What came to my mind as I read the instruction was that, most generally, books contain knowledge necessary for higher education while hands-on experience offer us lessons on life. In my point of view, books are more important source of education; books teach us more various subjects than experiences and is safer methods of understanding knowledges to the fullest.
Above all, materials from books cover a wide variety of subject. Since book consists of words and pictures, which barley have limitation in explaining or showing, it grants students more opportunity on more fields of studies. From a physics related to sky-diving to the mysteries of invisible parasites, one can learn subjects that cannot be directly witnessed only by experiencing. On the other hand, experience has a lot of obstacles. For instance, we cannot experience mathematical equation or chemistry atom-tables, which we need in order to enter colleges. When I was a child, most of what I learned came directly from books, not experiences. Books taught me about the cultures of Korea's neighboring countries, how people looked like in European continent and how spacious the globe was. I was small, weak, and my family could not afford for travels. However, that did not preclude me from learning because books enlightened me of the world that I lived in, which is something experiencing was too unrealistic to do. Likewise, books grant us more abundant and accurate explanations of knowledge when experience does not.
What's more, learning through books is safer than learning through experience. There are certain situations when we cannot risk our lives just to learn something. Yet books can replace those methods of acquiring knowledge and comprehension. For example, getting to know how gravitational fall works through throwing oneself from Grand Canyon would be, of course, irrational and senseless. Then, we can turn to books - which tells us the related material in easy, convenient and quick ways. They do not render us to fall from cliffs or to drop a baseball from the top of a building. There are plenty of examples to support why relying heavily on experience can be dangerous. We cannot stay under the water for 5-minute to check our lung capacity. Nor we can offend someone purposely to study people's psychological reaction. Of course, if leaning they were possible to be carried out, they would impact us more strongly and cleary. Yet, there are too much information for us to learn in reality. Furthermore, the most of knowledge that we use and should know in this world can only come from books.
"Learning through experiences." This may sound rational and romantic. However, in reality, we must resort to books for the majority of time because of the restriction in time, energy, place and chances given. Books offer us more important, swifter and simple way to learn. What can be taught through experience can also be gained from books, but the vice versa is not true. |