Breaking Through - A Short Article from the Editor

‘I know something you don’t know!’ A child cries out on the playground.

‘Why should I care?’ another thinks to themselves.

As children, when we acquire knowledge that we believe others do not have, it can make us feel superior and subsequently rather reluctant to share that information with our peers. Conversely, some children think that opinions and thoughts outside that of their own are not worth listening to. For many, these attitudes continue well into adulthood and some people, to their detriment, never look to make any adjustment to their mindset. In that regard, I want to demonstrate here, within this short article, why such attitudes greatly hinder the transportation of knowledge and subsequent understanding. Indeed, the path toward developing our intelligence and subsequently creating a more compassionate and enlightened world is consistently blocked by our own righteousness, intolerance, and certainty. This road, however, can be unblocked and further paved through the use of art, literature, tolerance and, perhaps most of all – our curiosity.

In his book, Burning the Books, Oxford’s Chief Archivist, the remarkable scholar Richard Ovenden, explains to us how knowledge has been both preserved and, sometimes quite literally, ‘burnt’, throughout the ages. He describes how great libraries and archives over the past four millennia have been marvellous stores and vehicles for the transportation and acquisition of human knowledge. He also points out how these sources, whether it has been as a result of Nazi book burnings in the 1930s, or the pillaging of monasteries during the Reformation in the sixteenth century, have been destroyed. Though it could be suggested that there is another, more seemingly mundane yet equally significant, reason that the transfer of human knowledge is consistently blocked.

We have all known people who, like those children on the playground, have been reluctant to provide us with their newly acquired knowledge for fear of losing their feeling of superiority. Though, what these people do not realise is that knowledge is an enlightening force. As Thomas Jefferson once said: ‘He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening mine’. In other words, providing other people with your newly found knowledge does not dim your own intelligence. Indeed, lighting someone else’s candle does not darken your own, but acts only to brighten the room. Yet how might we aspire to transfer such knowledge in the first place if others do not wish to acquire it. Or, as Jefferson may have phrased it; how may we brighten the room when the candle wicks that surround us are too damp to light?

People who are so certain that the information they possess is true, frequently close themselves off from broadening their knowledge and developing their intelligence. After all, why do you need to question anything or listen to anyone else’s opinion when you already know ‘everything’? We all know people who possess such egotistical attitudes. Though it could be said that those who have such a mindset are not only more counterproductive than those who refuse to provide others with their acquired knowledge but are, particularly when they are grouped together, more dangerous.

‘Our knowledge is merely confined within a certain tolerance... This is the concentration camp and crematorium at Auschwitz. This is where people were turned into numbers. Into this pond were flushed the ashes of four million people. And that was not done by gas. It was done by arrogance. It was done by dogma. It was done by ignorance. When people believe that they have absolute knowledge, with no test in reality--this is how they behave. This is what men do when they aspire to the knowledge of gods’ stated Dr. Jacob Bronowski in his popular 1974 series, The Ascent of Man.

In other words, the Nazis were so certain that the Jews were evil that they determined to exterminate themall; they never contemplated that their actions mightbe deemed to be morally and ethically heinous. Hence, we should never stop questioning, because absolute beliefs can create atrocities that go beyond our wildest imaginings. Yet the only way to question our perceived truths, so Dr. Bronowski infers, and subsequently acquire further knowledge, is to be more tolerant toward the diverse mix of cultures, thoughts, beliefs, and opinions that exist within our world. This is because, he implies, the more tolerant we are of others, the more willing we are to ‘exchange of information’ with those around us.

Of course, the Holocaust is an extreme example of what can happen when we blind ourselves with certainty. Though when we choose to question our day-to-day certainties, whether that be our opinions of ourselves; a fact we choose to believe about a particular food or something we think to be true of someone; then we not only develop our own intellect, but better understand our fellow human beings. For whilst our ‘knowledge is confined’, as Dr. Bronowski says, ‘within a certain tolerance’, it is also confined within our individual levels of curiosity. In that sense, what comes first, curiosity or tolerance, is a matter of conjecture. Yet what is fair to

say is that these forces, once in motion, are symbiotic and move in a positive circle; because curiosity leads to discovery; and the more we learn, the more empathetic and inquisitive we become.

There is a lot to be said about our natural superpower, one that perhaps differentiates us from animals; our ability to question things. In a book I have been writing on and off for the past 4 years (it is almost finished I promise), I further elaborate upon the importance of curiosity and how it has been utilised throughout history to better the human condition. Within the book I also reveal how curiosity and the utilisation of the Arts can provide us with a few open-ended answers to some of life’s most fundamental quandaries, such as ‘who should I listen to?’, ‘how much money do I need?’, ‘what are my tools?’ and ‘who am I?’

Once we become tolerant and curious enough to question our truths and pass information on, we then need to know how to effectively transport that knowledge. Such an exchange has evolved from oral testimony and, as we explored in last month's issue, inked manuscripts to YouTube Videos and digital books. Art, of course, is also a great way through which, particularly before the invention of photography, to transfer knowledge from one era to the next. Furthermore, as we explored within Andrew’s article, art has the power that many other vehicles of knowledge lack – that of emotion.

Art has an immediate visual impact; a thousand words may be conveyed to the viewer in an instant. Of course, the information and ideas within the artwork may not be as clear to understand or ascertain as it would if we were reading a piece of text or listening to someone speak. Though, it could be said that this is what makes art such a different transporter of knowledge when compared to the likes of books. Many artists, from Andrew Warhol to Holocaust survivors for instance, have believed that emotions cannot always be expressed through words. Such assertions are arguably made because art, as opposed to our other vehicles of knowledge, has the power to quickly convey not only information but the complex emotions that we all experience. In doing so, it also reminds us that we are not alone in this world. Indeed, AI may be seen to be supplanting human expressions. Yet it requires a homo sapiens (or, a Pan narran, ‘the storytelling chimpanzee, as Terry Pratchett once said), with all their thoughts, hopes and dreams, on the other end of the brush, pen, or camera, to inject true emotion into the great exchange that is art.

Open your mind and take a look back at some the artists who have featured over the past 2 years...