I have a strong desire to comprehend stuff

Discussion in 'General Philosophy' started by coberst, Oct 16, 2007.

  1. coberst Registered Senior Member

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    I have a strong desire to comprehend stuff

    I claim that comprehending is a hierarchy and can usefully be thought of as a pyramid. At the base of the pyramid is awareness that is followed by consciousness, which is awareness plus attention. Knowing follows consciousness and understanding is at the pinnacle of the pyramid.

    Two aspects of this comprehension idea deserve elaboration: consciousness and understanding.

    When I was a youngster, probably seven or eight, my father took me with him when he drove to a local farm to pick corn for use in the café the family managed. We drove for a significant amount of time down local dirt roads to a farm with a field of growing corn.

    We went into the fields with our bushel baskets and filled them with corn-on-the-cob. Dad showed me how to choose the corn to pick and how to snatch the cob from the stalk.

    On the drive home I was amazed to observe the numerous fields of corn we passed on the way back to town. I can distinctly remember thinking to myself, why did I not see these fields of corn while we were driving to the farm earlier?

    Today I have an answer to that question. I now say that on the way to the farm I was aware of corn-on-the-cob but on the way back home I was conscious of corn-on-the-cob. There was a very significant difference in my perceptions regarding corn-on-the-cob before and after the experience.

    We are aware of many things but conscious of only a small number of things. We were aware of Iraq before the war but now we are conscious of Iraq. There is a very important distinction between awareness and consciousness and it is important for us to recognize this difference.

    To be conscious of a matter signifies a focus of the intellect. Consciousness of a matter is the first step, which may lead to an understanding of the matter. Consciousness of a matter is a necessary condition for knowing and for understanding of that matter. Consciousness is a necessary but not sufficient condition for knowing and understanding to take place.

    When discussing a topic about which I am knowledgeable most people will, because they recognize the words I am using, treat the matter as old stuff. They recognize the words therefore they consider the matter as something they already know and do not consider as important. Because they are aware of the subject it is difficult to gain their attention when I attempt to go beyond the shallowness of their perception. The communication problem seems to be initially overcoming their awareness and reaching consciousness.

    Understanding is a long step beyond knowing. Understanding is the creation of meaning. Understanding represents a rare instance when intellection and emotion join hands and places me in an empathetic position with a domain of knowledge. When I understand I have connected the dots and have created a unity that includes myself. I have created something that is meaningful, which means that I have placed that domain of knowledge within my domain that I call my self. I understand because I have a very intimate connection with a model of reality that I have created. It is that eureka moment that happens rarely but is a moment of ecstasy. As Carl Sagan says “understanding is a kind of ecstasy”.

    When I read I almost always read non fiction. I have tried to read fiction and to learn from reading what is considered to be good literature. However, my effort to read good literature fails because I thing that learning by reading good literature is a very inefficient means for gaining knowledge and understanding.

    I claim that I can acquire more knowledge in one hour by reading non fiction than I can while reading good literature for ten hours. That is, I claim that learning by reading non fiction is ten times more efficient than learning by reading fiction, i.e. good literature.

    Do you agree that acquiring knowledge by reading non fiction is ten times as efficient as from reading fiction?
     
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  3. Read-Only Valued Senior Member

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    No, I certainly do not because fiction quite often contains factual errors. And once error has been learned it is VERY difficult to un-learn it. First impressions - right or wrong - are very strong and hard to overcome.



    You are making this FAR more difficult and complex than it really is! It's not a matter of "reaching consciousness" - it's a matter of presenting material in such a way as to make it interesting to your listener. That's the mark of a good teacher (professional or not). A poor teacher lacks the skill/ability of presenting knowledge in a truly interesting way and, as a result, accomplishes little.
     
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  5. Baron Max Registered Senior Member

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    There's a lot more to life than learning about "stuff".

    I would also caution you that it's not so simple anymore to know what's "fiction" and what's "non-fiction". People who automatically assume that "non-fiction" is factual, honest knowledge are deluding themselves.

    Baron Max
     
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  7. coberst Registered Senior Member

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    I was discussing this idea with another reader and we thought that it would be interesting to take two high school seniors of equal ability and have one read Othello and the other go to Google and tell each that there would be an exam in one hour about the subject of tragedy and jealousy.
     
  8. Spud Emperor solanaceous common tater Registered Senior Member

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    coberst, I'm absolutely not trying to be a smartarse here but are you autistic?
     
  9. Baron Max Registered Senior Member

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    And that would prove ....................what?

    Baron Max
     
  10. cosmictraveler Be kind to yourself always. Valued Senior Member

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    No. Both are just as valuable to the reader for enjoyment as well as knowledge. True most non fiction don't contain what you're defining as "knowledge' but it really does in its own ways. What you enjoy isn't always what others enjoy but both people can get enjoyment out of their books.
     
    Last edited: Oct 16, 2007
  11. Grantywanty Registered Senior Member

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    No. You can certainly learn more specific data. You can often decide in advance what you want to learn and then pick the correct non-fiction book to get that learning. But fiction provides incredible opportunity for learning. Here however you are learning perhaps about human nature, about ways of seeing the world and things, about morality, how character changes, how another person experiences or might experience reality. I'd put Hamlet or The Brother's Karamazov up against any non-fiction book on the planet. As two examples amongst many.
     
  12. Grantywanty Registered Senior Member

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    If you think that Googling gives equal understanding you have a very shallow understanding of understanding. And also Othello is not simply about tragedy and jealousy. It teaches lessons about language - rhetoric, metaphor, how to manipulate, etc. - character, envy, perception, the problem of other minds, aesthetic beauty and so on.

    I think you are putting forward a very limited idea of knowledge as a batch of facts. You cannot reduce Othello into a set of facts. Though one can get a set of truths out of it. And vastly better than many non-fiction works, second readings produce new information, ideas, understandings. I have read Othello five or six times and I am not done with it and it is different each time. There is no non-fiction book I would read that many times.
     
  13. coberst Registered Senior Member

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    I do not think so. What is your diagnosis?
     
  14. coberst Registered Senior Member

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    That is for the reader to figure out.
     
  15. coberst Registered Senior Member

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    If you had to take an important exam in 2 weeks and you knew there would be questions regarding human nature would you prepare for that test by reading good literature or by reading text books on psychology and sociology?
     
  16. Reiku Banned Banned

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    No.. i get what he gets as well. I have a potential urge to comprehend physics all the time, knowing fine well that 99.99% of the time, i would be wrong in my hypothesis. But this doesn't stop me.
     
  17. coberst Registered Senior Member

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    If you ever get the urge to gain some idea of Quantum Theory read "QED" by Feynman. QED means quantum electro dynamics. It is a tuff read by it is written by a marvelous writer and great teacher and is well worth the effort.
     
  18. Why? Registered Senior Member

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    Your definition of conscious seems to be really only interest. You noticed the corn on the way out, because you were interested in corn on the way out, but not the way in. Interest is fleeting, though, like the memories of the last Coke commercial you saw. As for your definitions of knowledge and understanding, and I don't grasp what you are talking about at all. Is knowledge gaining more information about a topic? And is understanding comprehending how things work? If understanding is a eurika moment, then why can't you gain such moments from fiction?
     
  19. coberst Registered Senior Member

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    Why

    Our schools and colleges have not taught us anything about understanding and so it is not surprising that we all find it to be a difficult concept to grasp.

    Let me try an example. Empathy is a means for us to try to understand another person. We do so by creating in our imagination a happening that we think is somewhat like what the other person must have. We create this analogy as a way of placing our self in the other person's shoes. This is a way for us to make the other person's life meaningful for us.
     
  20. Baron Max Registered Senior Member

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    What's your basis for making that assertion?

    And you could do exactly that with billions of fictional novels that are written. One doesn't have to read only non-fiction to gain that similar insight into the lives of others or arrive at something like empathy for the plight of others. Fiction is just fine for that and many other situations in life.

    Baron Max
     
  21. Grantywanty Registered Senior Member

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    It would depend on who was giving the test. And parroting back a list of facts from psych books is hardly understanding. You do know the statistics on how much information is retained from such enterprises? And how little this really teaches people about human nature i situ. It is a bunch of data.
    The good thing about what you assume here is that it reflects an assumption out in society that knowledge is batches of words in correct orders. It isn't. Not only does two week cramming sessions not last, it offers no flexibility, nuance and depth. And good educators know this.

    You don't see the irony in you saying

    Schools think of knowledge and understanding in precisely the way your two weeks to study scenario with fact based regurgitation testing.
     
  22. cosmictraveler Be kind to yourself always. Valued Senior Member

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    Also when reading fiction you still learn something even though you think you may not. Fiction has many interesting ways to tell a story and just by the way the story unfolds is learning something. We can learn all day long but sometimes we also need to just let our brains relax and unwind a little. Fiction is one way to do just that, in a way.

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  23. Baron Max Registered Senior Member

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    And, as a matter of fact, there are numerous "Historical Fiction" novels that are not only fun and interesting to read, but they give us factual historical information as well.

    And just to be fair, there are some interesting "Alternate History Fiction" novels that show with some valid facts what MIGHT have been IF....

    Baron Max
     

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