What is something that you thought to be true but later learned was not?
(go beyond Santa Claus... link it to an AOK or personal experience)
skip to main |
skip to sidebar
PHS IB TOK at Play!
The purpose of this blog is to open a discussion forum for ideas, ramblings, debates, and random thoughts that pass through the heads of the students presently in Poudre High School's Theory of Knowledge Program.
PHS IB TOK at Play!
Post Conversation Threads and Ideas from PHS
Community Agreement
As you post and comment as a member of this classroom blogging community, consider the following...
1. Read for Understanding
1. Read for Understanding
2. Challenge Ideas, not People
3. Use TOK Skills to Justify Arguments
3. Use TOK Skills to Justify Arguments
4. Expect the same from your peers
5. Show what you "Know"
5. Show what you "Know"
Links
Labels
- african american (1)
- Arcadia (3)
- Art (4)
- black (1)
- Blog (4)
- Crash (5)
- ethical standards (7)
- ethics (4)
- Faith or Intuition (1)
- first family (1)
- Justificaton (3)
- Language (6)
- Logic (1)
- Media (3)
- obama (1)
- Perception (3)
- Photography (2)
- Politics (3)
- Psychology (1)
- Sensory perception (2)
- Slang (2)
- Symbols (1)
- Technology (1)
- TOK (1)
- Truth (3)
- Truth Fallacies (1)
- War (1)
93 comments:
I think that the "truth" that we have learned throughout all of our lives is continually being broken. Back in first grade they told us that Columbus sailed in 1492 and that he was a good guy but as you get older you learn that not everything is the way it was first portrayed and perhaps columbus isn't all he's cracked up to be...
Something that I thought was true as a little kid was that every city in the world was just like Ft. Collins (I guess this would fit under social or cultural AOK). I thought that everyone had a nice house, at least one car, indoor plumbing, and a grocery store no further than one mile away from home. Sadly, I eventually found out that there are a lot of people in the world who don't have any of these things that we take for granted.
Something that I believed to be true but later realized was not was that people wouldn't purposely lie or decieve others. Through experience, I learned that this wasn't true at a fairly young age.
I wrote the second post.
-Katie C.
I wrote the third post- Katie A
When I was little, I had my small bubble of childhood innocence. I believed that life was fair, and in turn, those who worked hard would be rewarded, and the slackers would be punished severely. The same goes for all those who lied and told the truth. Now, as time passed, I learned, (the hard way), that life is nothing like that. Perhaps the single moment that showed me that was an event that happened in Middle School. One of my friends decided it would be funny to slam my face into an open locker door. Now for those of us who know lockers doors, on the inside there is a small sharp edge where the locker meets the door. As you can imagine, that is where my face hit. Now, like any sensible person, I reported it. There was a small meeting where we discussed what happened, and my friend lied so they wouldn't get in trouble. They got off the hook, and I was portrayed poorly in front of the principal from then on. I have always felt that it was extremely unfair for that to have happened, and since that moment, I learned exactly how painful the shattering of innocence is.
I've always thought that money is very evil, kind of like marx that capital is a sin and such. i never liked the power symbol of Benjamin’s and washingtons but now, i relized how stupid that idea is, its not that i am greedy for $ but more like i relize the rules of life and money is just a way for people to exchange goods and stuff and now i really have no objections to stuff like this.
the stuff with money is by TC (tsizzinc)
Don't forget to tell us who you are if you are using another person's account to comment...
Great comments so far but I'd love to see you go deeper and explain many of the things that you are scratching the surface on.
Something that I thought to be true, but ended up being false was that I thought I would remain like a kid my entire life. I remember thinking when I was little why adults were the way they are and why they didn’t have the same sense of humor that I did. Now I realize that because of the experiences that I have had growing up and the new challenges and responsibilities that I now face, my personality has changed to a great extent. I no longer find trivial things to be absolutely hilarious as I did when I was five years old and my priorities in life have completely changed. Because of these events and my development throughout life, I have realized that it is impossible to retain my childhood personality while still being able to function in today’s society.
Elliot Ross
Just a question for the comment made about not purposely lie or decieve someone. what happens when you are trying to hide the truth from someone? Would you consider that to be decieving someone in a sense? I almost feel that some people will do this on purpose and it may just be because they don't want to hurt someone's feelings but i don't believe that statement is true all the time. Just wondering what you thought about that.
Erin Q.
When I was like eight or nine my family was on vacation through Texas. When we were near the border they had the sign that warns that there may be illegal aliens crossing. You have probably seen the sign. Its a dimond shape and has a family holding hands and running. Well so my older brother Graham told me that it was about real aliens (we had been in Roswell the night before and had been making alien jokes for days). He is seven years older than me and has been a source of authority knowledge for as long as I can remember so I believed him. I was 15 when I saw the sign again and someone mentioned it being illegal alien crossing and I finally figured out that he had been kidding with me. My whole family thought I knew it was a joke, but I trusted him explicitly and ended up believing something wrong. It shows that even the most trusted and knowledgeable sources can give wrong information
that last comment was by Caitlin Anderson
When I was younger, I used to think that the U.S. government was the best. I wrote letters to President Clinton, asking him about his daily life and the domestic animals he kept in his house, like his cat, Socks. After I sent these letters, I would check the mailbox every afternoon after school to see if I had gotten a reply from the wonderful ruler of our country. I never got a reply, ever. It was the neglection of me and my very important letters that led me to lose faith that the president was the greatest man in the world, and that the government does everything right. Of course the notion that the president of the United States is not the best man in the world, and it is also true that everything our government does may not be the best thing for everyone.
-Maris Antolin
When I was little, I had this dream that a little ways up the mountain where I live was a cave with treasure in it (I think I had just watched Treasure Island). I managed to convince myself and my older brother that it was true, and we ran away to go find the treasure. We made it to the end of the street before our parents caught up to us. That is the only time I have ever been grounded... I think that when you are a little kid, your reality is distorted. Up the mountain looked so far away that it could have been a different country. Kids are so strong willed, and their worlds are so little that they want to believe ridiculous ideas like a cave full of treasure. What else do they have but their dreams? This leads, then, to the disappointment of growing up and realizing that there is no cave (just think, I could retire before working a day if it were true). Enlightenment is valued because is brings a person to a greater understanding of the surroundings, but it can be a bummer too. Maybe the cost of enlightenment is losing the ability to believe in dreams.
Sorry, but Annie P. said the above.
Something that I thought was true but ended up being false was when, as a child, I realized that times do change and everyone gros up at point or another. The realization that I would,years from now, be an adult and have the same responsibilities that my parents have, shattered my perspective of the reality that I would not be a child forever.
Mandie
Well, when i was little i thought that my parents knew everything, think that is pretty common for every child to feel that way but that is truely truely!~!!! so then when i was in 5th grade and my dad told my the wrong spelling for a word i realized that everyone has flaws.
Kelly R. :)
In response to Erin's comment... I think that when you are hiding the truth from someone it's not always for the best reason, but it can be. Of course I won't tell one of my friends that their favortie shirt is really not that great if it does more damage then good. I mean if it would help them, then of course I would tell them but I don't think the truth should be exposed if its not a big deal and it hurts more then it helps... But I don't think hiding the truth is decieving someone if it is done from the bottom of their heart. If someone hides the truth from their friend in order to protect them if their intentions are good then I don't think its deciving them... yea out of time sorry its so disorganiazed...
One thing that I thought to be true but later learned was not, was the whole ordeal with Iraq having weapons of mass destruction. At the time, I was honestly paranoid and a little freaked out about the whole ordeal because the government and the media were hyping up the situation and played off of the emotions and morals of the United States by claiming that there were ties to Terrorism in the Iraqi gov't. Needless to say, I don't really have a whole lot of faith in our government.
Truth is the ability to learn something objectively and if it is properly justified, then taken subjectively and made into a personal belief. Truth is always being "proven" wrong. All of the justifications for truth sound right, but how do we know? we don't. What if everything we ever knew as truth is proven wrong? I know you cant prove anything, but how do you get past the fact that every bit of knowledge that we attain could be wrong? The truth is, that we have no idea... or is it? Does it scare anyone that we might be completely wrong about everything. How can we base our lives off of a false hope, a false belief, a false truth, and a false life?
~Janessa (period 7)
One of the times I had the proverbial rug pulled from beneath my feet was once when my sister and I rode our bikes to the mailbox and picked up the mail for our parents. When we were coming back, we got sidetracked by some friends and talked to them for a little bit, and didn't think anything of it. We were young, and our parents knew we were coming home, right? Wrong. When we got back, my mom was sobbing hysterically and thought somebody had kidnapped us, and had really freaked out. That was when I realized that my mom isn't the pillar of strength that I thought she was, that she's only human, and it is possible for her to be broken. That time really scared me, and still makes me kind of sad to this day...
~Clem
When I was much younger, I had friends that grew up believing different things than what I was raised to believe. Their strong religious beliefs in some way convinced me that to fit in, I had to "encounter" the same faith. Because of their influence, I thought that their opinions were the truth. I eventually grew up, and grew out of those friends and their impressionistic ideas. I realized that my personal faith shouldnt be influenced by those of the people aroudnd me, no matter how left out I feel.
-Adrienne Craig (period 7)
When I was younger I thought that my dad knew everything about math (he is an engineer) as he was always able to help me with any math problem. One day I had a math problem and my dad couldn't help me. He tried and tried but couldn't get the answer. I knew that my dad didn't know everything but I didn't know that he couldn't always do the math I was doing. That day jolted me back to reality, and made me think to ask my older sister for help too.
Might as well admit to it now, I am pretty gullible. I trust people implicitly unless they give me a reason not to do so, (however this reason can be completly arbitrary). Last Christmas, I went to a friends birthday party (even though I had one of those bad feelings). Or at least I thought them to be a friend. I had trusted them and when they made a choice that was pretty inappropriate, I realized that people cant be trusted just because they seem nice and friendly.
Of course, I had always heard that people like Ted Bundy were incredibly charming and sweet-seeming when in fact they were psychotic. However, to have this happen personally really changed my perspective about who I can trust based on intuition.
At a young age I came across a fact in a book that people in other countries think in their native languages . Although it was entirely logical, it shocked me; as a young child born and raised speaking English, that people thought in other languages. With the little Spanish I knew I tried to imagine thinking in it. The truth in this case was hard; I was welcome to new ideas, yet because this one was so different than all I had known, it made it literally, very foreign to me.
posted by kate neff.
Another thing I had believed (up until freshman year) was that it was illegal to not go to college. I'm not sure where I had gotten this belief (it may have been my mother), but I seriously didnt know that you didnt HAVE to attend a college.
(sorry this is so short, but were running out of time, and it was something that maybe someone can relate to right around now)
There are not many definite truths in the World that we live in. Many young children believe things with all their heart that turn out to be entirely wrong. For example, when I was younger I was taught all about how great America and its government are (from authority figures such as teachers). I looked up to the teachers because I thought of them as all knowing people and that I knew nothing. Once I grew up I took more international courses and learned to think for myself. I know no longer believe that America is that great and I have VERY little faith in the American government and political system. I think that when someone is a child "truths" and believes get forced on them by society and since they have not developed their own "truths" and opinions it is hard to distinguish what is actually true. I believe truth can be represented in many different ways. Each person has different things that are truthful to them and not to others. There are very little universal truths.
I used to believe that Pluto was a planet, but recently I had an epiphany that it was in fact not.
Clarification: AOK is, obviously, language. It is language that has dictated Pluto's nature, and thus it is through language that I personally believe in it's non-planet status.
This is more something I didn't think was true, but whatever. When I was little (when I lived in Germany) I didn't think it was true that people were racist. It sounds absurdly ignorant, but my family wasn't at all racist, and I was never racist, and I never encountered racism. With where I was there were multiple ethnicities around and I have quite a mixed ethnic background, so I never really thought that people would actually discriminate against people based on race or religion or whatever. Then I moved to Kentucky, and it's not the most...unprejudiced place ever. I was shocked by how much race mattered to some of the people there, and since I was so little I would catch myself picking up some of those things and thinking somewhat racist thought and I'd be like "whoa, what's happening? This isn't what I believe about these people" It was definitely an interesting experience, and definitely a reality shock that came when I was...4. For AOK that would be social discrimination I guess, but it's also a personal experience so yeah. That's what I thought wasn't true and found out it was.
And Dani-the thing about it being illegal to not go to college, I totally thought that too. I think it's just because we grow up with people telling us to go to college so we can do what we want to do, that unless you know someone who doesn't go to college, it doesn't really seem like an option, it's just something that people do, and to not do that seems positively insane.
Because I'm feeling controversial, I think that it is unfair to rule out Santa Claus from this conversation. For me, the prospect of 'Santa's coming soon' was huge. I made an effort to improve my behavior the closer we got to Christmas every year. I didn't really listen to the kids who claimed he didn't exist until more and more started saying it and I started doubting myself. Accepting that Santa Claus is not real is comparable to the first man that left the Cave and having to learn to accept that his reality wasn't real... That there was more behind it. NOt only is it really difficult to accept, but once one begins to do so, at least for me, worlds turn upside down and one begins to doubt everything. Understanding that Santa doesn't exist opens up the world of questions as to why he was made up in the first place. If you add the religious origin of Christmas, one can explore whether or not he adds to or retracts from original purpose of Christmas, both as a religous holiday and the celebration of giving to our loved ones. Does his selective giving presents to 'good' kids really instill the values of what 'good' is when those whose parents are fortunate will more than likely put presents under the tree whether or not the child is 'good'? What defines 'good' anyways? Does it teach those who are in poverty and whose parents cannot affort presents for the Christmas that they are not worth his attention year after year? Could it not be suggested that when a child realizes that his parents have lied to him for the past 8 or 9 years of his life begin to doubt their trustability at an earlier age than those who never heard the tall tale? Acknowledging Santa's lack of existence opens up a world of new questions about whether or not teaching young children that he does is beneficial. It shakes up a child's reality as he comes out of the cave into the sunlight of growing up.
Just like many other kids out there I had to go through my parents getting divorced. I was young and all I was told was that ‘they didn’t get along anymore’, a typical answer. I accepted that the issue was simple and that they just didn’t love each other anymore, and I thought that the whole thing truly was as uncomplicated as they led me to believe. Now that I am older I have had the chance to examine my own relationship with each of my parents and their relationship to each other and I see how far from the truth my belief was. Being able to see beyond the blocks my parents created to shield my innocence I now have more of the truth. It is kind of like in Allegory of a Cave. What I saw/knew was a reality, but it wasn’t the entire reality and as I grew up I was able to move from seeing shadows on the wall to seeing the bright glare of the sun.
I used to believe that everyone would complete high school and four years of college before starting their job. It was really very idealistic. My parents, as authority figures, instilled in me the desire to complete higher education by telling me that everyone else did. I never thought that lower-income individuals might not have completed a college education. The discovery of the truth was not really a destroyal of trust but more like a revealing shock. It gave me perspective on the world - not its faults but its reality.
As a young child, I underestimated the knowledge of others, in particular adults. While some children of that vulnerable age believe that the whole world is just the same as their family, I thought just the opposite. I judged the knowledge of adults around me by the information that they conveyed to me, which, due to the fact that I was only four, was very oversimplified and patronizing. As such, I came to the conclusion that all adults were idiots, and even worried from time to time that my own faculties would degrade with time.
I suppose now you're waiting for some quirky anecdote about how I realized that I was wrong. Trust me, when it happens, I'll tell you.
Alina, you're amazing.
And what I find really interesting in you rant Nupers, is not really pertaining to anything you said, but merely to the fact that I never believed in Santa Claus. I've celebrated Christmas as a family tradition every year, but my parents never told me that there was a Santa Claus that came to give me presents. I knew that it was my parents. And so it's always been strange and invigorating for me to hear other's stories about Santa beliefs. But on to further points, as I do believe Santa is a valid point of conversation...
You could actually go way way back to when the main religion of Europe switched from a more paganistic regime to Christianity. It is the theory of some that Christmas is actually a cloaking of the pagan holiday of Yule, or winter solstice. As such, Halloween is a cloaking of Samhain, and Easter is a cloaking of Ostara. For what purpose? To convince people to convert to Christianity. NOw, can we really tell if Christianity had those holidays in its origins or if it created them as a means to gain power; not so much. It's a "he said, she said" type of thing. But I think it's a rather interesting point.
Like Katrina, when I was little, I had a really hard time fathoming racism. Granted, I lived in Lincoln, Nebraska, and was not really exposed to a ton of different ethnicities. Maybe because of that, I never realy considered racial background as a basis for discrimination or judgement. It was maybe something that made you intersesting, sort of exotic, but didn't have anything to do with level of intelligence or quality of character. I sincerely thought that issues of equality had been solved by Martin Luther King, and was shocked to learn that racism still exists. That was a huge wakeup call for fifth-grade me.
One thing that I thought to be true, but instead turned out to be..well...not true was people being Christian. It amazed me that people outside of my private, Christian school were in fact not Christian. Granted that I grew up as the grandson of a preacher, and that religion was all around me as a kid, I think that you might understand the shock that I had when I moved out here to Colorado, and seeing that people were not Christian, and that if you try to press Christianity onto them, that they'll just end up hating you (that got me no friends in 7th-9th grade). But, anyways...back to my comment...when I found out about not everybody being a Christian, that's when I started to question if God really did exist or not. My perception on religion changed dramatically when I moved out here. I haven't found out if God existing is a lie yet, but I'll tell you when I die.
I thought that I knew a guy pretty well. Our family has been friends with his family since before I can remember and the eight of us would always go boating or skiing together. He seemed like a really nice, responsible guy with good judgment. Currently, he’s sitting is a prison cell because he was arrested for charges of rape. Now, I have no idea what to think.
Before going to Jr. High, I really had no concept of how diverse the world was. In elementary school, I was very sheltered, and more or less knew one demographic of people, and they were all pretty much just like me. In Jr. High, there were so so many more kids than I was every used to being around (my 6th grade class had like, 6 or 7 people in it) and so many of them were way different than what I was used to. I had thought before that people of other ethinicities or people in different financial situations than mine were rare, but they turned out to be everywhere. This was a huge shock to me.
Something that I thought to be true but later learned was not was when I learned that not everyone can be trusted. Unfortunately, I cannot remember a specific event of my trust being broken when I was a child, but through experience I received a revelation. I was shocked when I experienced a person saying that they could help me with a problem and then didn’t fulfill my expectations. Not only did I lose trust in this person, but my ability to trust people in general was further destroyed. In the end, it’s hard to trust people when you first meet them, but overtime the relationship can become a trusting one (unless they break your trust and you have to start the relationship all over again).
Ok something that i swear everyone will laugh at me sooner or later about.
I actually did believe that ghosts were real. During my childhood, my friend showed me books about ghosts and zombies and monsters basically and he also had those photos with "Ghost captures" and stuff. Sure they really looked fake but it scared me alot and i actually believed in it for some time.
So... yeah... thats one thing i actually did believe in when i was little.
Something I used to believe was true was that my family would always be there; I refused to accept death, when I was little. I didn't like to think about it (I still don't), but I came to accept that fact through many experiences over the past 5 years. I thought my parents would always be there, strong, for me. Now, as they age (and they are older than most parents to begin with) I came to realize that they won't always be there, and that instead of them being there for me, I am there for them. I can't pinpoint it to a specific event, but it was a gradual change that I have now come to accept, even though I rather not think about it because I don't want to accept that my truth is now false.
A belief that I used to believe in was that people always remembered the embarassing things that I did around them. I used to think that people would recall every little thing that I thought was mortifying whenever they saw me. I used to justify this belief primarily through consensus. When I asked others if they ever felt like I did, they obviously said that they did, because it's human nature, as I found out later, that people will think that everyone remembers every mortifying thing about them. Later on, I realized, with the help of one of my really good friends, that I shouldn't live in the past and always think about my embarassing experiences but should move on.
In elementary school, I thought and said that I was only good at math because it was the one class on the block system at Kruse, so it was the one class I could skip ahead in. Now, I have better reasons why I like math over other subjects, such as the lack of uncertainty and authority in math.
I used to think I was actually good at math. Then, in 05, I went the Math Olympiad Program in Lincoln, Nebraska, with the top 50 or so high school math students, and I really found out what "good at math" means. I tried to keep up, but I quickly realized how flimsy my arguments were. They had this team competition where you had to present proofs in front of a panel of judges, and when my proof I had come up with was slightly incomplete, they basically tore it to pieces, and all I had to go on was my intuition, which wasn't enough to revive my ideas. Graciously, they awarded me a 2 (out of 7) for what I had thought beforehand was a full proof. Afterwards, I talked with one of the IMO team members, Thomas Mildorf, who was on the opposing team, and he explained to me how his team had proved that problem, and how I had skipped most of the proof with hand-waiving. That really opened my eyes to how little my intuition serves me, and how difficult true math really is.
About college...
Didn't you guys ever play the Game of Life? College was one choice, and Career was another.
I used to firmly believe that there was only one right answer to every problem or scenario however in high school I have found at this this isn't always the case. Take President Bush for example; while everyone is quick to point out the negatives of the war they look directly over all of the positives. Do any of us who are 17 years old in Fort Collins, Colorado really have enough experience in the field to make a reasonable opinion based on the subject or do some of us just take the easy route and oppose the war because its the easy and popular thing to do. Yes, many parts of the campaign in Iraq have gone horribly wrong, but haven't we removed a dictator that massacred hundreds of thousands of people and who was a threat to our national security. I'd call that a success. This is just an example that has proven to me that more than one person can be right on a subject because good arguments can be made for and against the Iraqi War. My knowledge on this subject comes from experience, because I have talked to soldiers who have returned from Iraq.
I've never even heard of Game of Life...
And Rick, while I see your point, I don't think we can just say that none of us have had enough experience because we're 17 years old and in Fort Collins, Colorado. I think some people have done enough research and a few of us may have some sort of experience that would allow us to come to some sort of sensible conclusion. I'm sure some people do just take the easy way out and oppose it because that's what a good number of people are doing. But with some of us it's also morals, that we should try any alternative to violence before turning to violence. But I can see your point, I just thought I'd offer that idea.
Something I believed when I was younger is that everybody is honest. I thought everybody always told the truth no matter what. When I was playing a board game with my sister, I was shocked when I discovered she was cheating. I could not understand how someone could do that and I went to my dad crying. Obviously I have matured since then and realize that everybody lies at one point or another. But it still hurts when people lie because of greed or selfishness.
The first time I saw the show Criss Angel Mind Freak I totally bought the act that he does about how he can do his stunts because of an extremely powerful mind. My brother then went on to explain how he knew that everything that he was doing was a set up and that all of it could be found out how he does it. I was skeptical until my brother showed me a DVD starring Criss Angel himself showing how he does his most famous stunts. It was a big loss from the truth. Overall I question stuff more because when I had immediately put faith in what I was being told- that this was because of his mind power- I was mistaken.
-Graham P
You know Graham, I choose to ignore people saying Criss Angel's stunts are set up. I mean, inherently I know they are, but I choose to pretend that they aren't set up and that they're real, because it makes them look all that much cooler. And I think it's fun to have something of that sort to believe in.
And nevertheless, whatever he may make up on MindFreak, he's still a freaking amazing composer. He's got some of his music on his website, and it's very muchly lovely.
Just a scary feling that i have just begun to realize, is the fact that the decisions we are making right now, wlll effect our lives forever. It is scary and before i was happy in my ignorance. But now that i realize the truth, i have learned to make b=good decisions (most of the time...)
I had a period of discontent involving my Catholic faith last year. I attended a Catholic elementary school, and my family and I go to church every week. I have grown up with the faith, believing it was right, never really questioning it. However, last year, I suddenly had reason to no longer totally accept everything the Catholic Church dictates. I now view my religion no longer as a absolute truth, but as a piece of belief that I can bend to my own personal values.
I also agree with Wyatt's comment. Every action, every situation we are placed in leads us to the next step. Everything we do means something, somehow.
Perhaps one of the "truths" I believed in was that I could easily get through school easily, that it was just a happy ride that I would get through with ease. Most likely this reality was based on the trivialized display of junior high and high school that I had read in youth books or possibly the feel-good shows on television. I guess it was just the fact that I didn't actually go to a high school or junior high and see what it was like as a kid; I was well-adapted to my spot as a youth who didn't have a need for such things or was distracted by other things. And of course, it's obvious that it's not as easy as I had "witnessed", but it's significantly tougher and I wonder now what younger kids believe as well. Live and learn, I suppose.
When I was about 8 years old, I had a few recurring dreams, but one of them happened so often, that I began to confuse the dream with reality. It was a dream that I could fly. It was something that I didn't think about much when I was awake, so when I was asleep, I would think it was real since I had no reason to belive it was not. I was sure that I could truly fly. The dream stopped, and about 4 or 5 years later I remembered it, and I finally realized that I couldn't fly. It was strange.
I agree with what Wyatts said about how he used to be happy living in his childhood innocence. I believe that one of the most difficult things about growing up is facing the reality of an adult world. As children, our most difficult tasks may be waking the dog or practicing the piano. However, as we grow older we learn that life is much more complicated, and we are forced to take on numerous responsibilities and let go of our past beliefs, no matter how much we long to cling on to them.
One thing that I believed in as a little kid was the weatherman said about the weather. I would listen to what they would say and dress accordingly, but then two hours later the weather would be the total opposite of what they said. It goes back to what Rebecca and others have said about having trust in a person and then having that trust broken and they disappoint you whenever they don't live up to your expectations and as authorities they fail
A lot of what we declare as "truth" are issues or concepts that we do not even give a second thought about. Therefore when we actually take a closer look at the concept we realize it was not true all along. I have always thought that there was more than 1 ocean. From my childhood I was taught the names of these oceans and logically figured that because of the seperate names, there are different oceans. Well last year, yes it took me this long to realize, when I started to do Ocean Bowl, one of the first sentences in a textbook was that there was one ocean, the "World Ocean." Seeing this, I quickly justified this statement, and oddly enough, through the same way I justified the concept of several oceans, through logic. As I never before gave the idea of several oceans another thought, never bothered to notice that the oceans are in fact connected, I accepted the false "truth" that there were indeed several oceans. Therefore I believe that if we take a closer look and learn to question what we believe as "true" (yay tok) we will find many more of these situations where we find out that what we think is true is actually not.
The truth? I can't handle the truth!
Let's see, a truth... Well, I used to think that closet was spelled with an "n" so that it was "closent". It's not really Earth-shattering, but I made me feel stupid for having spelled it that way until I was 15. I mean, hearing something wrong as you are young really makes your future unbelievable, I know I didn't believe the true spelling at first. Hey I got an idea! Let's continue this on to the "Allegory of the Cave" post!
I used to have this belief that all people involved in justice, such as police officers, were 100% good people. I had such an idealized view on everything, in fact. I wanted everything to be perfect, so I believed it was. As I got older, I realized that officers and fire men are human just like everyone else. While of course there are good people in the justice system, there are still bad ones too. I now know that not everyone is perfect and the world is not ideal. I'm not sure exactly how this "epiphany" came about, but sure enough, I began to realize no one is invincible or perfect.
One truth that I always believed was that there actually was such a thing as the truth. But the longer I live the more I see that there's no such thing as absolute truth. Even the things that we want to be true, like "people care more about personality" or "everyone is ultimately good underneath it all" are untrue. (with the second example, I'm not saying that people are bad underneath it all, I don't really think there's any predisposition towards either good or evil.)
So basically to summarize there is no truth. Much of what we hope to be true simply isn't, and neither is what we believe to be true.
Now we'll do something in class that'll completely prove me wrong...
Something that I always thought was true was that you can measure the quality of something by time. For example, that you can measure the worth of a friendship by time or how well you know a person or subject or anything. I would justify this by experience because it is easy to be proven wrong when you make assumptions :)
I used to be very gullible when I was young (I still am for the most part), so I always believed what people told me, no matter how ridiculous it sounded. Whever I would tell these things I heard to my parents, I always told them with such certainty. When I found out I was wrong, I felt so embarrassed and stupid.
This still happens today, especially in math. I believe that my answer for the problem is right, and when I learn that it is wrong and why it is wrong, I always tell myself "Why didn't I think of THAT?"
Although these are very simple examples and not life changing, the reaction is the same. When we learn we are wrong, we are sometimes a bit surprised and feel a bit embarrassed for believing in something false.
Rick Andrews
Can I just say Michael, that you are amazing at putting everything in perspective.
Moving on though, I think there is one absolute truth: That the world is always changing. Nothing on earth is completely stagnant, there will always be evolution and movement.
As a child, I was a huge dinosaur fan. Watched all the Jurassic Park movies, memorized the names of all the Cretaceous Era dinosaurs. But I also believed the Velociraptor was featherless. But now, looking through the pages of Scientific American, I discovered that the Velociraptor had feathers which was discovered through the use of so-called "cold, hard evidence". That totally makes the Velociraptor exponentially less cool, seeing that my childhood favorite killing machine was in fact a large bird. *sigh*
my questioning of truth is basically the same as many others above. i used to believe that everything that was told to me was a truth. i believed what my parents, teachers, and friends told me was true. buuuuuuuuuuut it turns out a lot of people can and will be wrong and that was a shocker. this is proven most definitely through experience.
When I was little I believed that my sister was the coolest person. I also thought that she could do no wrong and would never do anything mean to me. So she got me to do some crazy things. I finally figured out that she is not perfect and yes she is a typical older sister and did pick on me. I figured this out when she locked me in a closet and also when she would lock me out of the house for the two hours before my parents would get home on school nights. Don’t get me wrong I love my sister and she is great but she is no angel. Just to let you all know my sister gave me permission to talk about this it is no family secret.
For a very long time, I thought it was true that when earth worms were cut in half, both pieces would grow into two different worms. I justified this with consensus and authority. My grandfather and many of my friends told me it was true. Since then, people with greater authority, in biology, have told me otherwise.
truth...for a long time, i was lead to believe that kissing and other such activities would lead to something horrible, because every time a movie had scenes like that my mother would either cover the movie or cover my eyes. I don't really know what i thought of it: i probably just thought that kissing and such was disturbing to look at, like watching someone's head get cut off. Obviously, i have learned otherwise.
One thing I thought was true and later learned was not was when I was in elementary school and junior high, I thought that high school was going to be terrible and really clique-y and basically like how it is in Mean Girls. When I got to Poudre in 9th grade, however, I learned that in IB, we are all so segregated from the 'normal' people and for the most part, we don't experience extreme cliques. I'm not saying we don't have cliques, because we do, but it's not as extreme and terrible as I predicted before coming here.
Thanks Emily. Your comment made me smile.
I suppose something that I always thought is that my parents knew everything. But I'm finding now that as I learn and form my own opinions, I disagree with them sometimes. And I realize that they don't know everything.
When I was younger I thought that my family was invincible since no one I knew had died. Pathetic as this sounds, I felt that my family was lucky and that I would be protected from death for the rest of my life. When I was 9 or 10, my cat Pumpkin died, giving me the first bitter taste of death. It is then that I came to the harsh realization that death is unavoidable and sadly, natural. I began taking things for granted when I learned the consequences of living carefree.
As a young kid, I think that every little piece of information you come across becomes true. At that age, what else is there that you know in your small universe that might lead to a contradiction.
Anyway, this is probably how, as a kid of 9, I got the notion that all High School kids were bad. The information seemed so overwhelming, every horror story, tv sitcom, magazine article, and various car crashes told me that high school kids were bad kids.
Empirical, authority, and general agreement by adults were my justifications. High school kids were drunk, overconfident, snobbish, high-risk takers, always looking for trouble, and getting into fights. Thus, I dreaded the day when I would one-day become one of these unruly "punks" that would disobey my parents. Gasp! I even, remember crying at the very thought that I was approaching this awful stage in my life.
Well, it turned out as I got older that this was not the case. The turning point probably occurred when I made the connection that my older cousins, who were just exiting high school, weren't getting into trouble and causing a ruckus like I had been led to believe. Of course, there are some high school kids who exhibit these traits, but they aren't the majority as I had believed when I was kid.
Right, so Wolf, I believe, mentioned that Pluto is now no longer a planet. So, I guess I blieved that it was a planet, but then that truth was "proved wrong," and now Pluto is a dwarf planet. Funny thing, though: I still choose to believe that Pluto is in fact a planet. I mean, its title still has planet in the name. It's just a really small planet. I guess that's my challenge of authority. I was told something wasn't true, I was goven the evidence, and I still choose to believe that thing. What's that called? Maybe it doesn't have an official name.
When I was at a young elementary school age my parents always told me that I was the smartest kid in the world. Like parents should, they supported me at this young tender age but my mind really did believe what they were saying. It was not till later on that i realized that, i was not the smartest kid in the world. Its interesting because I was so convinced of my parents authoritarian knowledge, that it was not till I was old enough to learn to questions such knowledge that I fully understood the lack of fact in the claim.
From the beginning of school until about an hour and a half ago, I believed that writing on the TOK blog would be much easier than raising my hand and talking in class.
When my TOK teacher told us that some people who don’t talk in class do really well on the blog, I (quite naively) hoped that I would be like one of those people. I then assumed was that it was also easy for these people to post. And voila, I decided it would be easier for me to type on this blog than talk in class.
Unfortunately for me, it is harder! I realize now that the posts are essentially “permanent” and anyone can later come and look at any of them, which is intimidating.
Now two minutes later, I realize that I shouldn’t get so stressed about posting on these blogs, because I have time to think about my posts (versus having to come up with them on the spot). I have just come in a complete circle from where I started out, demonstrating the unreliability of our thinking.
I guess this is kind of a strange example, but oh well =D
Because of my brothers' strong opinions on music, I honestly used to think that there was such a thing as "god" and "bad" music, and that I was "wrong" for listening to the music that I listen to. This is simply because of my brothers' strong opinions on music, and it got me to think that since they felt so strongly about disliking modern music, and if I wanted to be as "cool" as them, then I'd better realize that modern hip hop is junk and that I need to listen to "good" music. I now realize that art is always up to interpretation and opinion, and I may agree on some of those things or disagree on them, but their opinion isn't truth, it's belief, and the fact that I used to think that their belief is the "right" belief was something I later learned was not true.
I used to believe that all people had a motive behind their actions. I figured that there was no point in following through with an action if there was no reason for doing so. I realized that this is not necessarily true and actions (large or small) take place daily that have no motive or basis of rationale.
I used to believe that in life, I must strive for excellence in every aspect of..well.. everything. I now realize that I have no possible way of doing this. I have realized through personal experience that I should stick to one or two parts of my life and just work on them. My life has too many things going on right now, and I am glad I can rationalize this.
I was having a lot of difficulty thinking of one particular epiphany actually, but your entry inspired me GRIFFIN!
I used to be (well, occasionally still am) a very COMPETITIVE and JEALOUS person. Like Griffin, I felt that I had to be the BEST at everything I pursued and if I couldn't be, then I would GIVE UP on that aspect of my life and try so hard to make up for it by being exceptionally BETTER at something else.
It has taken ALL of my high school career and will probably continue to take the rest of my life to come to terms with mySELF and the extent of my OWN ABILITIES. I occasionally still tear myself down over my FAILURES and LOSSES to other "competitors," but what I have slowly begun to realize and accept is that life is not a COMPETITION. If it were, the biggest reward would be at the END of the race, but in this life, there is no trophy presented to you at your funeral. Your MEMORIES, your effects on OTHERS, and the LOVE you give and receive are far more PRECIOUS than any gilded statue the material world could ever offer.
Something that I believed was true was that nothing would happen to my family. I guess its not just a belief but its like you never think that something could actually happen... But now, unfortunately through experience when my uncle died, I have found out that this is not true.
I grew up in an almost completely Republican family, always taught that right-wing was good and left-wing bad. I really had no idea about the actual politics involved, I was merely accepting what I was being told by my parents and others around me. Finally, my sister began to lean toward the leftist side, and began to show me other points of view. While I would still not call myself completely liberal, it was a very interesting change that I went through and the experience was not as easy as it would seem. Especially at the beginning, I found myself looking for excuses not to change my opinion and maintain my previous views. Eventually, both my parents also became more moderate, and we can now discuss politics fairly openly and with no real agenda.
When I was younger I used to believe that the socioeconomic status of everyone in the world was similar to what I saw in my own city growing up. I was unaware that there were people in other third-world countries starving while I ate dinner. I always thought that everyone had an equal opportunity to be whatever they aspired to be. I spent the first six years of my life in St. Louis so I was aware that not everyone was as fortunate as me, but I was unaware of the extremes of it. I can't put a certain point in which I learned that there were people starving in other countries, but the knowledge of it still makes me feel fortunate for the opportunities I have had during my life.
when I was younger up until the past few years I used to think that since the US prides itself on being one of the wealthiest nations in the world, that we would never face or even have the poverty problems that occur in other countries, and that if any type of disaster were to hit our country, it would be taken care of quickly. In the past few years however I have found this to be false based on logic, authority, and I dont want to say experience because its not something that I have personally experience, but I've educated myself about these types of problems. One example would be Katrina, where two years later there are still no levees, and thousands of people, specifically in the lower ninth ward of New Orleans are still in need of more help than most can imagine. So I learned that our country isnt always helping out the people of this country and that we do face many of the problems we read about from other countries.
As a child, I believed that I could move the clouds with my thoughts. I would stand in my backyards for hours with my arms outstretched to the sky, pushing the clouds over the sun, and then away from the sun, and then over it again. I guess this is a prime example of how children often think that they are the center of the universe. As a person ages, his or her life seems to become less and less significant, because childhood imagination and individuality slowly diminish with time.
I used to believe that whenever someone left an unwrapped, fresh piece of gum behind they were trying to poison me. This belief came out of an experience when there was an entire packet of unopened, banana-flavored Wrigley's packet someone had dropped in the street, and believe me, to a three year old it was gold (and not just because of the color). Just as I was about to pop the first flagrant, sweet, succulent, juicy piece into the waiting abyss that was my mouth, my mother shattered my dream by knocking the piece away. She then proceeded to tell me that if there was really nothing wrong with the gum, then someone would not have left it behind, and therefore, since someone did leave it behind, the gum most be poisoned. Alas, my young brain could not wrap itself around my mother's logic and so I accepted her authority until several years later.
For the longest time I believed that if you spit into a pond of goldfish, they would eat your spit. My friend told me when I was four and there was a goldfish pond behind my house. I never had any reason to think otherwise, until I moved, and just figured it out.
I used to think that everywhere in the world was the same. That no matter where I'd go, the boy my exact same age would live the exact same life. As I grew I realized that hardly anything is ever similar between different places. That reality blew me away at first, at how things could be so different. But it's that variety that creates such a great world.
WEll for me it was just recently when i found out that Columbus did a lot more to the natives then just "befriend" them. He gained their trust and then mercilessly killed and used them. This was an eye opener. I read it in a history reading we read. It is very long but very interesting.
( this it the reading) http://www.historyisaweapon.org/defcon1/zinncol1.html
Like many of us, I've always been amazed when I've found out the "true" stories behind the lives of our "American Heroes". Columbus, Lincoln, Washington; I'm just amazed at how many sordid details have been skipped over in order to promote their "greatness".
When I was young, I think around 4 or 5, my best friend was Winnie the Pooh. I was not Sara then, I was Christopher Robin. My love of Pooh evolved into a truth for me. I WAS Christopher Robin, and Pooh was missing! I would cry after scouring the house for hours to find my missing invisible Pooh, going on adventures and questioning my parents franticly. I can't remember what ended that period of my life, and I wonder about our own personal truths and why we leave them behind.
Post a Comment