An expert on nothing

Apparently I looked pensive that day, because a friend suddenly asked, “What are you thinking?” When I responded, “Nothing,” she laughed and said, “That’s impossible. Nothing can come out of nothing,” cleverly quoting Shakespeare’s King Lear. But I must confess two things. Firstly, I lied: I was, in fact, thinking about something—mainly, what to write about for my last column. Secondly, I am an expert on nothing.

The latter statement can be interpreted in multiple ways. I could be an expert on the philosophical concept of “nothingness,” which has been a heated topic for over 2,500 years and takes almost 10,000 words to summarize in an encyclopedia of philosophy. English literature students, too, obsess over Wallace Stevens’ famous line, “Nothing himself, beholds / Nothing that is not there and the nothing that is.” But I’m not going to talk about this particular aspect of nothingness—I’m only here to reveal an inconvenient yet incredible truth that the liberal arts degree, and especially the philosophy major, makes a non-expert out of you.

Most undergrads aren’t experts in academic fields, despite having to choose a major, concentration, or minor. Even our research papers or theses, while promoting “original” ideas and arguments, are products of quasi-experts who have the potential to delve further into the topic if given more resources and time.

A troubled sophomore asked me a day before the major declaration date, “How important is your major for finding employment after college?” I gave him the same answer my older peers gave me last year: “Not very.” The liberal arts curricula at the undergraduate institutions make us well-read through general requirements, and every department demands both careful analysis and critical thinking. This is why anthropology majors are not hindered from becoming financial consultants, English majors from becoming lawyers, and so forth.

“The goal is less to teach him a truth,” wrote Rousseau, “than to show him how he must always go about discovering the truth.” Like the biblical idea not simply to give a man fish but to teach him how to fish, students are equipped to investigate a variety of problems and situations, not to find the ultimate answer to everything in the universe (I still don’t buy the “Hitchhiker’s” answer that it’s 42).

The philosophy major takes this broad, non-expertness to a further degree. Despite my clear understanding of Plato’s dialogues, Aristotelian metaphysics, and the Hegelian dialectic, to name a few, these ideas have made me less and less sure about my own understanding of the world. They have urged me to continue questioning rather than answering or resolving issues.

A student in a philosophy class exploring the theory of knowledge argued that the more she learned about the different theories, the less she realized she knew. “Yes! That’s exactly what I want you to get from the idea of knowledge!” the professor responded, smiling.

While this status of confusion may seem detrimental to one’s future endeavors, I find myself more flexible to different opinions than I was prior to studying philosophy, something that I believe will benefit me in whatever I pursue from now on.

For example, this mentality of “knowing nothing” is useful for some vocations, especially editing. In order to edit, one needs to view a piece of writing, however solid it may seem, from the most ignorant and naïve perspective in order to solidify and clarify the argument to the utmost degree. (Of course, the editor must be skilled in grammar and syntax, but that is easily handled by copy editors alone.) The editor is not expected to be an expert on whatever topic the article may be about, but an expert at being a non-expert. In that sense, Socrates exercised his philosophy by admitting his ignorance and making sure his companions were consistent in their arguments (which was rarely the case).

A few years ago, I would have never had the courage to name my column “2+2=5” out of fear of sounding absurd. But just as I learned that there is no easy answer to or consensus on a question like “What is there in this room?” (chairs, computers, people, ideas, dreams, the Internet, shadows, holes, etc.), I learned to perceive my local observations and events on campus via the same light. From music, film, women’s history and literature to computer science and, of course, astronomy, I wanted to demonstrate to readers that anything can be the target of philosophy if you just think about it hard enough.

Perhaps King Lear was wrong: Something can come out of nothing (just as nothing can come out of something). And in defense of suggesting that 2+2=5, I’ll leave you with the words of one of my favorite philosophers, Bertrand Russell.

“This seems plainly absurd,” he said, “but whoever wishes to become a philosopher must learn not to be frightened by absurdities.”

Yurina Ko is a Barnard College junior majoring in philosophy. She is a senior editor of the Columbia Political Review. 2+2=5 runs alternate Wednesdays.