Knowledge is Pain: The Reality of Knowing Too Much

[chroot]

Don't listen when they tell you
"KNOWLEDGE IS POWER."
Knowledge, in the end, buys
only fear, isolation, and sadness.
Knowledge is darkness.
Knowledge is sitting alone
in the dark in your bedroom
listening to wonderful music that
you can't share with anyone because
no one you know has ever heard of it.
Knowledge is your girlfriend
telling you she doesn't want you to
meet her friends because they
probably wouldn't like you
because you're too clean cut.
Because you wear the wrong clothes.
("Who shops at Banana Republic
when they're 24 anyway?" she'll say.)
Because you don't worry about how
you're going to pay the rent next
month like everyone else.
Because they don't understand your
problems, and, try as you might,
you don't understand theirs either.
Because you won't understand how
anyone could enjoy ketamine.
Listen to me.
Knowledge is never fitting in.
Knowledge is being misunderstood.
Knowledge let's you see the future
for the darkness that it really is.
Should you ever want to understand
one more equation, or read one more
obscure novel, remind yourself that
every symbol you recognize and every
word you read separates you from
everyone else. One day you'll put
down the books and find yourself
in the middle of a party,
surrounded by drunk, high,
beautiful women
who don't like you because you
don't care what happened on their
favorite TV shows last night.
You're going to wish
to hell and back
that you could care,
but you can't, and they'll see it.
No matter how hard you try,
you'll always be different,
and they'll always see it.
One day you'll wish
you could give up
every clear thought,
every gorgeous understanding
you've won through
all that hard work.
You'll wish you could trade it all
just to be normal.
Just to fit in.
But you can't.
What's done is done.
And you'll have to live
with it
forever.

 

[Zero]

Does someone need a cherry danish?

 

[Evo]

You do write very well.

I know there are a LOT of beautiful women your age that would give anything to meet you.

One day the "right" girl will come along and the things she will love about you is the fact that you know more, have a deeper understanding and are more "grounded" than all the other losers she's met all her life.

It sounds like the people you are meeting are immature and without much common sense. Probably the "right" girl isn't associating with those jerks.

Why is it when I was younger I never found anyone like you? I only met the type of people you are writing about.

 

[motai]

Evo, most of the people that I know act like that. They don't even want to consider what I have to say and continue discussing trival things, and acting perpetually ignorant. Since poetry abound, I might as well free verse.

There are not very many people
that I know of in my daily life that I can talk to.
I remain an outsider, outcast, different.
They talk about fashion, I, about philosophy.
They speak to boyfriends/girlfriends,
while I speak to myself.
They question each other, "If a tree falls in a forest,
does it make a sound?" I give my insight to unlistening ears.
The others cast me down, my thoughts are not wanted.
Whenever I try to bring up a discussion with the others,
their dogmatic views clouds what I try to teach them.
Again, I am not wanted, and thrown aside, treated as so much rubble.

The others trifle and cliche about nothing and no one,
while I struggle to grasp the identity of the universe.
They go to school, day in and day out, learning nothing,
I am eager for more.
Everyday is a new day for them to talk to the others,
Everyday is a new day for me to listen to the world.

I realized I was not wanted, and nothing I could say could change it.
My question to them is, "If someone speaks and no one cares,
does it make a sound?"

I walk down a road most different, one of loneliness and despair.
It is a solemn road, of truth and understanding. It is far more wide than the superficial highway the others may take.

 

[Evo]

Wow Motai, you're good too!

I was the same way when I was younger. I didn't fit in. The other people my age were mostly morons. I had no interest in things they enjoyed and they had no interest in what I did.

Rats...I'm in a test that's going to time out...got to get back to it.

More later...

 

[Kerrie]

girls like diamonds warren, which you seem to be like a diamond-deep and bright inside, just keep on shining...

 

[Evo]

Motai, my daughter is your age and she goes for the "brainy" type. She thinks most of the girls in her school are brain dead, and she's right.

Those level headed, smart girls are out there, they're just rare.

Is there a philosphy club at your school? You might find other people with similar interests.

You're more mature than the others your age. You will eventually start meeting more people at your level, it will just take time.

 

[photon]

Hey, chroot, sort of neat. You ever heard Alan Parson's "Don't Let it Show"? It's one of my fav songs and kinda on your topic.
Has someone, like, rejected you for not being mindless? Weird, I get told all the time at school that I think too much...

You think the "knowledge is darkness" thing is a tad over the creepy mark?
Well, all I really have to say is if others make you feel this way, then you're just allowing yourself to be molded by their corrupt ways.
If you let the blindness of others cloud your sight, then it's a could time to start sharpening your blades.

Take from that what you will.
If anything
probably nothing [b(]
oh well

 

[recon]

I can sympathize with chroot. It's EXACTLY how I feel. Sometimes, it feels good to outsmart someone, but you regret it afterwards. When I was younger, my maths teacher popped us a question asking us to calculate the value of 1 + 2 + 3 + 4 ... + 100. I was the only one able to figure out a smart solution, and subsequently gained a place in the school's math team. Since then, hardly anyone wants to make friends with me.

It's just so damn sad. Of course, the PhysicsForums has since perked my spirits up. It is such an honour to be able to be among so many fine minds - a far cry from what I experience at school daily. My miserable existence is acerbated by the fact that I come from a tiny country of only 350,000, where most of the advice I get is to 'act your age'.

 

[Adam]

Knowledge is not power. Applied knowledge is power. Knowledge not applied is merely a hobby.

 

[meteor]

people habitually fear strange things (intelligence=strange)

 

[hypnagogue]

Knowledge and personality are two different things. A person can be smart and at the same time not be clean cut, or struggle to pay a bill, or like ketamine. Likewise a person can be the contradiction of all those things and not have much knowledge by most people's standards. Find people who match your personality and knowledge won't matter.

 

[Zero]

The good news is that as you get older, you begin to find your place in the world, and that place is higher than the losers who bother or ignore you now.

The bad news is that some people might actually like you right now, and you'll have no idea because you can't see past your own differences.

 

[Artman]

Originally posted by chroot


...who don't like you because you
don't care what happened on their
favorite TV shows last night.
You're going to wish
to hell and back
that you could care,
but you can't, and they'll see it.
No matter how hard you try,
you'll always be different,
and they'll always see it...

Good piece of writing chroot. I can particularly sympathize with the section I quoted.

Here's my own contribution buiding off chroot's well written piece:

The words of derision rising from their limited vocabularies to attack at the slightest provocation if you just try to join in the conversation, "Boring...who asked you?...Buzz off creep!"
Then they sidle over to some football player that you know to be a real creep, a cruel moron that would treat her like dirt and she would be thankful that he took the time to treat her like anything.
Inadvertantly, your eyes follow her as she walks over to the gorilla and linger there too long, only a second or two. As they talk, she points in your direction, the moron looks over and you turn quickly away, but not soon enough. He saunters over toward you, pulling his beer belly up into his chest, "What choo lookin' at, jerk?"
The obvious answer, "A talking ape," leaps to mind, but you opt for the slightly less offending, "Nothing."
"You better be lookin' at nothin'," and he turns and walks back, his beer belly, lifted to its new elevation making his pants slide down so his ill-fitting shirt untucks on one side.
Now you find comfort in knowledge. Now you realize that she will probably get pregnant after the prom, have to quit school early, he'll get a job at the local factory or pumping gas. Then one day (I think it was Jeff Foxworthy says) she'll be leaning out of a mobil home, holding a screaming baby on her hip, wearing a tanktop, pointing to the half drunk slob in the wife-beater shirt, yelling to the police, "You lock his butt up!"

You know this.
And you smile.

 

[motai]

Originally posted by Evo
Motai, my daughter is your age and she goes for the "brainy" type. She thinks most of the girls in her school are brain dead, and she's right.

Those level headed, smart girls are out there, they're just rare.

Is there a philosphy club at your school? You might find other people with similar interests.

You're more mature than the others your age. You will eventually start meeting more people at your level, it will just take time.

Sure are rare, havn't met very many of them and none display interest even after my occasional advances . There isn't a philosophy club, so I mainly just find it online. Thank goodness for the internet age.

 

[Vast]

I have to say knowledge has value.
As someone else put it knowledge when applied has power.

What is Humanity striving for? Knowledge? Isn’t it the backbone of our species? If brilliant minds throughout history didn’t contribute to the accumulation of general knowledge, there would be no progress.
Many great minds have suffered unimaginable challenges, and many have died in isolation. Yes you could say knowledge brings fear isolation, and sadness, but in contrast to what they offer the world, they’re contribution pushes the boundaries of our understanding.

 

[Monique]

Originally posted by photon
Well, all I really have to say is if others make you feel this way, then you're just allowing yourself to be molded by their corrupt ways.
If you let the blindness of others cloud your sight, then it's a could time to start sharpening your blades.

Take from that what you will.
If anything
probably nothing [b(]
oh well

Those are some very wise words, it's time to sharpen my blade :) And oh, photon? You should too, looking at your last paragraph :P

Originally posted by hypnagogue
Knowledge and personality are two different things. A person can be smart and at the same time not be clean cut, or struggle to pay a bill, or like ketamine. Likewise a person can be the contradiction of all those things and not have much knowledge by most people's standards. Find people who match your personality and knowledge won't matter.

Some more wise words.. I personally know it to be true that knowledge doesn't matter if the personality matches. Intelligence still matters though!

 

[Thallium]

Hey chroot.

I liked that poem. I wrote something myself once that is terrifyingly alike your poem. I go for the brainy guys, it's just a shame that all of them are on forums like these, miles and hills away from me.

I would be all over you Chroot, if I lived near you. (only I hope you would not try to persuade me to sleep with other partners outside the central relationship just because you wanted it and that you would break up with me if I denied to do it)

 

[chroot]

Thallium,

Thanks for the compliment. And don't worry, I'm not all bad.

- Warren

 

[Thallium]

I'm glad you liked the compliment You should have more compliments like that! It's good for your soul