The question of whether ignorance is bliss or the truth will set you free is a difficult one to answer. Although countless films have debated it, frequently they conclude with the viewer being able to clearly see both sides of the argument. That being said, the truth seems to always be the best option. In what we have seen so far the main character goes through learning some truth, often after a hard journey of acceptance, but sometimes also faced with a journey to be accepted. The truth was often hard to truly accept, but benefited the main characters in some way. The truth is able to bring you knowledge and can lead to power, valuable knowledge comes from knowing the truth, and one can find their true purpose once learning their truth.
People
…show more content…
Often, valuable knowledge is learned when you find the truth. In Allegory of the cave by Plato the escaped prisoner came out of the cave with just shadows to see the real world. This was obviously a big deal to find out the truth about his entire life being essentially a lie and pretty hard to accept but, we can presume that the outside world was a whole lot more beautiful than inside a cave with just shadows as your world. One thing that comes from finding out the truth is that you have more of a freedom to make your own choices. When you are in the ignorant world you just go through the motions and follow what you have been taught your whole life but when you accept the truth you are able to make your own decisions and educate …show more content…
An example of this is in Oedipus, one could argue that if Oedipus did not know his prophecy he would have never gone to Thebes and killed his father or married his mother but in reality if Oedipus knew his prophecy he could have just not killed or married anyone for a little bit in case it was his parents. Although Oedipus didn’t, since he knew his prophecy he could have easily just not killed or married anyone in case they were his parents, so the truth could have helped him. Another example of Ignorance being bliss is contentedness. In all the pieces we read so far (Oedipus Rex, The Matrix, and Allegory of the cave) one could argue that the main characters were all perfectly happy before finding the truth, they lived their lives perfectly fine without knowing the truth even if it wasn’t in the “real” world. Although they were able to happily live in the ignorance, the truth was always more beautiful or better in some way and knowing the truth can set you
As seen in the novel Night and Fahrenheit 451 , ignorance can perpetuate the destruction of a society by not listening to the warnings of others and therefore not looking at another viewpoint of an idea. This occurs early in the text, when Moishe reappears in the town and warns his fellow Jews of the Germans. However, they disregard these claims, and would rather focus on the pleasures they have in life: “He told me what had happened to him… they were forced to dig trenches. When they were done their work, the men from the Gestapo began theirs. Without passion or haste, they shot their prisoners, who were forced to approach the trench one by one and offer their necks...How had he, Moishe the Beadle, been able to escape? By a miracle. He was wounded in the leg and left for dead…but people not only refused to believe his tales, they refused to listen.” (Wiesel 7). As seen in this quote Moishe was giving his fellow Jews a warning about the Germans and they refused to listen to him about it. This ignorance caused them later in the book to become victims of the Holocaust. This subclaim can also be supported by Ray Bradbury’s novel Fah...
Socrates once said, “The unexamined life is not worth living.” He questioned the very nature of why things were the way they were, while never settling for simple, mundane answers. Socrates would rather die searching for the truth than live accepting what he considered a blatant lie. I like to think of myself the same way. I too would rather examine the wonders of life rather than accept what I am just told. The truth is some can’t handle the truth. I on the other hand welcome it with earnest anticipation and fervent enthusiasm.
The way a person is taught from a young age often times affects his or her values and perceptions throughout their life. A person is taught how to think and what to think about but is rarely given the choice of how to perceive this information. This can be seen in Plato 's “Allegory of the Cave,” “Learning to Read and Write,” by Frederick Douglass and the speech, “This is Water” by David Wallace. Each of the three pieces talks about characters being born into enslavement either hypothetically or literally. Being born into enslavement resulted in each of them to seek for freedom in different ways. Only knowing one way to see and think due to the environment arises self-centered thoughts by the protagonist.
Knowledge helps people make conclusions, lets them be skillful, smart, and keeps them aware. People gather knowledge through experience, whether it's from school, mistakes, witnessing a situation, or trying new activities out. Including in “Fahrenheit 451”, the author, Ray Bradbury does an amazing job in explaining and describing to his audience of how society results in a setting without reasonable amounts of knowledge. People in the society of “Fahrenheit 451” begin to lose common sense after the books are prohibited to keep. In the novel 451 Ray Bradbury warns the audience that without knowledge people are manipulated easily. In reality knowledge is the key to surviving.
The phrase, “ignorance is bliss,” points toward the fact that sometimes not having knowledge about something is frightening, but it can sometimes be better than knowing and stressing about it. The definition of “Bliss” means supreme happiness; utter joy or contentment, and it is explored in, "Anthem," ignorance does not always ensure a person to bliss. In, "Anthem," the people of Equality’s society are often scared and depressed. They do not know why they aren’t allowed to love who they want to love, why they can’t do the jobs they want to do, and why they aren’t allowed to ask questions. Everyone in this society has been raised ignorant of their government’s form of corruption; their subjugation of individuals. These people fail to realize this, and their lives are miserable because of it.
Our knowledge is a key to our success and happiness in our life to give us personal satisfaction. Knowledge is power but not always. Sometimes our self-awareness and growth as an individual gives us negative thoughts that make us want to go back to undo it. Everyone wants to unlearn a part in our life that brought us pain and problems. Good or bad experiences brought by true wisdom can be used for our self-acceptance, self-fulfillment and these experiences would make us stronger as we walk to the road of our so called “life”, but Douglas’s and my experience about knowledge confirmed his belief that “Knowledge is a curse”. Both of us felt frustrated and sad from learning knowledge.
In conclusion, in Naguib Mafouz’s Fountain and Tomb, we are faced with a central theme of Truth. It can be reasoned that most of the time the Truth (or knowledge) isn’t always something that it is necessary to know. The Truth can bring about happiness, prosperity, or a positive affect, but that seems to happen much less frequently. Sometimes being ignorant of the Truth is better because it makes lives easier and happier. People don’t necessarily need to know everything (the whole Truth), because what they don’t know can’t really hurt them. Truth comes with excess baggage, and it sometimes leads to conflict, hurt feelings, alienation, or broken hearts. As the old saying goes, “Ignorance is bliss.” Fountain and Tomb does an excellent job of illustrating that cliche.
Pretend that you are class president. One day, you and your best friend since kindergarten have a huge fight, so as revenge, he releases one of your deepest, darkest secrets out into the world. The secret passes on all around and soon the whole school knows. Now it is too late to try and fix this because dark secrets are hard to forget. Ultimately, this causes all your peers to look at you in a different and bad way resulting in your reputation being ruined. You probably won’t be voted for class president ever again. This situation proves that “What you don’t know can’t hurt you,” is not always true and can do the exact opposite and cause destruction. William Golding’s The Lord of the Flies shows that ignorance can become a vicious monster and destroy. This can also be seen in many other novels, such as Ray Bradbury’s Farenheit 451 and in everyday life. Golding and Bradbury also provide characters that show knowledge, at times, is a good thing.
Throughout the history of mankind there have been numerous cases in which people were victims of oppression or hate. Among these cases the sole reasoning behind this oppression or hate being based on the perception of others. History has shown that society is responsible for labeling groups of people, generally these labels are misleading.
Many people believe that ignorance is bliss. There is a mentality that exists, where the truths are better off unknown and another where the truth is ignored completely. This is certainly true in William Shakespeare’s Hamlet and Sophocles’’ Oedipus. Jocasta and Gertrude both choose to ignore reality, and therefore blind themselves from the truth before them. As a result of her intentional ignorance, Jocasta severely damages her relationship with Oedipus and her reputation, whereas Gertrude’s ignorance merely causes mild, repairable damage to her relationship with her son and her reputation. Therefore, Jocasta’s contentment in her ignorance inevitably results in a far more tragic ending, than that of Gertrude.
In today’s society many technological advances have contributed to advanced communication. While these are advantageous and can improve communication across the globe, they have become a hindrance to critical thinking. With the advancement of technology throughout the world human beings are able to think less while still “functioning.” Literacy is thrown to the wayside and texting “lingo” runs rampant. Why read a book when you can watch the movie? Students are becoming less interested in language, reading, and writing and more involved with surfing the web for answers. This shift in the value of literacy opens the world up to many dangers that if not confronted and demolished could lead to a society unable to think for themselves.
Not only does ignorance have a negative impact on people, it is also “the root and stem of all evil” (Plato), which can destroy a person. To start off, self-superiority can cloud a person’s judgment; making it evident that intelligence can easily be lost to arrogance. To add on, anger and the human tendency to make rash decisions can also contribute to ignorance, resulting in eventual downfall. Lastly, unconscious attempts to blind yourself from the truth can result in the committing of major sins. Tragedy occurs in “Oedipus the King” when ignorance causes disastrous events, proving that lack of knowledge can result in their misfortune.
Kim Harrison once said, “Knowledge is Power. Ignorance is Bliss. But curiosity—even if it had killed the cat—is king.” It is one’s natural curiosity that leads them to make inquiries and investigate certain issues until they are satisfied with their research and the answers they have found. Nevertheless, common idioms such as, “Ignorance is bliss” and “Some things are better left unsaid” will conquer this natural curiosity when faced with controversial issues that directly contradict one’s beliefs and upbringing. When presented with these uncomfortable choices, one must decide whether to acknowledge different perspectives despite possible consequences or remain uneducated in hopes of maintaining the status quo.
The lesson in the Allegory of the Cave was you must be enlightened to understand
.... From it we learn not to lose sight of the facts and some of the things we do most of the time come because of our society, “they are only culture products.” It also teaches us to keep an open mind, not everything that unknown to us we most immediately reject it. We should see things through an open mind and not let our feelings and what we have been taught by our culture get in the way of finding the truth. Religion is different in many cultures but we should be open to what others religion is, it might be different but if we don’t take a minute to actually try to understand their way than we are making a mistake. We have to have an open mind because without an open mind we will not see beyond what we already know or think we know. I like one of Rachels sentence and its true what he says, “Then we may be more open to discovering the truth, whatever that might be.”