I wonder sometimes if ignorance is bliss when ignorance of things brings stark raving terror to the human soul.
An ignorant who thinks a warm and fuzzy tiger is something pretty to crawl into a cage with might as much in ignorance go off chasing a tornado to their own demise.
Where is the end of bliss and the beginning of terror when ignorance ends and knowledge begins?
Lame Cherry
In such fun, I found this quote from a sailor, yes not an officer of ship, but a common sailor of merchant and whalers who gave this line which amused me, as in it his prose was as deep as his foundry of knowledge which would perplex the greatest of diploma and degree graduates to utter confusion.
"It was a lurid glare, such as may be seen playing over a cupola of Bessemer steel when the speigeleisen is added, only on such an extensive scale that its brilliancy was dulled into horror."
Frank T. Bullen. The Cruise of the Cachalot Round the World After Sperm Whales
In the above passage about a horrific storm, Sailor Bullen reveals a genius of understanding on common terms which literally changed the world, and have in them the secret of the industrial revolution.
As I have doubts you will know the words "cupola, Bessemer and speigeleisen", this is the education today to reveal what the author was seeing and what he was comparing it to.
A cupola is a vertical cylindrical furnace used in the melting of iron or casting metals. Bessemer was Sir Henry Bessemer who lived from 1813 to 1898 and invented the process of cheaply turning iron into steel by injecting air, creating a blast furnace of intense heat which would burn out carbons and impurities from iron.
Yes Bill Gates appropriating IBM technology and calling it Microsoft had a genesis in Andrew Carnegie appropriating Sir Henry's process for American invention and profit.
...and finally, the quite german word of speigeleisen is speigel iron, which is high in manganese in being pig iron, and added as a deoxidizing agent by raising the content of manganese in the process of making steel.
I frankly do marvel at the level of education of the educated in past eras, for where degrees are handed out now to lettered doctors, they are completely ignorant of information commonly bandied about by people in the 19th centuries.
One can read books by Libby Custer in her life on the American plains and find contained in them buffalo hunters who would quote Greek tragedies as such was the common education of the common people.
Self education is a necessary process. By it the greatest minds of American genius were unleashed in Benjamin Franklin, for he had little schooling as Abraham Lincoln did, as most did not, but what they had were books they read, and then a common speech pattern where people were informing each other of subjects from geology to immigration patterns.
Yes George Armstrong Custer and Richard Irving Dodge, two American military officers of the 1800's both opened their treatises on the Great Plains of America with an examination of the geology of the region as it was spoken of in common knowledge.
People used to know the intricacies of how processes worked. In this era, I doubt most reading this could explain how a diamond is cut without shattering, how the process of welding of metals takes place or how to bake a loaf of bread in a pan without it sticking.
I confine my reading when I have time to memoirs, and unless their a racial slurs abounding in them as common speech, I rarely will read them, as modern writing is filled with absolute idiocy.
The most recent book I read was of Ronald Reagan's personal letters, which taught little except in the breeding of horses. George Patton's memoir was one of the last worthwhile in the 20th century. So I confine myself to periods of history and information where the conversation was about information and not about some Vatican dogma of the Holy Roman empire, meaning I read from 1500 to 1900 and those are the works I share here.
People are such condescending one dimensional idiots now. Most have a level of education that within an hour of conversation, one can pattern them and if you have your laptop for a bathroom break, quick educate yourself about the "expertise" they are rambling on about to make fools of them
I have to go brave the elements now as after that I have to phone Mom about her day in the elements. I do like ignorant people of Reagan Blue State America, as they have existential experience in such in depth knowledge of working wisdom that is million dollar knowledge of necessity and beyond what is university related now.
Something about a well driller knowing that a propane torch end put into a metal box with the bottom out and end open, as a space heater on 20 below days fascinates me.......like the little plumbers stove which is but a sealed metal can, a platform with holes in it for oxygen and for setting your cup on it, packed with cotton and filled with alcohol making a nice little stove is just such wonderful knowledge.
"People really should know things, but how will they ever know when the people they listen to know nothing"
Lame Cherry
agtG
