Assignment #1

In Chapter 2, Albert Knox states that "It seems as if in the process of growing up we lose the ability to wonder about the world."

By this he means that as people grow from children to adolescents then to adults we lose the feeling of needing to question everything and that we eventually grow to accept most things we encounter. He also hints that as we gradually get older, we seem to focus more on the "what?" and "how?" questions instead of the "why?" questions that children are more likely to ask their elders.

I disagree with Albert Knox's statement because I believe that we do not lose the ability to wonder (or to question) about the world as we grow up, but just eventually see the need not to wonder as time goes by and as we get use to things that we encounter frequently. We eventually get tired of questioning and start to just accept things (and often take things for granted).

In 'Sophies World', Albert Knox gives an example of people loosing their ability to wonder as they grow older by mentioning the baby encountering a dog. The baby gets excited seeing a dog, pointing it out and identifying it as a "bow-wow" every few times it sees one. The childs parent is use to seeing a dog and so, is unimpressed by its presence, yet the animal is new to the child. From this example Albert Knox is trying to explain that 'grown-ups' would be unimpressed because of the numerous times we have seen a dog before, however, I personally believe that grown ups would be unimpressed by the presence of a dog because unlike a child, we already know what a dog is and what it usually does and can do (we have received answers to fulfil our curiosity, basically), where as a baby would wonder what the dog is, because it has not received any answers. I believe that we only question because we want answers.


For example, if Person A were to see a fancy Ferrari one day, outside his window, he would get all excited about it and wonder where it came from and who it belongs to. If he saw that same Ferrari each day for several months, but never saw the owner or found out who owned it, he would eventually get use to the fact that there is a fancy expensive car outside and he would give up trying to figure out who it belongs to, and just accept that it's there.
Suppose, Person B (Person A's friend) goes over to A's home and sees that same Ferrari parked outside which Person A has seen each day for several months now. Person B would get all excited about it, and would also wonder who's car it is (just like A did all those months ago), but eventually after going to A's home each week and seeing that same car, he too would stop wondering who it belongs to and would also just accept that the car is there.

Suppose one day the car is no longer there outside A's window anymore, and several years go by. Person B remembers the car and reminds A about it. They both wonder about the owner just like they did, the day they each saw the car for the first time.

This shows that the ability to wonder about things is not lost as we get older, we just lose our interests in things after we find the answer or don't find the answer to them.

Robert Win 6N4