During this vacation I started to feel a lot of pain on
throat, it felt like a pressure, something I had never experienced before. I
was immediately worried. First of all because I thought I might have vocal
nodules and second of all because I’ve had problems with my thyroid and my dad
had thyroid cancer. So I decided to get my throat checked on an ENT specialist,
who told me everything was fine with my larynx and that it might be a stomach
problem I already had that is triggering the pain. I was relieved but I still
had one more exam to go though, an ultrasound of my neck region. I wasn’t really worried, there was
close to zero chance of having any tumors or anything wrong at all with my
thyroid but when the doctor came and sat down I started to doubt my certainty.
Laying down and looking at the screen with the corner of my eye, I watched as
the doctor marked certain areas and how serious his face was. I had no idea of
what the screen was showing and that made me realize how powerful knowledge can
be. At the end he said everything was fine which made me feel very relieved.
But on my way back home, I started to reflect on what had happened. The doctor could have said things
such as, “so far, so good” throughout the exam; he knew what he was looking at,
yet he did not share the knowledge. Remaining silent gave him a lot of power,
holding back his knowledge gave him a lot of control. Also at the same time, my
lack of knowledge along with his lack of communication left me terrified.
Knowledge holds a lot of power; if I had known what those images meant, I
wouldn’t need him to tell me anything, nor would I have been worried. It really
made me reflect on how much knowing something that someone else doesn’t know
can give you an advantage over him/her, proving how knowledge is power.
Bel, I really like your response as it takes a bit different direction than mine and describes a personal experience and a realization. I makes me realize how strong language and communication is, for example if someone was to be told the words, "Your father was killed last night in a car accident". Words can contain knowledge that is so important or knowledge that is not so much, like, "lol jk". I believe this is found a lot through knowing a language we don't know as well. Not only in silence, but when relating it to language, hearing something in another language that is extremely different than our own, can be like silence to our ears. So I think there are two important points here, both relating knowledge and language. The first is that knowledge that is not communicated can be important and when someone needs to know something, it can create an element of fear or anxiety when this knowledge is not communicated. The second is about knowing and understanding a language that is unfamiliar to you, for example, not knowing medical language, or simply a foreign language while traveling has the ability to influence your feelings towards a situation quite drastically.
ReplyDeleteI agree! I also believe that the silence the doctor made really not only shows that he has a lot of knowledge, but he also has a lot of power. Knowledge by itself has way less power than actually holding important information to yourself. Knowledge may be considered as the foundation of power. If your doctor, by any chance, began to explain everything to you, his power would certainly decrease. Trust also may be included in this. Without knowing anything, you trusted what your doctor was doing. It certainly gave a lot of advantage to him, making him have full control over the situation. It was interesting that at first you weren't worried at all, because the doctor did not show any emotion whatsoever. However, when his facial expression began to change, then your reaction was different. This also shows how he had a lot of power over you. He clearly manipulated your reactions with a simple serious face.
ReplyDeleteIs knowledge power or is ignorance bliss? I understand your point of view and this is a very delicate subject, but what if you did have a tumor that was impossible to treat, you would you want to know that you had it? i mean you would certainly not have a choice, the doctor would have to tell you about something this serious so it might not work so well with this example. But we cannot really prove that knowledge is power in many other examples, one of the most "amazing" things about us humans is how we can lie to ourselves so well and so often. We can see this on the study we learned about in class that showed how smokers wanted to hear about how smoking might not be that bad for you. Not wanting to know different from what our own beliefs might be what we want sometimes, knowledge might not be so powerful and it could often destroy our beliefs.
ReplyDeleteBel, this was a great ToK moment: I'm really glad that a real life experience (even a scary one) gave you the chance to reflect on knowledge. I would like to have seen you push the last few sentences further, since that's where the ToK is. Where do you think the doctor's power came from? Why did he have it and you didn't? If he misdiagnosed you, would he still have power? What about the zone of exchange: did he share his knowledge with you--and if he did, did you get his power as well? Saying "knowledge is power" equates x and y. It would be interesting to try to nail down that relationship exactly. Are you saying that all x is all y? that some x is y? x is y but y isn't all x. Etc. Anyway, good catch spotting a reflective moment.
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