Follow-up

Ok, I said that I would talk about people who want to know only about their chosen field and nothing else, so here it is. I'll get my initial thought out of the way now - this approach is stupid. There, I've said it. It limits and restricts you, it seeks to define you in a way that you shouldn't necessarily be defined, it ruins you and it can in some cases destroy esteem (not the best word, but the only one that I can think of). The best ideas come from people who for some reason have to change their field - they don't know what is possible yet. But people seek to know nothing about anything else. I'll discuss these issues first and then get to the other thing that irritates me later.
Before I begin, you don't have to know everything - just be well rounded in your knowledge.

Seeking to know only a specific area limits you: with the sum of human knowledge doubling every couple of years, it now seems that to be able to learn about everything is a futile effort, and on both hands it is. Let's consider though the three approaches that can be made to learning.
1) It is Futile and therefore I won't bother. I don't think that I need to point out the idiocy of this statement, and so I won't.
2) It is Futile and so I will learn about only one thing. As the sum of knowledge expands, so does the areas in which knowledge is acquired. As an example, 200 years ago, you were called a scientist and you knew about science. Now, you can't be called just a scientist, you must be a Physicist, or a Chemical Biologist or a MetaQuantum NanoTechnologist and all of these fields are continually narrowing. As you seek to know more about your subject, you have to keep narrowing your gaze to be able to keep up. You become blinded to anything else.
3) It is Futile and so I will seek to Specialise. While this may seem the same, there is a difference. A specialist is an expert in one area, but they must also understand the things around their area. It is no point being a Gastrologist if you don't want to know anything about the rest of the anatomy and so you learn about other things. While you might not want your gut surgeon operating on your brain or vice versa, you expect that they will both know something about their counterparts.

It seeks to Define you: This one is fairly simple. An expert is someone who knows everything in a certain field. And so they are defined by their field. I've discussed this before, you shouldn't be defined by what you do. Where their field goes is where they have to go.

It can destroy esteem: This can be a fairly extreme case, but I feel that it's worth mentioning. If expertise defines you, then what happens when you can't quite make expert? You fail. Which means that you aren't good enough any more. Yes, I said it was an extreme case, but still plausible.


The second reason that I don't like it is because despite people not knowing or caring to know about areas outside their ever shrinking interests, they will always have an opinion. And it will be wrong, almost inevitably, but people will never seek to be corrected and will want to correct those who actually know what their doing.
GAH, Idiots.
But anyway, this is just my opinion based on the observations of an occasional lunatic. If I'm wrong, sue me.