Picking apart the nature of human existence, Rousseau denotes our stem for desire and passion. He claims that “we desire knowledge only because we wish to enjoy” (3) and that “our passions, […] originate in our wants” (3). Pondering these ideas they seem to be debatably relevant in the human psyche.
By nature, humans seek knowledge to conquer or understand a bigger picture. The definition of enjoy can mean different things, however; denoting ‘enjoy’ as an emotion of benefit or pleasure, the cause of knowing permits the effect of enjoying. For example, in our never-ending denotation of Avatar, Jake seeks knowledge from the blue people. He in effect becomes enthralled in the culture and enjoys the different ceremonies and way of life the Navi share with him. This gift of knowledge all humans have the ability to experience is a presence only in our wants rather than needs. Or is it? Tracing back to evolution, living things must in some context seek ‘knowledge’ in order to survive: survival of the fittest. Without knowledge and invention, wouldn’t all life on Earth be destroyed? Could Rousseau’s statement that “our passions, […] originate in our wants” (3) be falsified by this fact? If no one were to have passion in their lives nature and everything else in our world would lack beauty. The photo taken from the “Nature Paintings” would lack the existence in our human minds because beauty would be unrecognizable to us. Beauty is passion and without passion there is no beauty. So, if passion is a want could we really survive as developed human beings?
i think also what Rousseau talks about is that in order for us to enjoy life we must understand it, that is why to obtain knowledge is to obtain the information to enjoy what we are looking at. Therefore in my mind it is kind of an automatic process; we seek knowledge automatically because if we didn't do it even subconsciously we would not be enjoying ourselves. great post!
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