Superficial knowledge is potentially more dangerous than ignorance. It gives a false sense of security encouraging an ignorant man to persevere in his efforts that can result in huge damage.
Eraldo Banovac, energy expert and a university professor
Rote-learning helps primary schoolchildren in memorisation skills and excel in examinations, while those lacking discipline or interest have little to regurgitate.
But from secondary school onwards and particularly in tertiary institutions, students must acquire higher order thinking skills, but are evidently lacking in graduates that could not describe sensibly using their own words what they have learned.
Compiling or copying information that includes plagiarising result in superficial knowledge with little understanding and application. Real learning takes place when actively pondering over questions and discovering wrong solutions, not by spoon-feeding students with standard answers.
Since the advent of the internet where vast amount of information is available online, knowledge that are easily accessible have little commercial value. A flash drive can store information more precisely in the form of text, picture or video than any human mind and data can be transmitted effortlessly and efficiently to a global audience.
Those who learned by rote are no match to robots and artificial intelligence (AI). As an indication of what is in store, Indonesian President Joko Widodo recently ordered the removal of two of the top four tiers in government agencies and replace their roles with AI.
Telling others to think does not mean they will do so, as thinking is a skill that varies greatly and can be gauged by asking them to describe how they think or think out loud on any subject. Nothing will be said when the person’s mind goes blank.
For many Malaysians, thinking hard or rationally seems to be an excruciating exercise to be avoided and seldom practised. Hence, we have many unthinking Malaysians that allow their emotions to rule, adopting a herd mentality and seeking validation from their peers.
Our politicians are having a field day stoking emotions to gain popularity, including those in government that are busy politicking instead of governing and leading the country to progress. Many of them look like clowns, much like the current United States President, who practise ugly nationalism and is unpatriotic when his actions hurt the American people and economy.
Thanks to smartphones and laptops, we consume huge amount of information daily, mostly for entertainment or stay connected with people we like. But cursory glance at superficial knowledge give us a false sense of being well informed and knowledgeable.
To develop ourselves or our careers, we must learn deeper and be clearer, starting by learning how to learn. Sadly, this is largely absent in our education system, including personal development and the most important of all skills — interpersonal communication.
This is made worse by poor learning culture among Malaysians as very few working adults would pay a little money to attend a short training course, unlike people in many developed countries where lifelong learning is practised.
But what saddens me most are many Malaysians do not even know how to think and communicate well. They know what think is but may not know how. Only those who can will be able to say something to share their thoughts.
We can visualise pictures and scenarios, imagine our fantasies and calculate using figures. But to think, even while dreaming, we need words, and mastery of a language empowers us to think, write and read well.
Unfortunately, most Malaysians have a poor command of a language, although they can chit chat for hours. But when it comes to something more challenging, few can prepare an intelligent report or give a good account of an incident or issue.
Most people struggled when asked to describe the neighbourhood where they live or their hometown or village, or why did they apply for the job or attend a course, or what they would do if they suddenly have half a day free time, or describe who they really are apart from physical self.
Those who interpreted or described poorly is already half the battle won as they have opened a mental file in their mind and are ready to add more or be corrected. But many prefer to keep quiet even while in training, to avoid making mistakes.
To be sure of understanding something well enough, we must be able to describe it in our mind or to others. Better still, put it down in writing so that the words can be edited for better clarity. Many people are impressive while talking but their writing can be very shallow.
Finally, the best and surest way to go beyond superficial knowledge is to construct our thoughts by writing them down.
The views expressed are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the New Sarawak Tribune.
