Posted by Dianyong Chen on July 16, 19102 at 03:19:04:
Dear Sir,
Would you please review my essay. English is not my first language. In a sense, I lack the ability to judge whether essays are good, except extremely bad ones.
Thank you!
Regards!
David Chen
Philips Research East Asia
Email: david.dy.chen@philips.com
How people learn knowledge through practice is a quite complex process. Although some people learn much more from people whose views they share than from those whose views contradict theirs. This doesn't suggest that disagreement will cause stress and inhibit learning. On the contrary, some wise people learn more from people whose views contradict their own, even from their opponents and enemies.
On the one hand, it is absolutely true that we feel it is easier to accept the views that are similar to ours. People learn things that they like much faster than things that they dislike. From this point of view, if someone shares views with us, emotionally we do not repel what he teaches us. In schools, teachers who can evoke students' interest in a subject turn out to be much more successful than those who compel students to learn. A view point is not so easy for us to accept if it contradict to that of our owns. Normally we have a natural antagonism against it. We refuse further study of it.
On the other hand, it is not wise to repel the opposite ideas. We are not God, we hold wrong view points so often that we can not avoid views contradicting ours. If we are in favor of the view point that disagreement can cause stress and inhibit learning, we will become stupid in the long run.
In fact, wise persons enjoy criticism more than praise. An ancient Chinese philosopher said "Be happy with your critics!" Definitely disagreement causes stress and unhappy feeling, stupid persons may burst into fury and refuse to think more about the opponent's idea. However, most probably when we think it over, we find errors of our own ideas and learn knowledge from our opponents.
Furthermore, disputation helps to clarify truth. When we argue with those who hold controversial views with us. Truths become obvious in the end. If we are right, we know why we are correct. If we are wrong, we know what the truth is.
To sum up, we shall enjoy opposite ideas. Keep in our minds that when we come to the world, we know nothing. We learn so much not only from favorable views, but also from contradicting views. Perhaps we are not aware of it. We shall keep this good habit.