As Alberto Knox states that 'It seems as if in the process of growing up we lose the ability to wonder about the world.' By this I believe he means that as a baby or a young child we are amazed with everything that surrounds us because it is new it keeps us questioning and wondering it. As we get older; information, knowledge and common sense starts to enter the aging mind and then the world around us becomes a routine and nothing amazes us anymore.
I agree with Knox, that as we get older we lose the ability to wonder because (as stated in the above paragraph) knowledge enters the mind and at the same time making us "get use" to the world. For example; the excitement of a baby seeing a "bow wow" (a dog). The baby does not have a range of vobcabulary and cannot express themselves fully in the presence of the dog, they cannot ask the questions. The parents on the other hand are not excited by the dog, since it became an everyday thing. The child is then calmed down and told that is nothing but a dog and with that the child grows up thinking that it is nothing and forgets about the questions when he/she was a baby. In addition to that, with age come a lot of responsibilities, work (social life, etc.) and that becomes the distraction. With these distractions, the ordinary people are concentrated on "now" and "this moment". These people are going straight ahead, missing the things that pass them by and the questions that surroound these things.
To some extent , I do not entirely agree with this statement. I do not believe that we can lose the 'faculty of wonder', it is only hidden within our minds, not being used because of conformity. An example of this is Socrates. The people around him did not agree with his ideas and which lead to his death. I, myself was in a situation like this, my questions and ideas were seen as outrageous (at the time) and was humiliated for it, my days for speaking out for ideas became on a low. Also to that, for being a Christian I thought my questions would be answered, but with every answer I hear I can repeatedly (with good reason) ask '€˜why?' which does not get any further than that, the answers cannot be answered or the answers are repeated which lead to stop of questioning. But for those who still wonder have the "question that drives" them. They have this motivation and also this uncomfortable task which makes them wonder. They travel in curvey lines, even going back to link questions to make new ones. They are not distracted and have the time to stop and wonder.
Overall, I have to say that I disagree with this statement. As people start to reach an age where they are so busy in there life, they do not lose the 'faculty' and are so comfortable 'deep in the rabbit's fur'. It's just being ignore, not being used because they do not have the time. Even if they presented with a philosophical question, some of the answers are right there in front them. From books to the internet but they are ignoring the question itself and the question that surrounds it, making their thoughts too straight and forward. An example is: Why is the sky blue?, I can answer that with the the order of the colours of the light starting from red (the sun) and as it travels to earth it's blue (like the rainbow). That there, is straight and forward. But why blue? why that shade? why not green? these questions surround the answers are being ignored because they are afriad of more questions taking up their time. At an older age than that, I feel that the 'faculty' is being used often now because at that age they are relaxed. Retired from work and have the time to lie in the grass and just wonder. But in this era of technology and media, everything is efficient and to the point. We are comfortable in deep in the fur and choose not to use the ablility.
2 comments:
A very interesting response.You raise a lot of issues and, a bit like TOK itself, there are more questions than answers. Your example of the colour of the sky is a good one,but I don't think that a child loses a sense of wonder about dogs just because they get to find out that the animal is called a dog.You semm to suggest there are 2 types of people - those who go straight ahead witout thinking about the world around them and those who do because they get motivated by something. What kind of thing gets these people motivated?
I wrote vaguely about the same ideas. I explained why “grown ups” do not technically lose the “ability to wonder” but they are just preoccupied with their busy lives and do not have time to “wonder about the world”. However, I was interested by your idea that children mimic their parent’s unenthusiastic responses to everyday events such as seeing a “dog”. I did not pick up on this factor.
Moreover, I enjoyed your ‘line analogy’ as it really helped me visualise the complex idea of thought and questioning. It made me compare adults to straight lines as they have fixed answers like line equations have a fixed formula (y = mx + c).
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