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IGNORANT

   "How ignorant we really are!"  He read a great    
   deal, but he had little real knowledge excepting  
   in the field of literature.  And even in          
   literature... Until now it hadn't bothered him -- 
   no need for any specialized knowledge to fight in 
   the Resistance or to found a clandestine          
   newspaper.  He had believed that that was the way 
   it would continue to be.  Obviously he had been   
   wrong.  What is an opinion?  What is an idea?     
   What power do words have?  On whom?  And under    
   what circumstances?  If you publish a newspaper,  
   you have to be able to answer those questions.    
   And, what with one thing leading to another, you  
   eventually question everything.  "You have to     
   decide in ignorance," Henri said to himself.      
   "Even Dubreuilh often acts blindly -- Dubreuilh,  
   with all his learning."  Henri sighed; he was     
   unable to resign himself to this defeat.  There   
   are degrees of ignorance, and the simple fact was 
   that he was particularly ill-equipped for the     
   political life.  "Well, I'll just have to start   
   working at it," he said to himself.  But if he    
   really wanted to extend his knowledge, it would   
   require years of study.  Economics, history,      
   philosophy -- he would never be done with it!     
   What a job!  And all that just to come to terms   
   with Marxism!  Writing would be completely out of 
   the question, and he wanted to write.  Well?      
   Whatever happened, one thing was sure: he wasn't  
   going to let the L'Espor fail simply because he   
   wasn't an expert on all the fine points of        
   historical materialism.  He closed his eyes.      
   There was something unfair in the whole thing.  He
   felt obligated, like everyone else, to take an    
   active interest in politics.  That being the case,
   it shouldn't require a specialized apprenticeship;
   if politics was a field reserved for technicians, 
   then they shouldn't be asking him to get mixed up 
   in it.                                            
                                                     
      -- Henri (Camus) as portrayed by               
      Simone de Beauvoir in _The Mandarins_.         
      Translated by Leonard M. Friedman              
      (Dubreuilh is an analog of Sartre.)            
                                                     
                                                  So, how do you know
                                                  what you need to know?
                                                  
                                                  How do you choose 
                                                  what information you 
                                                  need to search for, 
                                                  in advance of knowing
                                                  the information? 


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