True knowledge does not exist.

Our schooling system tries to give children the knowledge that we feel that they will need in order to contribute when they grow up. One of the problems with this concept (besides the reliance on the idea that everything that we will ever need to know is known now) is that true knowledge does not exist. You can find theoretical flaws in just about everything that the schools share.

Take a look at history. We insist that history is important because we learn from the past. What happened in the past? Does anyone really know? History is heavily skewed by the people who recorded history (winners of wars) and those who write the text. I always found it interesting that the schools are always demanding updated textbooks. History won’t change. The words might.

The interpretations of someone writing about American history because he is fascinated with the country will turn to various sources to piece together information. The text of these interpretation could be cited by future historians. Many of the sources used will be written by similar pro-America historians well after events took place, and their sources will likely be from the American perspective of historical events. Each generation of history textbook will be less accurate than the last. Historical facts are completely unreliable. We don’t know what really happened because the facts that are presented to us are heavily influenced by what historians want history to be.

Being told something is insufficient to make it true. Simply reading text or listening to a lecture shouldn’t be nearly enough to convince us beyond a doubt that anything is true. Going one step further, there is always a theoretical possibility that anything that you believe to be true could actually be wrong. While some of these things could require a great deal of creativity to question, the inability to find any theoretical flaw could be viewed as a mental deficiency on your part. This is a big part of the reason that I value thought above knowledge.