To what extent is ignorance bliss
some say that ignorance is bliss, but is this true?
In the case for ignorance is bliss i can see the idea of what you don't know can't hurt you. For example if one of your family members dies and you don't know about it then you can't get upset or angry over it
However on the other hand for ignorance isn't bliss I can also see that if you don't know about somethings, that for example will improve your life then you aren't "in bliss" because those things that you don't know about would actually make your life more blissful.
So what is the point, possibly between these stages, that ignorance is bliss
In the case for ignorance is bliss i can see the idea of what you don't know can't hurt you. For example if one of your family members dies and you don't know about it then you can't get upset or angry over it
However on the other hand for ignorance isn't bliss I can also see that if you don't know about somethings, that for example will improve your life then you aren't "in bliss" because those things that you don't know about would actually make your life more blissful.
So what is the point, possibly between these stages, that ignorance is bliss
Comments (7)
Though, the expression comes from a poem, in which it is qualified. That when ignorance is bliss, then it is folly to be wise. It isn't stated categorically.
My favourite expression (because I created it) around ignorance is "ignorance is power". You can't be defeated in an argument if you don't understand your opponent's argument. You can't be convinced of he failings of religions or of the failings of putting too much credit to religious beliefs, if you don't understand why.
Most long, drawn-out, in fact incessant dialogues on the Internet forums are between normally and customarily these two types: a theist, a religionist, who refuses to give up the apparently very false beliefs of dogma, and an atheist, who revels in driving home countless valid arguments, but to no avail, since the theist's point is to get to heaven, and that's worth eschewing the truth.
This gives an effect of ignorance to the theists in these debates, and it is power, for the theist, feigning or really not internalizing the atheist's points, doesn't have to lean toward the weight of argument at all.
We might say that knowledge is framed or sifted by ignorance. If we drown in information, we can't find the knowledge we need to improve our lives. So the information that is not there is "part" of the knowledge that's useful to us. We might think of the whiteness of a page in a book that makes the shape of letters possible.
I often reflect on how I'm forced to choose what I investigate further. I have no choice but to choose the directions in which I'm to be ignorant, since this is just another way of describing that which I choose to obtain knowledge about. To me this is a very philosophical question. What is worth knowing? Does knowledge even have any value in itself, for its own sake? We might say that wisdom is a meta-knowledge about what knowledge is worth seeking (or sharing). So we sift knowledge from information and wisdom from knowledge. But this sifted wisdom "feeds back" and affects the sifting.
Do you want to have only wanted beliefs to be blissfully ignorant (delusional), or unwanted beliefs and be knowledgable but have increased stress?
Should I be blissfully ignorant that a giant hurricane is bearing down on my home town of Miami, or should I stay informed and prepare? While everyone else is running scared from the hurricane, gas and water shortages, I'm sitting blissfully at home playing video games. Which will help me more when the hurricane actually arrives?
Would you plug in?
I think you are using the term 'bliss' incorrectly in that expression.
'Bliss' is close to 'blessedness' which means 'moral goodness', not 'subjective contentment'. Under this new definition, here is why it is true:
If a needy is at your doorstep and you can help him, then you should help him, out of duty; and you are a morally bad person if you choose not to, therefore not 'bliss'. But if you don't know that a needy is at your doorstep, then it is not your duty, because you cannot have any duty over what you don't know. Therefore ignorance is bliss.