<p>Hi! This is my second essay-to-be-graded, and hopefully my last. I appreciate all your help!</p>
<p>Prompt: "Knowledge is power. In agriculture, medicine, and industry, for example, knowledge has liberated us from hunger, disease, and tedious labor. Today, however, our knowledge has become so powerful that it is beyond our control. We know how to do many things, but we do not know where, when, or even whether this know-how should be used.</p>
<h2>Can knowledge be a burden rather than a benefit?"</h2>
<p>With knowledge comes the power to effect change, to solve problems, to educate the next generation. On the other hand, the possession of dangerous, controversial information places people in a predicament. As seen in the Information Age and in literature, knowing secrets is a burden rather than a benefit.</p>
<p>WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has suffered directly as a result of bearing knowledge that others consider classified. Since his database aims to improve transparency in governments, Assange has an obligation to WikiLeaks to share any incriminating political records. His commitment to leaking these files garnered him an international arrest warrant for treason. Although Assange currently resides free, his actions so angered global authorities, who believe the release of diplomatic cables a felony, that he must now fear for his liberty. Without having obtained the cables, Assange would have lived as an ordinary Australian, rather than confining himself in virtual exile from many major countries. Clearly, Assange’s knowledge of these files compromised his own lifestyle because he felt responsible for exposing what he viewed as corruption.</p>
<p>A similar dilemma faces protagonist Edmond Dantes in The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas. Dantes believes he must become an “angel of justice” because of the wrongs committed against him by his peers. Aware that four venal men conspired to frame him for their own material benefit, Dantes decides that he must bring each culprit to his downfall, especially since almost no one else knows of their misdeeds. The lifelong mission of Dantes succeeds, but at the end of the novel, he tells his friend Maximilian Morrel that he regrets his arrogance in acting as an avenger. He says that he should have left the men’s fates to God instead, because he himself is also imperfect and thus unsuitable as a carrier of the law. From Dantes’s remorse, it is evident that his treatment of his knowledge brought him discomfort in the end. He admits that he would have been happier without the hellbent desire for revenge that resulted from this information.</p>
<p>Evidently, knowledge harms the individual when it pertains to concealed facts that ultimately disturb the peace. However, it is still important to glean this knowledge; one must simply learn to handle it cautiously.</p>
<p>(This took me 27 minutes, so I would probably have cut down a bit on the first paragraph)</p>