Ignorance is Not Bliss

They say that ignorance is bliss that not being aware of the world events is great. Looking
at the world today with terrorism plaguing the world, nations threaten world war, disease
spreading, the impoverished only grow as the worlds wealth remains in the hands of the few,
that it begs the question of why should we live with awareness. Why live in a world where odds
are we will never succeed, when we can remain ignorant. We can simply silence the outside
world by deliberating closing our eyes and choosing not to acknowledge its existence. That way
we can live happy, hopeful of the future. However, I completely disagree. I believe firmly in
Socrates age old statement that The unexamined life is not worth living (Plato 30). It is the
examined life that allows us to look in retrospect and review out past. It is what allows us our
sense of curiosity as we admire the world. Ultimately, it is the examined life that has advanced
society and can advance us further.
The phrase in retrospect refers to looking back as ones life their decisions and choices
and contemplating on them. They say that we learn from our mistakes and looking in retrospect
is the simplest way of recognizing potential mistakes. We then do not commit the same mistake.
While we may not have the correct answer, we did discover an incorrect answer. This is how we
grow as a person. This is how we learn what is right and what is wrong. Without this method of
learning from mistakes we are unable to develop. The unexamined life is a life where there is no
retrospect, in a sense neither past nor future. There is only the present as a person does not look
back at what they did. They do not question what happened and whether or not they made the
correct choice. Without this evaluation of our past choices, we are unable to make new decisions.
All we would know is the choices we made previously. Without this knowledge how can we
have a future? A future is based on the possibility of tomorrow and the uncertainties it contains.

How can we have a future when we make the same choices every time? All that life would be the
endless continuation of the present. We would be unable to grow as a person and thus remain the
same from birth until death.
The examined life plays the greatest role in the development of children particularly their
curiosity. As we grow and are able to look and examine the world, we wonder about everything.
Why is the sky blue? We are only able to ask these questions because we examine the unfamiliar
scenario we grow up in. Curiosity is a key in the advancement of humanity. Without curiosity we
would never question anything. We would blindly follow people and consider them true leaders
despite the fact they could be fanatics and completely insane. Curiosity is directly linked to
technology. For example take the automobile. Looking at the technology before automobiles, we
had trains which carried people long distance and carriages for short trips. A good carriage
though is not an easy thing to come by. First you would need a newly made carriage with wood
and metal. Second you would need a good two to four horses to pull that carriage of yours and
lastly someone capable of leading and directing the horses. The problem was carriages were too
related to a horse. A horse has to eat; drink, sleep and can get injured. Hence someone thought
what if we had no horses, that the carriage powered itself. Look at us now, cars clogging up the
freeways and the horses left their namesake with horsepower. If we all followed the
unexamined life curiosity would be discouraged and technology would never advance.
Technology leads in turn to society. Society today is a result of centuries of examining
life. We were determined and are still determined to improve life. We have medical care,
transportation, education, housing, a stable food supply etc. All of these are the results of us
wanting to improve our lives. We want to live longer and fuller lives. Todays society has been
molded by those who lived the examined life. Our predecessors determining what could be done

to improve our life. For example, diseases were rampant across the world for centuries, from the
Black Death to the Spanish Flu killing millions upon millions of people. Our predecessors in
wishing to stop plagues created the concept of vaccines and thus could prevent a majority of
these deaths. Had no one come to the conclusion that such a thing was possible, disease would
have continued to plague the world in greater strength than now. The unexamined life would
have only maintained the status quo. Society would have continued to follow the ideals and
traditions of the earliest societies where the modern concepts of science were nonexistent. Our
understanding of the world would be solely spiritual or religious with us never being able to truly
understand the world we live on.
In conclusion I agree with Socrates. Society has what we take for granted now only due
to those before us examining their lives and wondering how to improve them. This examination
came out of their natural curiosity, as we attempted to understand this world we came into and
how to better use the resources around us. This examination came out of their ability to look in
retrospect at the past, rooting out the incorrect processes and searching for the correct answers to
situations. These ideas have continued to be passed down through the generations, despite
various groups having tried to influence society to a more unexamined life. We are makes society
now. As our predecessors before us, it is our job to use these ideas to continuing leading society
through the examined life. The examined life is what we can use to end the world conflicts. If
everyone on this planet had their ignorance removed, and could examine life, I believe that the
world would be led to peace. Radical groups such as ISIS would never exist, as no one would
blindly follow ideologies. The world governments would be able to work together and find
solutions to solve poverty and hunger. The masses would be better informed, capable of better

electing and deciding politicians and their politics. In all, the world would be better and it would
be all thanks to Socrates.