The art of original thinking

Our society tries to define a person's intelligence by the level of his/her formal education. but does it really reflect the person's intelligence? I think not. Personally I'm beginning to think that 'formal' education actually restricts our mind frame, teaching us what some other person found out and telling us to carry on from where that earlier person left...in his path of thinking. Well, it is sort of trying not to re-invent the wheel, but at the same time it also restricts our minds to think along the lines of someone else, and does not encourage 'original thinking'.

Perhaps it's not just the teaching, but maybe the way we are taught. As students we are taught things and not encouraged to ask 'why?' and 'how?', and pretty soon we get used to 'hanging on to every word' the teacher say like in blind faith.

After reading Sir Richard Branson's autobiography I was wondering about this factor. He wasn't an A-grade student, not even close! But he understood that the authoritarian rules in his school were restricting the freedom of students, and wrote down a list of suggestions to the administration of the school at the age of 15. He challenged the ideas of most 'conservative' businessmen, and went on to break a lot of 'defined' rules. Somewhere in his book he mentions about the degrees and educational programmes on "entrepreneurship", well..it shouldn't be about sitting down and studying the subject but throwing away the books and getting down to work!

On the same note I was interested in finding out how Einstein coped with this. So I just finished skimming through a book called "The unexpected Einstein", trying to get some insight into this. Einstein excelled at maths in school, but was terrible in other subjects. But the thing to note is that he wasn't interested in what the teachers taught him, (and so he wasn't a favourite with his teachers at all) but he was interested in the subject and he learned it in his way. He didn't get bogged down with the 'formal teachings'. Once during a chemistry laboratory session, he had thrown away the teachers instructions and tried to do the experiment - his way, which had ended blowing up in his face. And later he dropped out of school by the age of 16.

Another example Martin Wickramasinghe, one of the most prolific writers of all time in Sri Lanka, dropped out of school early. But in my opinion Sri Lanka has't been able to produce a better author at handling the Sinhala language since. It's not just the language but his insight into the society and the people is simply amazing. In one of his books 'Yuganthaya' if I'm not mistaken he writes about how this character, a surgeon carries out a delicate and complex surgery on a patient. You can't stop but wonder at the intricate details of the human anatomy and the medical procedures he goes on to explain. How the hell did he get such a knowledge? (There weren't any Internet or the Discovery channel in his time!)

I remember our music maestro Premasiri Kemadasa once saying (by the way that's another example) "when you play music in a class room and ask the children to clap to the rhythm, if there's one child who doesn't seem to be clapping to the correct beat, take interest! he might be seeing something that all the others don't".

All in all it's difficult to define and mould a person's intellectual capacity and original thinking. But the guideline "not to believe in anything anybody says without giving it proper consideration" as preached by Lord Buddha in the Kalama sutra seems to be absolutely correct!
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"Do not go upon what has been acquired by repeated hearing; nor upon tradition; nor upon rumor; nor upon what is in a scripture; nor upon surmise; nor upon an axiom; nor upon specious reasoning; nor upon a bias towards a notion that has been pondered over; nor upon another's seeming ability; nor upon the consideration, ..... when you yourselves know: 'These things are good; these things are not blamable; these things are praised by the wise; undertaken and observed, these things lead to benefit and happiness,' enter on and abide in them."