To live and learn or just read about it?

TL, there are many things we can learn efficiently from books. The ones you mention are not among those, of course, but many things are. For example, I learned how to opearate a computer from books, back when I didn't know of anyone who could do it. I've learned a lot of the skills it takes to use complicated electronic devices from their manuals. I've learned a great deal about places I've never visited, and I doubt that I will ever be able to afford to go there. My health is poor, so I've learned a lot about several medical conditions by reading about them, but I know enough to read several different sources, and to draw cionclusions based upon synthesizing the information. Most of all, I've learned a great deal about people from books. Nobody will ever have the opporunity to talk with historicsl figures who have passed on, but we can learn enough about them to feel that we knew them and their ideas!

I would tend to agree with you. People can gain a lot of knowledge through reading books and are a valuable source of information. I think no one really knows a subject inside out. I think life experience of a certain subject gives someone more insight and experience of something than someone who has just read about it. I think having knowledge about something by both reading and having experience of it are both valuable and it is good to balance both.

I have to say you make a very valid point, you really dont know everything but by reading you get an insite to what something is or how it is done or what it may be like to do something... I think that everyone has a special talent and that they can do something well and they can tell or write about it in their experience but yes, you really dont know it all until you try to experience it in some way. cool discussion... happy mylotting.

It is about balance. One must build a foundation in life and a great deal of that comes from study be it from a book or from a person. Obviously in the case of doctors they begin with book work and classroom tests. Though, much of college, for those who have been, know is a mixture of book learning combined with laboratory and practicum application settings. Meaning, the foundations are learned from the book, and the knowledge learned is thus applied through lab settings or in practicums. Doctors do a mixture through their undergraduate and medical school. During their internship and residency is where they take that book learning and fully apply it to the real world setting and thus gain "experience". This is very true in the pagan world. Anyone can read about healing, using herbs, casting circles but until one has actually worked alone or in a group there is no experience gained. Most mystical orders today rely a great deal on both book knowledge combined with experience. Even in education not everything comes from books. Much is learned from books, and journals but even quantative research into various areas of education is based upon empirical data-meaning experiements-meaning experience. And each year that a teacher teaches they become more experienced in their field partly because of continued learning and partly because of classroom experience. I don't think anyone can have just one. If a man does not study books, what's been written then he has nothing to base his experience on. If a man only reads books and has no experience, he has no way to see if what is written about actually exists outside of the written word. Interesting discussion. Namaste-Anora

Well said. One of the many reasons why an employer or a company prefers experienced workers rather than a person with only academic qualifications. It's like the difference of being smart and being wise. One can be smart by just reading but you are wise when you have experience it personally. That's why elderly people are commonly known to be wiser than younger people because they have experienced life earlier and therefore know better. I think experiencing something is a step-up to just reading about it.