Learning on the Internet

ANYTHING, and I mean ANYTHING can be found on the Internet in 2007.  Take for example, the meaning of the Latin phrase "e.g.".

Being a voracious reader, I come across this term all the time and I had always assumed that I knew its precise definition just from the context in which I read it.

Well, this morning I decided to find out, once and for all, what "e.g." really means. So, popping over to the ubiquitous Wikipedia, we find this:

exempli gratia (e.g.)

"for the sake of example"

Usually shortened in English to "for example" (see citation signal). Often confused with id est (i.e.)[2]; see also: e.g. vs. i.e.. Exempli gratia, i.e., "for example", is commonly abbreviated "e.g."; in this usage it is sometimes followed by a comma, depending on style.

So, now I know FOR SURE that "e.g." means "for the sake of example" or "for example", which is what I thought.  However, I had no idea that the "e.g." stood for "exempli gratia".

I repeat, how cool is the Internet? 

I have to say, in the developed world, a person who is ignorant remains ignorant out of choice or sheer will, because access to the Internet is practically universally available to anyone who can walk into a public library.

Walking into any decent library provides you access to a terminal that is a "virtual window" that allows you to look up the answer to ANY QUESTION you could possibly conceive of.  So, once again, to remain uninformed or ignorant is a choice.  A choice, by the way, that I refuse to make.

Get on the Internet, people.  Stop chatting and looking up sport scores and movie reviews and stop using it as a gigantic dating service.  Use it as the limitless tool for education that it really, truly is.  The power that you will add to your educational arsenal is truly staggering.

Information TRULY IS Power.  Embrace it.  Live it.  Breathe it. There is nothing more important that anyone can do than to constantly strive to learn something more than they knew a moment before.