote: " An education isn't how much you have committed to memory, or even how much you know. It's being able to differentiate between what you do know and what you don't." What don't you know?
In middle high school, I studied in a lower-level class. It was convenient for me to ask questions because when the teacher asked 'Are there any questions?' only several students would raise their hands. However, when I attended the best gifted class in high school, I found I couldn't always have the teacher's attentions to myself. Every day I had to queue in order to ask questions, because almost all of the fifty-four students had questions. I realized that only the students who learned well found questions and knew what they didn't know. Although today I know more than I did in the past, I still have so many questions.
Last week I got fever, and I felt pain in my eyes. I asked the doctor about it, discussed it with my biology teacher, and searched on the Internet for the cause. Finally, I found the explanation in a book in a university library. There are many reasons, including bacteria and conjunctivitis. Although I still want to ask how bacteria hurt my eyes, a college professor at the university told me that due to my limited knowledge I cannot understand the mechanism. Seeing my struggle to find the answer, my mother asked me why I wanted to know the cause. In fact, I don't know either. Up until now, I have had fevers at least 20 times in my life, but I have never thought about why I felt pain in eyes when I had fever until I had deeper knowledge of biology. Now that I know more about biology, I ask why, and I have the ability to differentiate between what I know and what I don't know.
I used to think I had enough knowledge to answer other people's questions. However, the more I know, the more I find unknown. I cannot list what I don't know, because there are countless questions that I cannot answer, and even I don't know what the questions are. I also believe that I can never know everything, even if I absorbed knowledge without stop. What is important to me is to find out what I want to know. There is still so much I want to study. Because of this, I have been motivated to explore for the sake of exploring and to study for the sake of studying.
Is it too common?
