Excuse me, your ignorance is showing

I help to referee at a lunchtime philosophy club, and was asking the children if they could think of any questions to discuss in future sessions. One they came up with was, 'Should children be made to go to school?' In my opinion, yes, they should. There's no excusing ignorance, especially when you can do something about it. It amazes me that huge amounts of people seem to have no curiosity about anything at all. I'm lost if I'm not finding out things. If I don't know something, I need to find out answers. I even found out the answer to the practice/practise problem, you'll be relieved to know (and here, I need to duck, cringe and apologise. I did mean it nicely. You know who you are....)

Something that really bugs me (yes, sorry, it's going to be one of those posts) is the sort of person who pretends to be stupid, thinking it makes them look cute and feminine (because it's almost always a woman, letting the side down). You know the sort: 'Me? Oh, it's no good asking me! I'm so silly!' Usually accompanied by fluttering eyelashes and giggling. Those women need a slap. 

Sigh...

I don't get how these women think ignorance is attractive. Or is it? Maybe I've got it all wrong. I find knowledge rather appealing, myself. It certainly comes before looks in my book. I was watching a programme called Wonders of Life the other day, presented by Prof. Brian Cox. Now, I've seen photos of him and not thought a lot, but when he was talking about hydrogen atoms and how much energy there is in a waterfall, well, you could have knocked me down with a physicist; he went straight to number 2 on The List. (You know what The List is, I bet you've got one.) He's not overtaken Steve Backshall, as it takes a lot to beat someone who abseils into extinct volcanoes and finds a new species, but there's time - I've only seen the first programme in the series. 

Intelligent men make up the majority of The List. I had to retire David Attenborough - although I don't believe age is important, that was getting silly. Chris Packham made it into single figures when he got emotional about polar bears on an iceberg, and taught me how Canadian forests depend on salmon being in the rivers. I think that's it - I like people who can teach me things. Apart from maths; quadratic equations will never be sexy. 

So, to get back to the original question: yes, children should be forced to go to school, or else there will be no clever people, and nobody left to fancy. Case closed.