Undergraduate / Bown University Supplement: What don't you know? [NEW]

Prompt: C.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?

I tried to take a little bit of adifferent approach to this essay, as I feel that most people who answer this quesiton will inevitably end up with the generic, "I know nothing". Even though the conclusion is the same,I think this may present a slightly more creative approach.

I'm still working out the actual conclusion, but I was wondering if this would be alright so far.

Three-Dimensional movies are a lie. I put on the supposedly "3D" glasses, and all I am greeted with is the knowledge that I am wearing glasses. Nothing pops out at me. I walk into walls when there is an unfamiliar corner. Stairs are a hazard, I must slowly descend until I can feel my foot upon the hard ground. It's very entertaining to watch me play sports such as badminton or tennis, since the ball will be meters away but I'll swing as if the ball was merely milliseconds away.

In short, I have no depth perception. I was born cross eyed, with a case of strabismus. My first memories are of being in the hospital getting surgery done on my eyes during Easter. During my elementary school years, I wore a patch to strengthen my weak eye so my eyes would not reverse the surgery. Even still, not seeing depth was never an issue growing up and neither was the recurrence of double vision when I was tired. It was all simply natural, all I had ever seen and known.

I learned of this concept of depth in AP Physics during the optics unit. To help bring some intriguing examples into the lecture, my physics teacher began to describe his inability to see in depth. All the things he described reflected what my world was composed of, the inability to judge what was closer, where things were, and walking into walls. I was stunned to know that my eyes did not see as everyone else's, that I was missing something in my eyesight. Yet oddly enough, I wasn't upset about it.

I actually enjoyed being in a flat world. It was familiar, comforting, my own little world. Not being able to see in depth was also a teacher for me. I knew that I was not omnipotent, but there was nothing so drastically reminding me vevery moment that there are things that I didn not know. And even if I felt familiar with something that I always knew -like vision - there was still so much that I probably never knew about it.