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Mon 13 Mar, 2006 07:34 am
I don't understand
There is a great difference between knowing and understanding. Everyone can answer "yes" when asked if they know music. Of course, ?'all god's chilin' know music. We receive answers that go on forever when we ask a teenager if they know music. We awaken instant and sentimental memories when we ask an older person to tell what they know about music. A great deal of emotion is contained in our ?'knowing' about music.
Silence and puzzlement is our response when we ask a person "do you understand music?" Occasionally the question "do you understand music?" receives an expression of delight and a verbal outpouring. The person who understands music--they are few and far between--has studied music in a way very few of us have. I suspect such a person is not only a lover but also a student of music. I do not understand music but I do understand the meaning of "understanding music".
I create this musical metaphor for the purpose of illuminating a state of affairs of which we are seldom conscious.
Our formal educational system teaches us the knowledge required for making a living. Our formal education does not teach us the understanding required to live well. The development of understanding is something each of us must create on our own. If we do not recognize this fact we will not pursue this understanding and if we do not pursue this understanding we will remain intellectually naive.
We start our formal education experience as intellectually naïve children and end it twelve to eighteen years later as well informed intellectually naïve grown ups.
After formal education ends our understanding begins. The task of understanding is a private enterprise by me and for me. Understanding begins with this recognition and continues as one creates a process for the solitary activity of self-learning. I think a person could look at self-learning as a hobby, it could be one of your hobbies like tennis or golf, just a few hours each week and I suspect after a while it will become a very important part of your life style. Developing a sophisticated intellect is a solitary study lasting a lifetime.
Carl Sagan is quoted as having written; "Understanding is a kind of ecstasy."
The difference between what we know and what we understand is
the difference between what we sense and what we perceive.
For my part, I understood the "language" of music before I could speak. It is something that you can not express in words. Very fluid, ever changing, and unto a world of its own. The closest analogy to understanding music is likened to the ability so speak in metaphor, in the sense of verbal expression. Very strange.
music is art and you "understand" it if it resonates within you. You don't need to understand the mechanics of it to understand it, and you don't need to be educated or bright. It's a gift to all of us from the most educated and intelligent to the lowest of human creatures. Even animals respond to music.
We have little comprehension of ?'understanding' because our schooling has taught us only to know. Understanding is a step beyond knowing and our society which values production and consumption has little use for understanding. Those who make public policy do not want a population that cares about understanding. The bull that understands will hook at the Matador rather than the cape.
Understanding is generally not valuable in our society and so we have little comprehension of what it is. However there seems to be one application for understanding. I have on several occasions heard a professor say that "you never really understand a subject until you try to teach it". Here is one occasion that people can begin to comprehend the meaning of the concept. I suspect we all have a sense of what the professor is saying. So here is a ?'use' for understanding and in this example we who only value that which is ?'useful' can begin to gain a comprehension of the concept.
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