I was explaining to someone today about the idea that was raise in our online conversation last week, that knowledge is something that can’t be unlearned. As Stephen Downes explained, it’s similar to looking at a “Where’s Waldo” picture. Once you know where he is, you always see him. You can point to him in an instant and will be able to do so into the future.
This person at work looked at me, said “hmmmm, I’ll need to think about that, I’m not sure I agree.” Stephen’s explanation seemed completed logical to me and to many others in the class.
#cck11: Connectivism and Social Constructivism – what’s the difference? blog: Life through a Linz
Day 4: Where’s Waldo? #CCK11 blog: Profesorbaker’s Blog
(2008) Rehasing Old Tools to Look at CCK08 blog: OUseful.Info, the blog…
I’m curious to hear from anyone who perhaps didn’t agree with this statement? Please feel free to comment here:
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Unlearn knowledge is not possible, I think.
In psychogy therapists do not agree on the possibility of forgetting traumatic memories. Freud seems to say one never forgets.
Unlearn a skill is very difficult. I am playing a clarinet end the one I play now has a different fingering. It takes hours and hours to learn my fingers to play this new clarinet using the new fingering and not the old fingering.
I left a comment on Linday’s blog yesterday but it doesn’t seem to be there…oh well. I may have written this yesterday (on that comment or somewhere else) so forgive me if I am repeating myself 🙂
I don’t believe that you can unlearn knowledge (unless of course you have some sort of physical traumatic experience that effects how your brain works). Knowledge is just temporary, and as we (as a species) learn more, and develop more implements to test out physical world, our knowledge expands, and old “knowledge” gets depricated.
For example, the (western) ancients thought that the sun revolved around the earth. They observed the sun doing this with their own two eyes! How could it not be true? With more testing methods, more implements and the natural curiosity that we have, we discovered otherwise.
Kids these days don’t learn that the sun revolves around the earth. They are taught what we consider current “accurate knowledge”, but at some point they contrast it with the ancient’s views of things so that the kids know of the progression of knowledge.
Now, what happens when in my life-time something I hold as “knowledge” turns out to be inaccurate? I tend to use it less and less and you replace it with the “new knowledge”, and on occasion you’d probably joke around about the times that you thought that X was true. 🙂
You can’t unlearn something (and why would you want to? it serves as a point of reference as far as I am concerned) but you can weaken the connections it has to other pertinent knowledge areas you have.