Knowing Stuff

What we learn from our culture, the books we read or the Internet has no value until it's thought about. Having knowledge without examining it is what computers do; just inert data with no meaning. Citing facts, isn't the same as understanding them. What's needed is not the acquisition of facts but what we think they mean.

There are ways that enable us to collate facts into some subjectively meaningful ideas and help discover novel insights. To some this might be meditation or the contemplation of knotty problems, to me it's good weed. The point is to find a way to step outside your ordinariness, overcome your certainties and question your beliefs.

It seems likely that most people will abjure these practices because they offer no materialistic advantage and lack secular respectability. They prefer everything simple and unambiguous, seeing a nice mechanistic progression in all things. Contemplation is for the spacey, the intellectually flexible, people who aren't looking for mere facts. This may explain why progress is measured by what most people don't think about.