OK..I am a Chinese science student who pick science in high school just because I don't want to be brain washed learning history and politics, feeling still living in Oceania in 1984. The problem is, I want to learn history or political science or sociology in college, but I don't have any intellectual experience related to liberal arts. This is the closes thing to "intellectual experience"...IS THIS RIDICULOUS OR OFF TOPIC??
STANFORD STUDENTS ARE WIDELY KNOWN TO POSSESS A SENSE OF INTELLECTUAL VITALITY.TELL US ABOUT AN IDEA OR AN EXPERIENCE YOU HAVE HAD THAT YOU FIND INTELLECTUALLY ENGAGING.
It was a cold winter afternoon, when the twilight was setting in. A friend took me to a tiny bookstore on a cramped space between a glamorous mall and a noisy hot-pot restaurant. It was dimly lit. I felt walking straight into the archive of a Chinese government department-fluorescent light that flashes every now and then, piles of dusty dated books with unattractive covers, colorful plastic stools that you can by with 8 RMB for three. I raised my eyebrow as my friend began dashing and searching between the shelves, stacking me book after book, "Here, you have to read this. And this." I sat down (the stool gave out an unwelcoming crack) and opened one on the top. It was The Road to Serfdom.
Growing up in China, I have been told that socialism is the best in the world. I was convinced, until I grew up and was convinced again democracy is the best. But as I read more editorials, I became more puzzled. All of them seemed right, but none seemed totally right. They go around the same arguments, quoting the same social problems and political events over and over again, but none of them touches the fundamental problem. Everyone was equally convincing, and I got brainwashed after I read every article. It did not take long for me to realize that my brain was washed more frequently than my hand. I did not have an independent stand point from which to make judgments. When I argue with people about politics I quote fragments of ideas from random articles instead of forming my own new ideas. (How do you distinct the difference between quoting others and forming your own? It is the difference between a bad "intellectual conversation" and a good Model UN draft resolution) The thought was frustrating.
But the books opened to me a brand new way to see things. They brought me to late 19th to early 20th century, when the debate between socialism and democracy, planned economy and market economy occur mainly between intellectuals and had yet to transform into ideology wars between massive campaigns. They were systematical theories touching the nature of the regimes instead of superficial analysis of random events, and do not rush to accusations. The stack of books on my knees carries a real constructive debate, while New York Times and People's Daily carries a quarrel, or a street fight. Suddenly it dawned on me: what I have been lacking is an individual mind that I can make rational judgments myself, because my understanding on society and politics are fragments, accumulated from the sea of editorials and other articles I read. I have a sudden urge to read all the books and understand their arguments-by Karl Max, by George Orwell, by Hayek, by Keynes, by...whom?
I don't even know who the major thinkers of the era are.
This was when the power of "systematical learning" first shed light on me. It is the foundation of independent mind, of expanded scope, of critical thinking, of all the innovations and developments. The true meaning of liberal arts education is not memorizing figures and facts-which is something we do often and take for granted. It is a laying of foundations and an expansion of scopes.
We stepped outside in the dry winter wind, watching the construction site across the street buzzing with action despite the night site. He said:" This is the world we know, isn't it? But there is something else outside this, outside our domain of knowledge that we may never know." "The books you showed me today did open a door to something new." "Yes, but there are thousands of such doors."
We turned again to the bookstore behind us and saw an ocean of unknown possibilities. We need guides to navigate through them...And I guess that's why we go to colleges.
