There is difference between being inquisitive and being argumentative. I myself am branded as argumentative by many. I don't accept things easily. I question to know the authenticity of anything. I would say myself as inquisitive and not argumentative. Had I been argumentative, I would not accept anything even after giving sufficient number of reasons. But how can I accept or agree to anything when I am not satisfied with the answers given. The answers given raise some more questions in me and my inquisitive nature comes to the fore. Is it wrong to be inquisitive? Is it wrong to question? Is it wrong not to be satisfied by an answer?Questions, again!!!!!!!!!!!!!
People get bored with so many questions and slowly people get bored with the person,i.e., me in this case. There have been many instances in which I was asked to shut up in a not-so-sharp way when I was asking many questions. But at the same time, these questions helped them too. There were instances in my 11th and 12th when my friends wanted me to ask the lecturers so many questions that they would stop teaching and leave the class. This really happened too. Once in a chemistry class, our sir was teaching something and explaining about the oxidation states of oxygen in inert gas compounds and I raised a doubt suddenly. He got so used to me that as soon as I raised my hand and asked that question, he said, “ I knew you would ask this question. I knew that YOU WOULD ONLY ask this question.” As soon as he said this, the whole class burst into laughter. But the question was not answered effectively.
When people are unable to answer me, they say I'm stupid to ask such questions. I say that yes, I'm ignorant. I'm foolish. You are so wise, right. Please answer my question and enlighten me. But again they say this is arrogance. Then how should I behave? I'm agreeing that I don't know anything. If you know, please let me know too. If you don't know, join me in asking someone else the same question and let us both get enlightened. Whatever it is, I keep on asking questions, whether you like it or not. Because, this is me.
Coming to the topic, this actually propped up in my mind when I heard about the book “ The Argumentative Indian” by Nobel laureate, Amartya Sen. The book outlines the need to understand contemporary India in the light of its argumentative tradition. He termed the Indians as argumentative, he himself being an Indian. He is a Nobel laureate and no doubt a great man. But, he shouldn't be commenting about Indians that way. Had he been staying in India and be an Indian, I wouldn't mind any criticism from him. But he is staying in some far away land and took the nationality of some other country and criticizing the people of his own mother land. This is just my view and not against any particular person or anything else. I would have valued the book much better, had it been named “ The Inquisitive Indian”, rather than “ The Argumentative Indian”. We, Indians are inquisitive than argumentative. Our inquisitive nature lead to many astonishing discoveries.
One such marvellous example is the discovery of infinity. Srinivasa Ramanujan questioned his teacher what was the result of a number divided by the itself, when the number is zero. This lead to the concept of infinity in mathematics. Encourage this inquisitive nature. Who knows, one may become another Ramanujan tomorrow. Or may discover something astonishing for the use of future generation. Don't stop them from asking questions by mistakenly branding them as argumentative. Have patience in answering the innumerable questions. If you don't know the answer, then you also have to know and learn something. :)
When people are unable to answer me, they say I'm stupid to ask such questions. I say that yes, I'm ignorant. I'm foolish. You are so wise, right. Please answer my question and enlighten me. But again they say this is arrogance. Then how should I behave? I'm agreeing that I don't know anything. If you know, please let me know too. If you don't know, join me in asking someone else the same question and let us both get enlightened. Whatever it is, I keep on asking questions, whether you like it or not. Because, this is me.
Coming to the topic, this actually propped up in my mind when I heard about the book “ The Argumentative Indian” by Nobel laureate, Amartya Sen. The book outlines the need to understand contemporary India in the light of its argumentative tradition. He termed the Indians as argumentative, he himself being an Indian. He is a Nobel laureate and no doubt a great man. But, he shouldn't be commenting about Indians that way. Had he been staying in India and be an Indian, I wouldn't mind any criticism from him. But he is staying in some far away land and took the nationality of some other country and criticizing the people of his own mother land. This is just my view and not against any particular person or anything else. I would have valued the book much better, had it been named “ The Inquisitive Indian”, rather than “ The Argumentative Indian”. We, Indians are inquisitive than argumentative. Our inquisitive nature lead to many astonishing discoveries.
One such marvellous example is the discovery of infinity. Srinivasa Ramanujan questioned his teacher what was the result of a number divided by the itself, when the number is zero. This lead to the concept of infinity in mathematics. Encourage this inquisitive nature. Who knows, one may become another Ramanujan tomorrow. Or may discover something astonishing for the use of future generation. Don't stop them from asking questions by mistakenly branding them as argumentative. Have patience in answering the innumerable questions. If you don't know the answer, then you also have to know and learn something. :)
True...and precisely framed as always..Honest feeling that genuinely does arise in all of us at various stages of life...Depends on us as to how seriously we consider the whole phenomenon...Of we the readers there would be segment of silent folks who would agree with the silent-listening policy and protest the argumentative and inquisitive fundas..Given a chance they would be ready to punch down the favouring folks also..I have one question for all such readers...Do you generally dont have any arguments within you or you just pretend to for the heck of it...If you cant question for the fear of it plz dont condemn the ones with guts either!
ReplyDeletethere are many a question which cant be knowledgeably answered by many. the best way to escape the barrage of inquisitive queries is to say that the fella asking them is either a fool or a nerd or something. If our school teachers,coll lecturers were to answer our questions that arose out of inquisition, then where is, according to science or social or maths,the starting point of a circle??? lets wait for such a world wen at least they can accept they don't know it and will try finding out along with us!!
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