Much like the title says, is knowledge a good or bad thing to obtain? Where would you learn to insert your knowledge? How would you tell what you know? If you’re having any of these questions, you’re probably experiencing the democratization of knowledge. All of these questions are what runs through people’s mind when it comes to “having too much knowledge”.
So, democratization of knowledge is having knowledge available to the masses, thanks to technology. Also, creating and disseminating, or sending out knowledge, becomes easier. This knowledge that people can obtain, can either help you or hurt you. I say that to say, it is good to have a lot of knowledge, but too much could lead to more empowerment, sometimes in a bad way.
Democratization of knowledge, to me, is having too much knowledge for one person. Larry Sanger, founder of Wikipedia, said in “Who Says We Know: On The New Politics of Knowledge”, “To be able to determine society’s background knowledge–to establish what “we all know”–is an awesome sort of power.”; That power could be good, cause it shows people your smart, right? But, what if somebody uses that knowledge and turns into an evil genius?
There’s also some good that comes with the democratization of knowledge, but to an extent. For instance, if you don’t know something, and you need to look something up, you can now use the Internet to gain that certain knowledge. It’s coming to a “ if you don’t know something, look it up” type of world. Sanders also said in “Who Says We Know”, “Professionals are no longer needed for the bare purpose of the mass distribution of information and the shaping of opinion.” An example of this is, if you don’t know the specifics of something, you get on Google and look it up. Adding to the Internet, there’s also various resources to choose from within the internet. Casey Colman from the GSA blog says “Technology allows more information for more people than ever… The growth of resources available to anyone with Internet access is truly astounding.” It’s like you can get more than one person’s opinion on something. The Democratization of Knowledge But, let’s say you do look at something, and it looks good, but it doesn’t really fit with what you’re thinking, you’ll look at the internet as somewhat of a liar.
There’s some things that the “streets” or outside world can tell you, the internet can’t.
There’s something the world can teach you, that a book can’t. Schools can teach you the history from which you came, but the world could teach you that you’re just a person in the world, and you have to make your own landmark and legacy. When gaining knowledge, comes some lessons. There’s a learned lesson, and a life lesson. A learned lesson is when somebody teaches you something, like 4×4=16. Simple enough, right? A life lesson and something that you go through and what you’ve learned from it, like if you get into a car wreck, and you weren’t looking at the road. I’ll bet you’ll start paying attention to the road more than your phone when you’re in the car.
Long story short, democratization of knowledge, could help us and hurt us at the same time. It’s helpful because we can use many resources and form an opinion on something, it’s hurtful because if we seek it so much, to the point where we start inheriting falsities, and maybe what we knew, isn’t true at all. So, I feel that’s a slippery slope, you’ll just have to know what’s real and what’s not.
Ray's Little Spill 