교양 없으면 안 되는 이유 [ft. 영화평론가가 역사 얘기해도 되는 이유]

0:00 We're currently covering topics related to general knowledge through this channel, and every time we do, we inevitably get comments like, "Why are film critics only talking about movies and in such strange places?" To determine the authenticity of the content itself, we don't judge the content itself, but rather examine the group the critic belongs to. Whether it's gender, class, region, or age, I think what's important in general knowledge isn't who said it, but what they said and how they said it. In a way, I think it's a bit of an intellectual distinction. It's not that they don't know because they're from the humanities or the sciences, but because they lack sufficient general knowledge. BTV Lee Dong-jin's Pike. Hello, I'm Lee Dong-jin. Today, we're going to talk about general knowledge.

0:48 What general knowledge is, its boundaries, and the issues surrounding writing. I think it's important to discuss these things. Feel free to ask me any related questions, and I'll listen to them and freely answer my thoughts. General knowledge is a system of knowledge that has been proven to be useful and valuable over time, forming an intersection among various types of knowledge. Now, when we talk about culture, some people will say that it is culture and others will say that it is not, but we can't clearly draw a line between them. In some cases, when someone says, "That person is trimming at a meal and talking so rudely," the word culture can also be used as a word for manners. There must be a lot of knowledge in the world, but where does this knowledge fit in the overall knowledge system? This

1:34 knowledge is useful knowledge, and this knowledge is the basis for distinguishing between false knowledge and such, such as the spirit or the power of thought. I think culture is the concept that combines all of these things. I don't think so at all. I think culture is essential. I said that culture isn't just about specific knowledge, but rather knowing the roots, system, or context of that knowledge. If you think about it, the ability to think and the power of thought itself are culture. If you don't cultivate culture, the windows through which you view the world or the context through which you view it will be very narrow. In some cases, ignorance itself can become a sin. There can be sins that I commit due to ignorance. The cases are a bit different, but within the affinity for Greece, this

2:20 Oedipus has a very noble aspect to him. He took responsibility for his sins, which he committed without knowing. He had a relationship with his mother and killed his father while he was still unknowingly in the womb. After it was all known, he did n't deny it and instead took responsibility for it for the rest of his life. From that perspective, he could be considered a moral hero. But in modern society, isn't it true that even something you did without knowing is a crime? Not only that, but if you do n't have proper education, you can develop prejudices about the outside world and others because of that lack of education. And that ignorance can lead to countless errors or even crimes. Education isn't simply a matter of choice. It's a

3:11 matter of scope. If you think about digging, you need to first dig broadly to dig deep. Expertise is now very important, and education is about breadth. Without breadth, depth is impossible. Breadth is essential, and depth is selective and thoughtful. Even without that expertise, you can easily achieve anything. There may be people who are living well, but on the other hand, it's impossible to have only expertise without breadth. This is because even if I have expertise in a certain field, there are countless specializations in the world, and there are certain relationships between these specializations. Most of the problems we encounter arise at the intersections between many different specializations. If you only have specialized knowledge in a certain field, it's

3:56 easy for others to misuse it and abuse it. Imagine you have some kind of vast intellect and explore it. It has strengths, valleys, peace, and peaks, right? You climb to one of those peaks called expertise. You become thoroughly familiar with that peak. The world isn't just peaks; it has strengths, peace, and valleys. Without the overall context and general knowledge, your expertise would be like a frog in a well looking at a coin-sized sky. We need to have a very broad and fundamental understanding. At the very least, you can properly utilize your specialized knowledge within that framework. I think the important thing about general knowledge is I

4:42 think the question isn't who said it, but what it was said and how it was said. When a non- expert speaks about a specific topic, they're not speaking from their own non-expert knowledge. In most cases, for example, when discussing why pork isn't eaten in Islamic regions or why the Korean culture of mixing food together is relatively common, what they're saying isn't the result of their own deliberation. It's a matter of relaying the expert's story to other non-experts after reading it. The non-expert's intellectual foundation, the knowledge they possess, allows them to convey the expert's story. Both convey specialized knowledge. However, from a non-expert's perspective, it's closer to learning. In my case, I'm reading through books. I often

5:27 think about this movie, "Amage Don." Bruce Willis stars in the film. An asteroid is heading toward Earth, and scientists are trying to figure out how to avoid it. They plant nuclear weapons on the asteroid. Then, they detonate them to destroy the asteroid itself, preventing it from colliding with Earth. Originally, they were planning to send a space mission. But those people have never drilled a well, planted a nuclear weapon there, and detonated it. There are also non-experts in that field. When it comes to deciding which is more appropriate, the well is looking for drilling experts. Bruce Willis calls in drilling experts and trains them for spaceflight within a limited time. The process of carrying out this foreign object is the story of Armageddon. These difficult problems are bound to arise in the overlapping fields of different experts.

6:15 In this situation, it can be a matter of judgment whether to send astronauts or drilling experts who work on the well. When learning about movies and such, there was a very basic expression that I memorized: "Knowing is one thing to teach is." Knowing and teaching are separate things, but teaching is a different skill. Some people may be very good at communicating, but relatively poor at communicating. Some may benefit from speaking, and some may even not want to teach. On the other hand, some people may be good at conveying their knowledge effectively. If you work for an educational opportunity, you can shine a little more. I think I'm someone who can see things. I think I'm relatively good at communicating. Of course, when I talk about something, there are many people who are better than me.

7:00 There are many experts in that field, so I'm not an expert, but I've been intellectually interested in that subject for a long time and have read a lot of books. I personally think I have a unique advantage in communicating that. Anyone can learn all the knowledge in the world, but there may be differences in how well they communicate it. As an expert, someone who has been in a specific field for a long time may have a more stubborn attitude toward new things in that field or intersections between different fields because of the specialized knowledge they have fought for their entire lives. Thomas Kuhn has a very famous book called The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. The concept that came out of that book is the concept of a paradigm, right? But when it comes to intellectual leaps in the history of science, how do those paradigm shifts occur and who

7:48 makes them? In many cases, scientific revolutions are achieved by people who are new to the field or by people who have been in the field for a long time but are very young. In human history, what intellectual leaps have occurred? Of course, there are cases where experts create leaps forward, but there are also many cases where non-experts create them. When the Shinkansen was first built in Japan, a key engineer at Japan's National Railways said the Shinkansen project was impossible. If the train ran too fast, the ten cars would vibrate, and the vibration problem was physically difficult to solve. However, the problem was solved, and the Shinkansen was born. The person who solved it was an aircraft manufacturer. There are actually many examples of this kind of work in the world, and it's not something that can be left solely to experts. At some point where all these things overlap, how can an individual make a judgment?

8:35 Ultimately, it comes down to culture. These days, I watch Netflix, BTV, and ES. I watch more frugally. BTV. We cover culture-related topics through this channel, and every time we do, we always get comments like, " Why are film critics only talking about movies? Why are they talking about such strange things?" I personally think this situation is particularly severe in Korea, although it's the same all over the world. First of all, I think it has to do with collectivist thinking. In some cases, it's related to the level of culture. When we try to understand an individual's characteristics, there seems to be a very strong tendency in Korea to understand them in terms of the groups and categories they contain. To determine the truth of the message itself, we don't judge the content, but rather

9:23 examine which group that person belongs to. Whether it's gender, class, region, or age, you're a man, so you might see it that way. You might say that because you live in Seoul, you might say that because you graduated from Seoul National University, you might see it that way because you majored in religious studies, you might see it that way because you're in your 50s. We respond in this way, but it's convenient. When we look at the brain's cognitive process, we realize that to properly discern the truth of an individual requires both sophistication and a lot of energy, and it's quite difficult. But that's not the point. It's simple. There's no need for sophistication. It's very convenient. It's easy. In a way, it's a bit of intellectual laziness. Another thing is that Korean society is fundamentally more collectivistic than individualistic. It's probably

10:11 related to the fact that my value is based on my hard work and my individual effort. Rather than trying to break through with a certain value, there's a tendency to bury it in the values of the group to which I belong. In reality, it's not about how much wisdom and sophistication I possess that matters, but rather about which university I graduated from, what major I graduated from, and what level of certification I have in my field. For example, even if I lack basic linguistic knowledge, there's a tendency to think that my language skills are sufficient just because I'm a top-tier language student. This can lead to social dissonance full of prejudice in a culture with a strong collectivist culture. Another issue is that there seems to be a bit of a territorial dispute. Korean society has a high population density and isn't particularly resource-rich. In that context, it's achieved rapid growth in a very short period of time.

10:57 Even globally, Korea is considered a developed and highly developed country. But let's achieve this in a very short period of time. In this process, it's a society that pushes its members to the limit, and competition is incredibly important. From entering university to joining a company, and countless other things, everything is competitive. Even when it's like a fireworks festival, even securing a position is a form of competition. Koreans are competitive. They're used to competing, fighting, and occupying their own space. That's why territorial disputes seem to be very strong. In Korea, many people do n't graduate from college anymore, right? Everyone has a major. By saying they majored in a certain field, they seem to have some kind of expertise, and they talk about their specialty outside of that field, as if they have the qualifications to break through. How much did you learn in your major over the past four years? In

11:44 reality, you live a life that has little to do with your major. Even if you live a life related to your major, it's very temporarily tied to what you learned in college. And experts are the same. Some experts seem to have a tendency to monopolize their own specialized knowledge. Imagine a non- expert conveying the content of a professional book they learned through the media. From a professional's perspective, it might seem indifferent, dangerous, or wrong. Many experts would strongly discourage that and take a critical stance. If that's the case, the expert should have said something like that. In a way, non-experts can do more than experts in broadening their knowledge of the world. Because experts don't do that, there's a lot of knowledge that's helpful in life. So

12:30 why is it wrong to freely promote that knowledge? And if experts are the best at it, I would be so grateful if they could do it. This may remind me of the monopoly on knowledge in the Middle Ages. In the Middle Ages, books themselves were fundamentally rare. Before the invention of movable type, and even if books existed, most people could n't read. Even among the nobility, there were many who couldn't read. Only a small number of elites, such as nobles and monks, had access to books and could read them. In such a time, they monopolized knowledge, which was actually related to issues of power and wealth. In ancient India, when performing rituals like ancestral rites, the process was extremely complex. It was crucial to follow all of these complex procedures. At the same time, the

13:16 ability to read scriptures was crucial. What was the name of the group with such abilities? Brahman. Brahmans were the highest class. The complex and difficult procedures, coupled with the limited access, could be seen as a connection to the monopoly of class. When we say "liberal arts," we often use the term "liberal arch" or "liberal education," but the word "liberal" is included. " Free" means not bound by anything. Simply put, it refers to something that isn't confined to a conventional framework when approaching a field. So, in school, we're taught to study everything we're given. If you learn math, you learn math. If you learn science, you learn science. But

14:02 when you build your liberal arts, you build it on your own, right? Liberal arts aren't about telling you to learn something. They're about reading science books if you're interested, going to exhibitions if you're interested, and so on. I think the biggest problem with building your liberal arts is the idea of standardizing, building walls, and limiting things. What I find most odd in Korean society is the division between liberal arts and science. In fact, when I appear on countless broadcasts, editors often title things like, "A battle of wits between liberal arts and science," but these are n't fundamentally seen as conversations between two people with interesting perspectives, but rather as statements like, "This is liberal arts, this is science." I know, I'm a science major, so I do n't know much about history. Some people might say, "I'm a liberal arts major, so I don't

14:50 know about the history of science." It's not that I don't know about the liberal arts because I don't know about the sciences, but because I don't have enough liberal arts knowledge. Regardless of whether you're in the liberal arts or the sciences, thinking that because I'm a liberal arts major, I have a vested interest in this or that, and that's why I'm qualified to say this or that, is actually a very narrow-minded way of thinking. The best way is actually to read books and attend lectures, especially reading books. Because liberal arts are more accurate and less error-prone when written than spoken. I don't think of liberal arts as just a piece of knowledge. There are so many tangled threads in the world that are so painful to the core. If you take a quick look at this pillar and that piece and step back and discover that it forms a single question,

15:36 there's a tremendous intellectual pleasure. That's what I call liberal arts. Abstracting, structuring, and patterning individual pieces of knowledge means that they can be applied to anything with that pattern, right? Even if you only understand the simple structure of the book, it's good to have a process of mentally recalling the content. Sorting it a little more mentally, categorizing it, organizing it, discovering patterns, and having a simple review process like this is a more advantageous way to acquire general knowledge. Another point to make is that the core of these advantageous methods is actually history. History is not only a content, but also a methodology or perspective. It's an essential and

16:25 powerful weapon in any general knowledge. It could be a long story, but I think history is more important. History can be applied to every field of music we know about. I think it's absurd to say that someone is fine with other general knowledge but doesn't know much about history. I think that person simply lacks general knowledge. I can say that history is almost a prerequisite for general knowledge. One person I read who said this a while ago was Bismarck Grad, but that's a bit of a stretch. Bismarck said something very meaningful: "Fools learn from experience, and wise men learn from history." I find this a very interesting statement. Experience is, in fact, a very one-time thing, is n't it? History, no matter what historical fact it is,

17:10 survives over time and ultimately becomes useful. I think this warning highlights the importance of learning history as a form of liberal arts rather than being immersed in one's own one-time experiences. Liberal arts are, so to speak, a kind of basic stamina. They create a context of connection between others, and when accepting other knowledge, they can be viewed critically or properly utilized. That's what we call liberal arts. However, to achieve this, society is changing relatively rapidly, so there's no time to separate yourself and build your liberal arts. That's because you have to pass the Level 2 Chinese Character Proficiency Test or get a TOEIC score of over 900. Korea seems to be a society that excessively demands qualifications. Whether it's for employment

17:56 or a career, a liberal arts background is disadvantageous because it takes a long time in the long run. It should be very broad, but it's much easier to get a qualification by focusing on a narrow area. And is n't that a society that encourages that? They teach us how to take shortcuts and run straight toward our career goals. When taking a test, it's important to know how accurately we solve the problem, but we have a culture where solving it as quickly as possible is more important. This is true all over the world, but Korea is a bit more so. A cat is like a path. It's a maze where you can go for a walk, take a break, and then branch off. If you think about it, the relationships between those numerous paths are

18:42 incredibly difficult in today's performance-oriented society. As I mentioned in the content I followed, when we asked 17 countries what they considered the most important value in life, Korea was the only one to rank material wealth first. That's actually a very surprising survey result. These things are likely related to the superficiality of performance-oriented Korean society within a competitive society. In this culture, It's hard to be properly cultured. When someone talks about culture like I do, it's easy to make fun of them. The culture of ridiculing them is widespread, especially online. And most of all, they do n't feel ashamed of it. So, I've shared with you my various everyday thoughts on culture. These

19:28 are just my personal opinions. Of course, I don't know much, but I hope you understand me as someone who has a strong desire to know and finds joy in wanting to share that knowledge. There's a wonderful Italian film called Martin Eden that dramatically depicts the process of a person's life changing as they approach and learn about something with intellectual curiosity. I recommend it to you. It's a film that properly shows how a person's life changes as they acquire culture. It 's a wonderful film where the powerful impression of Luca Marinelli, a wonderful actor representing Italy, dominates the entire film. You can watch it on BTV Plus.