Knowledge & ImaginationIssuing time:2023-10-26 13:36Source:MBS Recently, I read an article discussing Albert Einstein's viewpoint that "imagination is more important than knowledge". I think to understand this statement, it is necessary to first understand what "knowledge" is and what "imagination" is. In fact, the word 'knowledge' is a short form, and its full meaning should be 'known knowledge'. Known knowledge refers to the theories that humans currently understand and master, which are mainly used to solve human production and life issues; And things in the unknown world cannot be called "knowledge" at present, because they have not yet formed knowledge or are in the process of human thinking that forms knowledge. Einstein defined this thinking process as "imagination", therefore, imagination should be not the occasional "inspiration" that many people understand. It is a tangible ability, a thinking ability used to think about the unknown world, it is used to solve the issues of human future development. If the known knowledge that humans have understood so far is the vast ocean, then the unknown world is the vast universe. Humans need to constantly explore the unknown world in order to develop. I think Einstein's statement "imagination is more important than knowledge" stands in the dimension of human future development.
But there is actually no opposition or contradiction between imagination and knowledge, for the innovative breakthroughs in human society, they are complementary and indispensable. Imagination is not chaotic daydream, it needs to be built on a logical structure that cannot be separated from the foundation of knowledge; And knowledge also needs to rely on imagination for continuous iteration, breakthrough, and reshaping. I think the phrase 'learning without thinking leads to confusion, thinking without learning end in danger' in《The Analects of Confucius》also shows a similar meaning.
Einstein never said that knowledge is not important, without a knowledge foundation, all of his scientific achievements cannot be explained. Therefore, I think he should also be very clear about the importance of knowledge, but why would he say that imagination is more important than knowledge? In addition to the viewpoint mentioned above that he expressed this statement from the perspective of human future development, I think another point is that Einstein also realized that the mode of thinking used by imagination and the way of thinking used to learn knowledge are different, because learning all known knowledge is based on a realistic and directed way of thinking, and imagination requires a surreal multi-directional way of thinking. Galileo said that once all truth (knowledge) is discovered, they will become easy to understand, and the key matter is the process of discovering them. From this perspective, acquiring the ability to imagine is much more difficult than the process of learning knowledge, and their difficulty is not at the same level. I think Einstein was also absolutely aware of this, so he stated the above point of view.
Imagination is not innate, or more precisely, like all other abilities, strengths or weaknesses. Without scientific methods of training and cultivation, any abilities cannot become stronger. However, unfortunately, from birth to adulthood, what people receive (see, hear, learn) is training in known knowledge, The opportunities available for exercising imagination are really limited. Can anyone tell me which systematic training on imagination have received since childhood? This is because training imagination is a very difficult task. As mentioned above, all known knowledge is based on reality and orientation, and imagination cannot be seen or touched, it is a way of thinking without direction, and humans find it difficult to operate things without direction. Therefore, we need to find a simple way to operate, cultivating imagination through systematic scientific tools that are not easily rejected by the brain as a fundamental competence, because complex theoretical tools can be used for academic research, but their practicality remains to be considered. However, as mentioned above, it is necessary to cultivate this ability without limiting direction, and also have strong practicality. Therefore, the difficulty of finding such systematic tools is also enormous. And we are very grateful to Einstein for giving us a hint, saying, 'Music has given him boundless imagination'. |