When babies are born, "they slip out into a brandnew reality". In this new environment, with the freedom of exploring and learning, they are curious to everything around them. However, once a person becomes known to what something previous new is, they become bored of it and seek for something "new". This something "new" could be knowledge or maybe a skill. This could explain why people strive to be better (e.g. get better grades and win more competitions).
A workforce motivation theory, called the Hierarchy of Needs (by Abraham Maslow), was based on this theory of the want of something "new". According to Maslow, there are 5 levels of "needs". Each "need" must be satisfied from bottom-to-top. He explains that once a need to satisfied, the next need above it in the hierarchy should be provided to continue motivating employees. The last (highest) need is "self-actualisation", which is realising your fully potential and heading to reach it. This is where employees would strive to perform better and be recognised for his/her efforts and achievements.
The reason why adults find many things that babies or children find interesting is that they have become used to them. It is like getting adapted to a daily routine, with things becoming like a "habit". This means that as people get older, they have less ability to express their "faculty of wonder". Most people just care about things in their own little world, some may have a border edge of the country they live in, for some the border may be the world. Then there are very few who look out further, raising big questions that seem unexplainable. For example, Albert Knox said "You know that you are stumbling around on a planet in the universe. But what is the universe?"
Overall, I don't agree with what Albert Knox stated in Chapter 2 - "as they grow up the faculty of wonder seems to diminish". I think that people still have their original curiosity and like to wonder. However, there is just less space for them to use this faculty. As they grow up, the world becomes smaller for them.
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4 comments:
Hi Jocelyn
A very interesting idea - we are living in an increasingly smaller world with the internet and mass communications taking away some of our "wonder" but maybe it is also adding to our "wonder" in that we are able to see whole new worlds which people in the past would never have seen. Don't you think this would inspire you to want to learn more?
Yes, I guess this is pretty true. The constant new developments in technology makes me wonder what other things, that were never thought possible, will be invented in the future. Will the future be like what we see in movies? However, I think wondering about the future is not part of philosophy.
If you say that you disagree with what Albert Knox has said, how often have you asked yourself the questions that he asked Sophie in the book? Questions like "Who am I?" and "Which came first 'the chicken' or 'the ideal chicken' and so on
Abby,
Well, I don't know how you related with me not agreeing to Albert Knox with big questions.
But, anyway, I super duper rarely ask myself these big questions. I would ask myself once, think up my answer and just leave it.
"Who am I?" - I'm a human being, named Jocelyn Tong. Our name, like our specie, is just an identity to define ourselves. To fellow humans I'm Jocelyn Tong. To the universe I'm a human.
"Chicken or egg first?" - This is one I can't answer, and no one can. I think that big questions are designed to make people retrive their lost "faculty of wonder". Such as this question, it just makes people go in circles. And a circle never ends. If the person is patient enough, he/she will continue searching for an answer, everytime searching deeper.
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