What it Means to Be an Educated Person

By: Clint Barton

People like Aristotle and Plato are considered by almost anyone as very educated and wise individuals. But what makes these men or anyone else that may be considered an educated person earn that heir of respect? To be considered and educated person, a person must have many different qualities that are essential to the development of their education and wisdom.

First, it must be made clear that simply graduating from college or high school and earning a degree doesn*t make a person educated in the sense that we are discussing. People that do earn college degrees can be considered knowledgeable because they have learned factual information and techniques that are related to their field of study or future occupation. But as far as being an educated person there is a great difference between this and just being knowledgeable. An educated person can do so much more that just recall facts that have been memorized out of a textbook. Educated people know when to lean on their knowledge and when to try new things. But being able to go and learn new things and better understand different opinions doesn*t make an educated person either.

An educated person, to me at least, must be more complete than this however. Someone with enough experience to make some critical decisions still may not be an educate person. This is because an educated person knows that they can be wrong and they can see when they are wrong. It may not even be actually not knowing some discrete statistic, but rather understanding that not everyone else agrees with their opinion. An educated person must understand, or at least be knowledgeable in many different subjects and topics so that they can understand where opposing viewpoints are created and what those viewpoints are based on.

An educated person must also know or have a sense of when to be quiet and just let things be. An educated person has an uncanny sense of reading people and their attitudes. Being educated allows a person to realize that starting a discussion on a controversial topic with a certain group of people will not benefit anyone involved, including themselves. An educated person wouldn*t attempt to push the theory of evolution on a group of devout Roman Catholics. Educated people understand that some people are set in their ways and will not change. We must all remember that educated people are very intelligent and wise but do not possess any special powers to change others* minds.

Another key concept that an educated person must grasp is that they are not the only educated person in the world. There are many very intelligent people in the world and there are more that most people believe. People who are considered to be educated are often considered to be arrogant. This is a heavy stereotype that has formed over many years of educated people pushing their own ideas and values onto other people. A true educated person also has well developed people and social skills that allow them to interact with people in all different environments. This correlates to what I stated earlier, in that educated people have the ability to read people and know when to open discussion and when to bite your lip. These social skills are critical to any educated person; the ability to interact with people from all walks of life makes an educated person more respected by everyone.

This idea of respect is also very important to anyone who wants to be known as an educated person. If people around you or in general have no respect for you, then you will not be considered an educated person. If you are disliked, people will never accept you and never recognize you as an educated person. No matter how wise or how knowledge able you actually are, without the respect of your peers and members of other generations, you are not looked upon as an educated person.

Anyone could be an educated person and believe that they are in fact an educated person but there is one problem with that situation. Anyone can think that they are educated, but that is almost contradictory in a sense. If someone believes that they are an educated person, they believe they are very intelligent. However, anyone can believe they are an educated person, but without interacting with others and gaining the respect of others, this self-proclamation is simply a narcissistic trait.

Being an educated person and the very title being discussed in this essay may indeed also be a contradiction, unless the title is given only by others. A person who considers themselves to be an educated person, actually may not be. If someone claims to be educated and believes they are very intelligent, they are in fact not educated at all. A true educated person knows that there is always more to learn and they never will have all of the answers. I did say that if the title is given to a person from others who hold that person in high regards, then the title is acceptable and may be given. But it is very important for the person who is considered to be educated to be humble. If the person allows the respect and honor to get to their head, then the person may become cocky and lose all the values that earned the respect from others. Being humble is a very powerful trait for any educated person. The ability to interact with people and understand their actions and behaviors is key. If a person gets overconfident and becomes arrogant, the ability to interact with people is lost and the respect earned from them is taken. As stated earlier, the respect given by others to an educated person is the most important trait of any educated person.