When we have the attitude that the important things are already known, we stop learning. This know-it-all attitude seems to be going out of fashion, now, but it was once held that not to know virtually all there is to know was shameful. One had to know simply everything. Or one had to bluff one's way through. I sense a change in paradigm now.
In terms of developing one's understanding, I recommend Bataille's THE UNFINISHED SYSTEM OF NONKNOWLEDGE. He speaks in Hegelian terms of a Nietzsche agenda. One must first negate the philosophy of the decline in oneself, which is Christian morality. This is done through "sinning". After this, one negates the negation. That is, it disappears like a pebble into a pond and is no more. Perhaps it's not so much this progam of his that is interesting, but the way Bataille humanizes and relativizes the meaning of the search for knowledge. Authoritarian systems seems to lose their power under this new light. For instance, people professing absolute knowledge are resting in the complacency of their sufficiency. With this remapping of the system of knowledge, you can see they have a long way to go. They, however, think they are on the summit. I had, for instance, one troll recently proclaim that Luce Irigaray had made an 'objectively stupid statement'. It was clear this idiot had not thought through the meanings of objectivity and stupidity. Neither of these are so simple as the unexamined mind would posit. Objectivity is more closely realized in the awareness that knowledge does not and cannot get you everywhere you want to be. Nonknowledge is satiety -- although it can be premature. These are not dialectical opposites, but dialectical counterparts.
In terms of developing one's understanding, I recommend Bataille's THE UNFINISHED SYSTEM OF NONKNOWLEDGE. He speaks in Hegelian terms of a Nietzsche agenda. One must first negate the philosophy of the decline in oneself, which is Christian morality. This is done through "sinning". After this, one negates the negation. That is, it disappears like a pebble into a pond and is no more. Perhaps it's not so much this progam of his that is interesting, but the way Bataille humanizes and relativizes the meaning of the search for knowledge. Authoritarian systems seems to lose their power under this new light. For instance, people professing absolute knowledge are resting in the complacency of their sufficiency. With this remapping of the system of knowledge, you can see they have a long way to go. They, however, think they are on the summit. I had, for instance, one troll recently proclaim that Luce Irigaray had made an 'objectively stupid statement'. It was clear this idiot had not thought through the meanings of objectivity and stupidity. Neither of these are so simple as the unexamined mind would posit. Objectivity is more closely realized in the awareness that knowledge does not and cannot get you everywhere you want to be. Nonknowledge is satiety -- although it can be premature. These are not dialectical opposites, but dialectical counterparts.
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