Student 61

My first object is my antique ink quill. This is a quill I have had in my room for quite some time. The quill is supposed to be used in tandem with a bottle of ink that it can be dipped into so that you could write with it. However, I unfortunately do not own a bottle of ink because it would be quite useless due to the inventions of modern day writing utensils such as pens. The ink quill now is sitting on my desk and hasn’t been used in years.

Through the years of owning this ink quill, I have never used it to write once because I do not own a bottle of ink. I chose this object because it made me question whether something needs to have some form of utility in order to be deemed worthy to own. I thought that knowledge seems to have the same quality in that knowledge needs to have a use in life in order to be worthy to learn. I came to the conclusion that, just like the quill needs ink to write, knowledge needs a purpose in society to be viewed as worthy to be known. Someone who is considered to have knowledge is someone who can use that knowledge in their society and life.

This object relates to the prompt because it represents one of the most common implications of having knowledge as opposed to not having knowledge, and that is to be useful to some extent to society. It also highlights the thought that many have that not all knowledge is considered useful. If society does not consider the knowledge that is discovered as useful to satisfy its means then that knowledge is thought to be useless to know, and therefore, anybody could learn the knowledge but still be deemed as unknowledgeable by societal norms.

Such is the case in school where mathematics, science, history, and literature are known as “core” classes just like how ink is “core” to the quill. This is because these subjects teach knowledge that has been proven to help throughout life, and to pursue careers that further society.

Another object thought to be made by someone who was implied to have knowledge is my standing desk microphone. This microphone connects to my computer in order to transmit spoken words and sounds into data on to the computer. I have this in order to interact with my computer through sound.

This object explores the prompt in determining if someone has knowledge or not in stating if that knowledge cannot be communicated to someone else than the people who own this knowledge are implied to be unknowledgeable. This goes to show that knowledge that cannot be taught to another person are thought to be delusions causing many people who cannot communicate their knowledge to be deemed as not having knowledge, and in some extreme cases, mentally ill or unstable.

This object relates to the implications of having or not having knowledge because I realized that without the medium of the microphone, then the sounds or words I speak would not have any meaning to my computer. Just like if knowledge cannot be translated to other people then it has no bearing to anyone else besides the person who knows it, and because they are the only ones who can understand their knowledge they are implied to not have knowledge which is known to be untrue by them alone.

According to John Locke, he speaks of the knowledge we learn as something that we perceive in the world around us. That means that something that only one person could perceive is still considered knowledge to them. However, because of the strict rules of globalized, modern society, many people who have personal knowledge through their own perceptions but cannot convey said knowledge are written off as delusional and unknowledgeable.

The last object in this exhibition is my Anker coin pouch. This is a felt coin pouch that I carry around in my car for holding various pocket sized items in, not just coins. I obtained this coin pouch as a gift for Christmas along with my wallet, and it has been useful in carrying many of my personal belongings that I couldn’t be asked to put in my pockets.

This object is relevant to exploring the prompt because it represents the implication of having or not having knowledge, in that it symbolizes how knowledgeable people are thought to be knowledgeable because they gain immediate value from their knowledge. Which brings forth the idea that knowledge is only considered useful if people can immediately gain from the knowledge because due to the circumstances of this competitive, consumer based world we live in most people only gain knowledge for the sake of using it to fulfill their own goals instead of gaining knowledge for the sake of gaining it.

Obtaining this coin pouch as a gift made me realize that if I did not gain immediate value from the coin pouch then I would have most likely returned it. I realized that with knowledge as well, and that being knowledgeable means gaining immediate value from the knowledge you have.

The recent outbreak of COVID-19 serves to display this kind of knowledge seeking behavior. As people rush to gain knowledge of the virus so that they can reap the benefits of being able to be known as knowledgeable, and gain rewards of money and influence. Only after COVID-19 caused a global pandemic did people start to rush to learn as much as they can instead of learning about it when it first appeared for the sake of learning.