The Sum of All Understanding?

Its quite impressive when people propose they have a handle on problems, and proposals that will hoist humanity into a better sphere. Many essentials of technology, to which we attribute the maintenance of our way of life, and reasonable expectations, were once curious, and arcane. 

One hundred and seventy years ago  Dr. Ignaz Semmelweis noted a correlation between the washing of hands by medical staff, and a reduction of the deaths of the patients. The ideas suggested that doctors themselves were causing deaths. His lectures, then and during 15 years of study and development were poorly received.

After his death, from blood poisoning in an insane asylum where he was committed following a nervous breakdown in 1865, a "germ theory" was developed, bringing Semmelweis to be recognized as a father of antiseptic practice.

Before the middle of the 19th century, oil was carried in vessels to make a weak light to illuminate the night. Then natural gas flowing in tubes, and nearly immediately electrical power causing filaments to glow in inert gasses burst forth into view in city after city and then finally the rural areas of Earth. for 100 years prior, electricity had been played with, and thought a curiosity while the whaling ships sought the precious oil allowing man to conquer night.

It is amazing, sometimes, that we get the feeling that there is a sum of all knowledge that is adequate. "Knowledge is power", certainly. It gives ability to deal with nature and our own dilemmas, that arise repeatedly from crucibles of human will and need. Knowledge also has another power. The power to delude the possessor into feeling he is sufficient. 

When Alexander and Ptolemy presided over the greatness of Egypt, the Alexandria library contained over 700,000 manuscripts. The interlocking foundation stones of western society came into the hands of Archimedes and Aristarchus, which grew for some  350-400 years, till it was burned. Then, rebuilt by Marc Antony, it survived diminished for another 200 years till Aurelius burned it, following Julius Caesar. Emperor's taking back into their own hands, the esteem of having all power.

 

How interesting that the power and identity of society consists in the sense of possessing a massive body of knowledge, but this concept increasingly promotes the sense of self adequacy. It may be that the society which entertains the concept of possessing all knowledge also minimizes the need of an individual seeking answers for his own individual life.

So a commitment to enlarging and possessing summary knowledge suits society well, but at any moment, and in any person, a particular knowledge is what will serve best. How is particular knowledge obtained? To start: by acknowledging that the needed knowledge is not ours. Strangely, an indolent dumbed down common people is not the cause of a lack of education, but the lack of desire for it. The very scary thought I have is that the sense that others have it, and it can be obtained when needed, in the 'automat' or in the common bank of stored understanding, if its worth the effort.