Chuck Klosterman wrote an entertaining discourse on popular culture called “Eating The Dinosaur,” wherein he argues that, “It is interesting to not know things.”
Why do we pursue knowledge then? Why are you on campus, reading a newspaper stuffed with information that various academic folk wish to disseminate across the minds of the Lobos?
If it is interesting to not know things, if there is value in a mystery or excitement in a conundrum, why is it so satisfying to reach the end and say, “This is what I’ve been trying to figure out!”
I’ll tell you why: Because it is fascinating to know something simply for the sake of noticing all the years that you didn’t know it. Maybe not just regretting, but feeling the contrast between the emptiness of your mind five minutes before you discovered the meaning behind “The Wizard of Oz” or a particular color that you’ve never seen before.
Why do we like to taste foods someone else invented, new flavors of soda, or new, brilliant candies? Not because we want to try this new thing — to discover what we haven’t yet had — but because we want to feel the polarity between knowing and not knowing.
This week, while you discover last-minute facts about the history of jumping rope, the invention of LSD, or exactly how many minutes you can be late to your class without the teacher noticing, keep in mind the satisfaction human minds get from discovering unknowns.
Worthington is a UNM student.
