Knowledge and culture are tightly interlinked. You gain knowledge from cultural experiences for example me being in a French school for most of my education and then moving to jersey has shown me different cultures first hand and up close.

As we can see from my object, French and English schooling methods are poles apart and we learn different things in different ways due to the cultures being significantly different. I am referencing school in this exhibition because it is the main way that that children and young adults acquire knowledge and is also infused with the culture it is in. I believe that culture, even outside of schools, heavily influences our way of learning. It influences our views on learning as well as our will to learn. For example if everyone around you is very laid back and not very bothered about acquiring new knowledge or learning, it is very difficult to not follow suit. In the video we see everyone grouped at the back of the class not paying attention to the teacher in any way shape or form which is how I got this argument.

This first hand experience of two cultures clearly shows me how culture can influence and change ways of acquiring knowledge in a good or bad way.

At first glance, knowledge and experience look very similar to one another. By definition, knowledge is information and skills acquired through experience or education. Similarly, experience is defined as the knowledge or skill acquired by a period of practical experience of something. Although the two words are used in each other’s definitions and are seemingly very similar, a distinction can be made between knowledge and experience. Knowledge emphasizes theory and the obtainment of information and ideas. Experience, on the other hand, stresses practice, or the application of knowledge over a prolonged period of time, in order to reinforce understanding of subject matter or a certain task. While further knowledge on a subject or task can be gained through experience, experience cannot be obtained through instruction. Experience comes with time, exposure, and practice. It is based off of practical application rather than supposition. Knowledge, on the other hand, is founded upon the accumulation of information through either experience or education. It can be taught unlike experience. Therefore, here lies the greatest difference between the two. While knowledge is the sum of impressions based off of sensation, experience is the act of exercising or challenging knowledge in order to obtain sensation. So, you gain knowledge from personal experience. Personal experience enables you to internalize the knowledge, apply the knowledge for actual performance, and customize the knowledge for you. I gained knowledge and a personal experience by watching curious George because he taught me lots of valuable life skills and lessons because he is CURIOUS! As child, I watched curious George for a long time as I had nothing else to do and it was my favourite TV show I have fond memories of watching it and brings me heaps of nostalgia every time see it. Therefore this tv show brought me knowledge about not only myself but the world around from my personal experience.

My object for this blog post is this piece of art I saw in a museum in London. It is a bunch of TVs/radios stacked to make a tower that produces static noise.

Anyway my answer to this question is yes, but it could also be no. I believe all knowledge is useful, but depending on context some is more useful than others. By this I mean for example your plane crashes in some jungle in the middle of nowhere, you’re not going to need to know about some radios stacked on top of each other, or how to make a blog post for your theory of knowledge class, you’re going to want to know how to make a fire and other kinds of survival techniques. This means that depending on the context of your life some information is more useful and therefore more important than others.

But if there is a choice more information is always better even in a situation that doesn’t suit it. Going back to my example about the plane crash if you have survival skills and also how to write a blog post, the skills that you know about technology might help you after the initial crash. If you survive long enough you might be able to use these skills to somehow find a way to communicate with the outside world to hopefully get rescued.

In conclusion, it’s best to accumulate as much knowedge as you can even if it seems futile and silly, you don’t know when you’ll need it. But I agree with the statement that some knowledge is more important than others. this does not mean only try and find the knowledge that suits you or that you think is useful, but try to get a varied and diverse intake to be able to overcome and thrive from whatever is thrown at you. Knowledge is power after all.