{"id":26668,"date":"2020-09-07T23:05:32","date_gmt":"2020-09-08T06:05:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dminlgp\/?p=26668"},"modified":"2020-09-07T23:05:32","modified_gmt":"2020-09-08T06:05:32","slug":"accumulation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/accumulation\/","title":{"rendered":"Accumulation"},"content":{"rendered":"

The room is large with high vaulted ceilings and windows that stretch to unimaginable heights.\u00a0 The flames of the torches hanging in their wall sconces bounce off of the walls, casting dancing shadows across the endless shelves of books of and scrolls.\u00a0 Each section is ordered and labeled properly: Preserved scrolls of the great philosophers, tomes that contain the wisdom of wise men and women passed down through the ages, the great classics that have served as the foundation of society, and the latest issue of Marvel\u2019s Avengers <\/em>to name a few.<\/p>\n

\"Old<\/p>\n

They say that knowledge is power. \u00a0There is always one more thing to know, one more blind spot to cover.\u00a0 If I can learn just one more thing, maybe that will be enough.\u00a0 It will protect me.\u00a0 My books are precious to me; my knowledge invaluable.\u00a0 I pause and run my finger down the spine one of my tomes that says we treat our knowledge as \u201cpersonal property to be collected and defended.\u00a0 It is an ornament that allows us to rise in the pecking order.\u00a0 We take what we know quite seriously.\u201d<\/a>[1]\u00a0 The author is right, but it doesn\u2019t hurt to know.\u00a0 Does it?<\/p>\n

My quest has led me to accumulate all that I want in this pursuit.\u00a0 There are moments where I\u2019m content as I sit at my desk reading and thinking aloud, my own voice echoing back to me through the chamber, confirming for me what I already know.\u00a0 I would consider myself an Expert.\u00a0 No one criticizes my knowledge or what I think I know because my knowledge is bulletproof.\u00a0 Not that they could anyway, for what to they <\/em>know?\u00a0 Surely nothing close to my own knowledge.<\/p>\n

I climb the spiral staircase into the lofts.\u00a0 The chamber is quiet apart from the echoes of my own footsteps.\u00a0 People used to come to me for wisdom on my Subject, saying that as well-read as I am I must <\/em>have the answer.\u00a0 And why wouldn\u2019t I?\u00a0 They don\u2019t come anymore, but that\u2019s their problem.\u00a0 I can\u2019t help it that they don\u2019t understand my brilliance.\u00a0 Besides, it\u2019s also my own choice.\u00a0 The world is becoming more and more complicated and I would shudder to utter those damnable words: \u201cI don\u2019t know.\u201d\u00a0 The thought makes me sick, causes bile to rise in the back of my throat.\u00a0 Knowledge has cemented my power, my station, my livelihood.\u00a0 My knowledge must remain unquestioned.<\/p>\n

I know what I know and what I know is that no one can take me to task if I don\u2019t allow them to ask.\u00a0 And so I reside in my ivory tower, inundated by my own knowledge.<\/p>\n

I sit in the armchair nestled in the corner.\u00a0 It\u2019s been years since I locked the door to my tower.\u00a0 I see no need to leave and no need for anyone to come in.\u00a0 The curtains are drawn to block anyone from looking in, but it also blocks me from looking out.\u00a0 Outside of my tower, there is so much uncertainty and so much that is unknown to me.\u00a0 You never know what tomorrow is going to bring unless you cultivate what tomorrow will look like.\u00a0 Nothing new means consistency, comfort, that nothing will challenge you past what you already know.<\/p>\n

Yet the comfort is becoming increasingly unsettling.\u00a0 A discontentment with where I am is slowly building in my heart.\u00a0Outside the window I can hear life going on as the world continues to change.\u00a0 But I like my tower.\u00a0 I love my knowledge.\u00a0 If those are taken away, if those things are challenged, where does it leave me?<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t\u2013\u201d Catching myself, I push the thought away, immediately grabbing the weathered copy of Homer\u2019s Odyssey on the table.\u00a0 This I know.\u00a0 This I\u2019ve read more times than I can count.\u00a0 It\u2019s a familiar story \u2013 one that\u2019s been retold countless times.\u00a0 There are no surprises here.\u00a0 I open the book and my eyes fall on the page, yet my heart wanders. \u00a0I close the book and put it down, frowning as the sound of cheers erupts outside my window.\u00a0 I gaze at the curtain and my heart begins to race.<\/p>\n

What is happening outside of these walls?<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

<\/a>[1] Nassim Taleb, The Black Swan<\/em> (New York: Random House, 2007) quoted in Steve D\u2019Souza and Diana Renner\u2019s Not Knowing <\/em>(London: LID Publishing Ltd, 2014), 32.<\/p>\n

Image taken from: https:\/\/bluesyemre.com\/old-library-handelingenkamer-the-hague-netherlands\/<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The room is large with high vaulted ceilings and windows that stretch to unimaginable heights.\u00a0 The flames of the torches hanging in their wall sconces bounce off of the walls, casting dancing shadows across the endless shelves of books of and scrolls.\u00a0 Each section is ordered and labeled properly: Preserved scrolls of the great philosophers, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":129,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[555],"tags":[1871,816,1868],"class_list":["post-26668","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-drama","tag-accumulation","tag-knowledge","tag-not-knowing","cohort-lgp10"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26668","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/129"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=26668"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26668\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":26672,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26668\/revisions\/26672"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26668"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26668"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26668"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}