“If thinking is bound up with action, then the task of getting an adequate grasp on the world, intellectually, depends on our doing stuff in it.”
The word “intelligence” conjures up images of books, classrooms, and serious-minded professors. But, real learning is just as likely to involve wrenches, ballet studios, and repairmen examining the parts of a bicycle.
In Shop Class as Soulcraft: an Inquiry into the Value of Work, Matthew Crawford shares his experiences and research related to the divide between thinking and doing. In this post, I’ll summarize some of his ideas and discuss their implications for independent learners. You don’t have to choose between being a “thinker” or a “do-er.” By accepting both, may find that your work is more intellectually rewarding than ever.
Are You Living an Abstract Life?
Many people now graduate from high school or even college without the ability to do anything. They get jobs as knowledge workers and their work consists of creating ideas, brands, and culture. Or, they work in a cubicle with such little responsibility that they do not need to know how to actually create anything on their own.
At home, people live apart from the things that they own. We don’t know how things work and we don’t know how to fix them. We have little connection to what we drive, wear, eat, and live in. In fact, manufacturers are beginning to create products that are harder to fix. Many cars, for example, now require foreign, specialized tools that can only be purchased by a dealer.
Unfortunately, living so abstractly makes us disconnected from the world.
Thinking and doing are meant to be united. A true intellectual is able to apply his learning to the actual world, instead of simply living in clouds of ideas and theories. The type of knowledge that results in action can’t be taught in classrooms alone. It requires people to create and to fix, to learn through practice and failure.
After graduating with a PhD in philosophy and getting a job at a highly-regarded think tank, author Matthew Crawford became frustrated with the fact that his work was so abstract. He wanted to do something. So, he quit the think tank and opened up a motorcycle repair shop. It may sound unusual for such an educated person to choose manual labor. But, Crawford found that working on a trade was, in fact, more intellectually stimulating.
Practical knowledge isn’t as easily transferred as facts and statistics. But, its results are real and tangible. [click to continue…]
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