Zhu Guangqian: Talking about Learning

This is a big topic, not easy to talk about, because many people have a big misunderstanding of it, but can not help but talk about it. The biggest misunderstanding in the study and reading as one thing. Children into the school does not say is "learning" and said "reading", students have always been called "readers". The rough foreigners should use "learn" (learn) or "study" (study) and other words commonly used "reading" (read) to replace. This traditional conceptual error affects the entire educational tendencies in our country.

Most of the schools at all levels of education is reduced to knowledge transfer, and the only way to transfer knowledge is to read, teachers are only "teaching people". If this wrong concept is not corrected, I am afraid there is no hope that education and learning will be on the right track. If we think about it a little, it should not be difficult to correct.

Learning is learning, asking is asking. The world can learn to ask a lot of things, knowledge and skills must be learned, character cultivation must also be learned; readers must be learned, agriculture, industry, business and soldiers must also be learned, each line has its own "line of work". Learning is any person for any matter, from not knowing to know, from not being able to seek to be able to a set of work. Its scope is unlimited, all the activities of life, all the phenomena and truth of the universe, all included.

There are many ways to learn, and there is not a single day when a person does not learn from the fall of the world. Some learning comes from imitation, and some learning comes from trying, thinking, experiencing and cultivating. Reading is only one of the methods of learning. It is certainly important, but not the only one. Zhu Zi taught his disciples that "reading is the second thing a scholar does." There are many readers who are not doing scholarly work, and there are also many who are doing scholarly work and do not rely exclusively on reading; the making of words - the elements of a book - is a great learning experience, and the first to make the words of the people who do not have a book to read at all, and many other learning can be deduced by analogy.

The first thing you need to do is to make a book.

Zi Lu's "Why read and then learn" is not bad in itself, and Confucius scolded him, just hated his motive for saying it in defense of letting a young scholar go to the government, and did not say that it was wrong in itself.

The general public often complains that young people nowadays have no strong interest in learning. In my personal experience as a teacher, I also have this view. In all fairness, this is mostly attributable to our "teaching staff". We have not tried to correct, if not all of us, the misconception that learning is "teaching" and "reading". And we do not have a good student learning, to young students to set a good example, can inspire their ambition, raise their interest. In addition, the society in general for the nature of learning and the function of the existing misunderstanding is not unrelated.

In recent times, Western scholars often separate the pure and applied learning, thinking that the applied learning is something to do, the pure and applied learning is nothing to do. They are afraid of learning all fall into the application of a narrow road, try to do nothing for the defense of learning, said it and "useless", but can satisfy the human desire for knowledge. This kind of intention is very admirable, but the wording is not quite correct. Learning from the needs of life, there is no learning useless, but "with" the meaning of the broad and narrow difference.

Learning a kind of learning, there can be a skill, take it to apply to the actual cause, such as learning math geometry triangle can go to accounting, surveying, construction, manufacturing machinery, which is the most normal "with" the word in the narrow sense. Learning a little knowledge and skills, you get a qualification, you can seek a career, to solve the problem of rice bowls, this is utilitarianism, "with" the word in the narrow sense of the word. But the utility of learning is not only this, we can even say that the greatest utility of learning is not here.

Psychologists study intelligence, and there is a difference between ordinary intelligence and special intelligence; the ancient and modern people characterization, there is a difference between generalists and specialists. The function of learning can also be said to have "general" and "specialized". The treatment of mathematics is applied to the calculation of quantity, which is the specialization of learning; the treatment of mathematics and become a thoughtful, harmonious character, good at standing in the world, which is the generalization of learning. This is the generalization of learning.

? As far as wisdom is concerned, learning is a tool for training the mind. A truly learned person must be rich in knowledge, sharp thinking, insight into the matter, in any environment, know to grasp the outline, analyze and solve the difficulties. In terms of character, learning is a means of moral cultivation. Socrates said it well, "Knowledge is virtue." Many of the evils of the world arise from ignorance, and if one truly and thoroughly understands that one thing is good and another is bad, a man will never go towards the bad with his eyes open. Chinese Confucianism is about learning, and has always emphasized the work of standing up for oneself, and a scholar should be a sage, not just a so-called "intellectual" as it is now.

Now the so-called "intellectuals" fault in only see the learning of the narrow sense of "use", especially utilitarian "use". Learning is just a kind of dry Lu tool. I once heard a professor, after compiling a handbook, say with satisfaction: "I will eat for the rest of my life!" I also heard a friend advise a relative not to allow his son, who had just graduated from high school, to go to work on a small matter, saying, "Your way of doing it is like eating rice seed!" Many young people who go on to higher education really only want the rice seed to produce a large amount of grain, so that they will be able to "eat it all. Therefore, the university "way out" of the most extensive departments, such as the Department of Economics, Department of Mechanical Engineering and so on is often crowded, while the Department of Philosophy, Department of Mathematics, Department of Biology, such as the "cold door", simply no one asked for. The study is not for the study itself, but for its way out of the market, in the study of both "drunkenness", of course, after the way out of the market is even more "to get the fish to forget the fish".

How can we expect young students to have a strong interest in learning under such circumstances?

This narrow and erroneous conception of the function of learning must be corrected as soon as possible. Life is the only thing that matters for life, and learning is for life. These two points are the natural order of things. However, the mistake of modern Chinese people is that they regard "life" only as the sustenance of the mouth and the stomach. "To make a living" and "to make food and clothing" have the same meaning in popular speech. This is so wrong as to be pathetic and ridiculous. Man has a body and a mind. The body has its life, and the mind should have its life. Flesh needs nutrition, the mind can not "grain". Flesh lack of nutrients, will be brewed into starvation, disease and death; mind lack of nutrients, naturally, to dry up and decay. The human being is the spirit of all living things because he has a mind or spiritual life. Therefore, the measurement of a man's achievement is not whether he can earn a living or not, but whether he has a rich spiritual life or not.

A person to only care about food and clothing and warmth and for the truth and beauty of the diffuse not feel interested, he can only be regarded as a kind of "walking dead", a nation to only care about the physical needs and do not cherish the value of spiritual life, it is bound to gradually decline.

Learning is the food of the spirit, which makes our spiritual life richer. It is a joy to have a full belly, and a greater joy to have a full mind. A person in the learning if there is a strong interest, deep attainments, he will find everything has a wonderful reason within, he will find his own heart contains all kinds of images, clear and transparent, when there is a support, when in the birth of the show, this kind of person's life will never dry, he will never make a lowly thing.

"Analects" records "Yan Zi in the ugly alley, a round of food, a scoop of water, people can not bear the worry, back to not change their joy". Confucius praised him as "virtuous" not only because he was able to live in poverty, but also because he was able to enjoy the way of life, in other words, he had a very rich spiritual life. The Song Confucians taught people to realize what Yan Zi's happiness was, and they were right on the mark. Not only do people nowadays fail to understand the importance of this kind of realization, but they also regard it as the pedantry of the Taoists. This is a very serious disease in the national culture, and we must try to cure it before it is too late.

The Chinese words "learning" and "questioning" together have a profound meaning, much better than the Western equivalent of learning, study, science, and so on. All human beings are born with an upward spirit and a desire to know, and they are happy to ask questions about things they do not know. To question something is to be interested in it. Since there are questions, the idea of solving it, a few fumbling, and finally get an answer, so do not know to know, the so-called "once through", this is to learn to have the experience.

The original learning is not far from the question, will not be able to question will not have to learn. Many people do not feel interested in a kind of learning, the reason is that that kind of learning is not a problem for them, there is nothing to force them to ask to know. But the good thing about learning is that what was a problem can become a non-problem, and what was a non-problem can become a problem. In the former case, the unknown becomes known, and in the latter case, the seemingly known is found to remain unknown. For example, logic, a high school student has studied for a year and a half, read a general textbook, propositions, reasoning, induction, deduction, and so on, all properly, no doubt. However, if he goes a little further into logic, he will find that almost nothing that he previously thought he understood thoroughly is not a problem, and nothing that has not been debated by many scholars. If he goes further, he will find many interesting problems for himself, and realize that he may not be able to solve them all properly in his own lifetime. Logic is a less na?ve subject, and so it is, and so it is with other subjects.

A person for a study if you are willing to drill into it, you must make the problem into no problem (this is the question), questions endless, see endless, interest is endless. The difficulty of learning is here, the joy of learning is also here. A person for a kind of learning is said to be not interested in, that only proves that he is not attentive, do not try to work hard, did not get into it. There is no such thing as an uninterested study in the world, and it is only due to ignorance or laziness that people do not feel interested.

Learning is linked to questioning, so learning is not just memorizing but must be thinking, not just copying but must be creating. All thoughts are pushed from the known to the unknown, and creation is a new synthesis of the old material, so thoughts must start from memory, and creation must start from inheritance. Ideas are born from memory and creations are born from inheritance, just as food is absorbed and digested and then turned into the driving force of life. Food without chemistry is of course useless, not food and seek chemistry is also still seeking to create something from nothing, always on the words of learning than Confucius, "learning without thinking is confusing, thinking without learning is perilous," two sentences more profound and insightful.

The original meaning of "learning" is "emulation", and scholars of child psychology know that most learning is based on copying or imitation. Here, "learning" emphasizes absorbing the knowledge and experience of those who have gone before us. Thinking is the use of one's own brain, on the one hand, to seek to integrate what has been learned, well organized, and on the other hand, to inspire new knowledge and experience from the difficulties. There are two kinds of common faults in the average student. One is the one that smart people are guilty of, that is, they believe too much in their own thinking power and ignore the achievements of their predecessors. In fact, every kind of learning has a long history, in which each problem has been many people have thought about, discussed, put forward a variety of different answers, you must understand these passages, in order to take advantage of the previous harvest, so as to avoid detours or even go the wrong way.

For example, the genetic problem in biology, once upon a time, Remarque, Darwin, Weissmann, Mendel and so on have done many experiments, get many observations, with many thinking. If you do not know anything about their work or if you dismiss it and rely only on your own ingenuity to solve the genetic problem, is this not arrogance? There are many people in the world who "think but do not learn," and they do not know the "criticality" of this kind of empty construction. Another kind of general malpractice is often committed by those who are less qualified but willing to work hard. They read dead books, no matter what the ancients said correctly or incorrectly, are indiscriminately accepted over, chanting and marveling, they do not use the thinking to seek to integrate, not to mention a little bit of the spirit of adventure, they go to seek new insights, this is to learn without thinking, Confucius for this approach to the comment is "reckless," which means that it is useless.

The study is all about the family. A good environment, adequate library equipment, a good teacher and friends to guide and inspire, of course, a great help. But these conditions do not necessarily guarantee one's success in learning, and there are some people who have achieved success in learning who do not have these conditions.

The most important factor is the individual's own efforts. Learning is an arduous task, and many people cannot endure the hardships it entails. In addition to effort, the second important factor is to recognize the direction and path. If you start out on the wrong path, the more you try, the deeper you get into it, the further away from the subject.

For example, learning to write, poetry or drawings, once on the vulgar and bad road, and later if you want to throw it away, more difficult than to collect the water, the power of habit is heavier than anything else, there are many people in the world like in the effort to do learning, but only into the "wild fox Zen", high self-expectations and the real absurdity of the problem only a good mentor and a good friend The first thing you need to do is to get your hands dirty.

School education, in my opinion, has only two important functions: the first is to inspire interest, and the second is to show the way. Nowadays, the general school does not work on these two aspects, but only try to instill rigid knowledge. This kind of education is not only not beneficial to learning but also an obstacle!