Knowledge Pales in Comparison to Understanding
Written by John Rozewicki   
Wednesday, 06 September 2006

Search for Meaning

There are a few meanings to the word appreciative. Most of them have to do with the idea of value; either you're attaching value to something or recognizing the inherent value in something by being grateful. I find that while the word is used most often in this sense, it is not the most important meaning. The most important meaning, in my life, has been the third one listed on the Dictionary.com page for appreciative, "to be fully conscious of."

A Lack of Musical Appreciation

I had an epiphany today while sitting in class thinking about how all the musical recordings we were listening to in my audio class were starting to blend together. I was paying attention. I wasn't dozing off. I was fully engaged. We were given dates and the names of important musicians, but none of it was sinking in. The epiphany was my discovery as to why none of it was sinking in. If my professor were playing Nirvana, The Beatles, or anything I knew about, it would not have run together. I would have been able to understand. I know who Cobain and Lennon are. I know why they are important to me. I know that when I listen to their music I feel encouraged to think. The difference between how I feel when I listen to music that's important to me, and how I felt in class was really depressing. I felt badly because I knew there were musicians that worked on these songs that really cared about them, and I wasn't having any of it. The epiphany I had in that moment was the realization that I had no appreciation for what I was hearing. I heard the names of bands or individual musicians, but none of that meant anything to me as a person existing 70 years after the recording date. It was completely separate from everything I knew, and I wasn't being given the pieces to fill the gap between what I knew and what I was being told. I didn't feel a drive to know in that moment. I was already knowing the music, I was listening to it. I felt a drive to appreciate and understand. Appreciation is being fully conscious of the importance of things. I wasn't being given that in class today, and I felt it.

Knowledge is No Longer Power

Knowledge has been dethroned as the key to power. Everyone has knowledge now. It's being piped into our bedrooms 24/7 and faster than ever. Knowledge is real easy. Anyone who can use Google can find out anything they could ever want to know. Understanding all of it is the more difficult part. The power isn't simply in knowing all the facts anymore. The power is in knowing how all of them connect together, and being able to explain their significance. Those sentences there are exactly the definitions of the words, appreciation and understanding, which are the ultimate roles of education. Google can tell us every single thing doctors know, but we will always go to doctors because they have an appreciation and understanding for how all those things fit together that we cannot have without 10 years of training.

The Drive to Appreciate

This drive to appreciate is what I feel separates me from a lot of my peers. It's not that they're dumb, or they don't want to know things. It's not even that they don't care. It's just that they don't have this drive to appreciate and understand. I don't mean that they're ungrateful. I am not speaking down of my peers. There are more of them than there are of me. Whatever they are doing is almost inherently the proper way to be doing things; I am the one who doesn't fit. The attitude my peers have is very Zen. They are interested in a few things, and they have a drive to appreciate and understand those things. Outside of that, it seems like any other pieces of information are exactly equal in standing to every other piece of information that ever existed. They can know it, or not know it, as they need to know it. The internet is built for them. It creates a collective knowledge base so that they can have it when they need it. They're going to be fine.

Conclusion

One could argue that true knowledge includes understanding and appreciation, but I would argue that understanding and appreciation are more often included in the meaning of the word, wisdom.
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