...Writings can be stolen, or changed, or used for evil purposes. But isn't the risk worth taking? The more people who share knowledge, the greater safeguard for it. Isn't there more danger in ignorance than knowledge?
Interpretation
Sharing knowledge can come with risks, but the potential benefits outweigh these risks.
In this quote, Lloyd Alexander emphasizes the importance of sharing knowledge despite the potential for misuse or distortion of one's writings. He argues that the greater threat lies in ignorance, and that fostering a culture of knowledge sharing ultimately serves as a safeguard against harm caused by misinformation and a lack of understanding.
In practice
In a lecture about the importance of open-source research, I can quote Lloyd Alexander to emphasize the value of sharing knowledge.
Long ago I yearned to be a hero without knowing, in truth, what a hero was. Now, perhaps, I understand it a little better. A grower of turnips or a shaper of clay, a Commot farmer or a king--every man is a hero if he strives more for others than for himself alone. Once you told me that the seeking counts more than the finding. So, too, must the striving count more than the gain.
Perhaps one reason we are fascinated by cats is because such a small animal can contain so much independence, dignity, and freedom of spirit. Unlike the dog, the cat's personality is never bet on a human's. He demands acceptance on his own terms.
We learn more by looking for the answer to a question and not finding it than we do from learning the answer itself.
In whatever guise - our own daily nightmares of war, intolerance, inhumanity or the struggles of an Assistant Pig-Keeper against the Lord of Death - the problems are agonizingly familiar. And an openness to compassion, love, and mercy is as essential to us here and now as it is to any inhabitant of an imaginary kingdom.
Llonio said life was a net for luck; to Hevydd the Smith life was a forge; and to Dwyvach the Weaver-Woman a loom. They spoke truly, for it is all of these. But you,' Taran said, his eyes meeting the potter's, 'you have shown me life is one thing more. It is clay to be shaped, as raw clay on a potter's wheel.
Ideas are only lethal if you suppress and don't discuss them. Ignorance is not bliss, it's stupid. Banning books shows you don't trust your kids to think and you don't trust yourself to be able to talk to them.
It is the supreme art of the teacher to awaken joy in creative expression and knowledge.
In limits, there is freedom. Creativity thrives within structure. Creating safe havens where our children are allowed to dream, play, make a mess and, yes, clean it up, we teach them respect for themselves and others.
The more research you do, the more at ease you are in the world you're writing about. It doesn't encumber you, it makes you free.
Let schoolmasters puzzle their brain, With grammar, and nonsense, and learning, Good liquor, I stoutly maintain, Gives genius a better discerning.
Education: the inculcation of the incomprehensible into the indifferent by the incompetent.
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