Posted on 04/06/2005 11:36:46 AM PDT by Alamo-Girl
Freepers began a most engaging dialogue at the end of another thread! It is not only a fascinating subject - it also presents us with an opportunity to clarify ourselves and hopefully help us appreciate our differences and thus relieve some of the contention on various threads (most especially science and philosophy threads).
The subject is knowledge - which, as it turns out, means different things to different people. Moreover, we each have our own style of classifying “knowledge” – and valuing the certainty of that “knowledge”. Those differences account for much of the differences in our views on all kinds of topics – and the contentiousness which may derive from them.
Below are examples. First is PatrickHenry’s offering of his classification and valuation followed by mine – so that the correspondents here can see the difference. Below mine is js1138’s offering.
Please review these and let us know how you classify and value “knowledge”! We’d appreciate very much your following the same format so it’ll be easier for us to make comparisons and understand differences.
PatrickHenry’s types of “knowledge” and valuation of certainties:
1. Revelation: Spiritual understanding divinely communicated.
Alamo-Girl’s types of “knowledge” and valuation of certainties:
js1138’s types of “knowledge” and valuation of certainties
2. Prediction from scientific theory: I calculate there will be a partial solar eclipse this week.
3. Conclusion from evidence: I conclude from the verifiable evidence that ...
4. Sensory perception of something external to me: I see my dog is lying at my feet.
5. Acceptance of another's opinion: I provisionally accept the opinion of X (an individual or group) as knowledge because (a) I haven't worked it out for myself; and (b) I have what I regard as good reason for confidence in X.
6. Personal memory: I recall I had breakfast this morning.
7. Internal emotional state: I feel I'm happy, or I have empathy, compassion or sympathy for you.
Separate List for theological knowledge:
2. Faith: Belief in a revelation experienced by another.
2. Theological knowledge, indirect revelation: I believe in a revelation experienced by another, i.e. Scripture is confirmed to me by the indwelling Spirit.
4. Evidence/Historical fact, uninterpreted: I have verifiable evidence Reagan was once President.
5. Sensory perception of something external to me: I see my dog is lying at my feet.
6. Personal memory: I recall I had breakfast this morning.
7. Prediction from scientific theory: I calculate there will be a partial solar eclipse this week.
8. Trust in a Mentor: I trust this particular person to always tell me the truth, therefore I know …
9. Internal emotional state: I feel I'm happy, or I have empathy, compassion or sympathy for you.
10. Evidence/Historical fact, interpreted: I conclude from the fossil evidence in the geologic record that …
11. Determined facts: I accept this as fact because of a consensus or veto determination by others, i.e. I trust that these experts or fact finders know what they are talking about.
12. Imaginings: I imagine how things ought to have been in the Schiavo case.
2. Sensory perception of something external to me: I see my dog is lying at my feet. I am aware that this has limitations, but what choices do I have? I learn the limitations and live with them.
3. Personal memory: I recall I had breakfast this morning. Same limitations apply, except that they are more frequent and serious.
4. Logical conclusion: I can prove the Pythagorean theorem is valid and true. The trueness may be unassailable, but the conclusions of axiomatic reasoning are only as true as the axioms, which may be arbitrary. Outside of pure logic and pure mathematics, axiomatic reasoning drops quickly in my estimation of usefulness. People who argue politics and religion from a "rational" perspective are low on my list of useful sources.
5. Prediction from scientific theory: I calculate there will be a partial solar eclipse this week. I am not aware of any scientific theory that I understand which has failed in a major way. Some theories, of course, make sharper predictions than others. Eclipses are pretty certain.
6. Conclusion from evidence: I conclude from the verifiable evidence that ... Oddly enough, "facts" are less certain in my view than theories.
7. Acceptance of another's opinion: I provisionally accept the opinion of X (an individual or group) as knowledge because (a) I haven't worked it out for myself; and (b) I have what I regard as good reason for confidence in X.
A reply unerringly devoid of humor. :p
I made a froth chart for 'truth.' I thought maybe it would be a simpler chart than the one for 'evil,' but it is about the same level of complexity. WordNet shows about 5 or 6 entries for 'truth,' but my froth chart has 15 first level links and an average of 7 second level. I gave up at that point rather than carry it all the way out. It's too much, I'll stick to logical binary truth tables where it is all yes or no, none of this consensus stuff.
You don't need Newton's laws to predict lunar eclipses, but you do need a model (or visualization). Simply noting regularities might be sufficient to make general pridictions of lunar eclipses, but not solar eclipses.
The first effective solar eclipse predictions weren't until the second century A.D, and they were based on dynamical equations for astronomical orbits. While Ptolemy had no insight into why astronomical bodies behaved the way they do, he did have a detailed mathematical description of their trajectories (in an earth-centered system). Accurate eclipse prediction wasn't possible until the 18th century, after Kepler's laws had been discovered.
Sherlock Holmes and Dr Watson go on a camping trip. After a good dinner and a bottle of wine, they retire for the night, and go to sleep.
Some hours later, Holmes wakes up and nudges his faithful friend. "Watson, look up at the sky and tell me what you see."
"I see millions and millions of stars, Holmes" replies Watson.
"And what do you deduce from that?"
Watson ponders for a minute.
"Well, astronomically, it tells me that there are millions of galaxies and potentially billions of planets. Astrologically, I observe that Saturn is in Leo. Horologically, I deduce that the time is approximately a quarter past three. Meteorologically, I suspect that we will have a beautiful day tomorrow. Theologically, I can see that God is all powerful, and that we are a small and insignificant part of the universe. What does it tell you, Holmes?"
Holmes is silent for a moment. "Watson, you idiot!" he says. "Someone has stolen our tent!"
At the end of a paricularly unproductive day, Decartes wanders into a bar. The bartender notices his grimace.
Bartender: "Yer lookin' down there, Decartes. How about a beer?"
Decartes: "I think not."
And disappears in a puff of logic.
Life: the whim of a trillion cells to be you for a while.
Rosencrantz: What a shambles! We're just not getting anywhere! Not even England. And I don't believe in it anyway.
Guildenstern: In what?
Rosencrantz: England.
Guildenstern: Just a conspiracy of cartographers, you mean?
Thank you for your post!
Care to share the results? Sounds interesting.
And there is also an other awkward fact: science was only developed in the western part of "The West" and this at a time when the predominant religion split up into several denominations. In eastern Europe and Russia science never developed on its own but was only imported much later.
All persons are infinite, all things are finite. (Actually created persons are potentially infinite while divine persons are actually infinite, but that's a different subject)
Since "comprehension is a species of circumscription" (St. Gregory Nazianzen) persons can know things fully but other persons partially.
Knowledge of entities lower on the ontological scale is by cognition, while knowledge of entities equal or higher on the scale is by love.
There is an innate epistemological gap between persons and things but no such innate gap between persons.
Things are therefore known at an ontological distance by the analytical faculty which circumscribes and breaks things down into smaller things, thus making quantification possible. (We call this science in its most pure form). This knowledge is provable yet less personally meaningful. Which does not mean it is less useful; it is used to control and shape the material universe. Morally, you can legitimatey control and shape what is lower on the ontological scale.
Persons are known by closing the ontological gap in acts of love. This yields knowledge by participation (see Charles Williams and Owen Barfield), not analysis and this knowledge is less certain but more meaningful. It is less certain because it cannot be checked by backing off to enough ontological distance to do an act of analysis.
It is ok, though, for this knowledge to be less certain because it is not used to control and shape; its use is simple union of persons (friendship), with no external objective.
The act of knowing a person analytically reduces the object of the knowledge into a thing and yields false results. This fallacy is variously caled reductionism or perhaps scientism - the belief that all knowledge can be reduced to the scientific method (see Jacques Barzun).
(You can either know a particle's velocity or its position but not both; you can either know an entity as a thing or as a person, but not as both.)
The act of knowing a thing by participation is called romanticism and yields false results.
This is not to say you can't feel affection for things; of course we do. And we also can think analytically about people or God.
But not all affection is love and not all thinking is knowledge. And the order is important; we can feel more affection for things as we understand them better scientifically, and we can think better about people and God if we are thinking about them through the knowledge love produces.
(Applying the analytical faculty to the residue of love is called theology; this is the discipline whereby we reduce the fire of love to concepts the mind can grasp. The purpose of theology is conversation between friends, whose purpose, yet again, is love -- and the pattern repeats forever. This progressive oscillation in friendship between the intellect and love shortens its wavelength as the friendship grows until the two -- the mind and the heart -- unite in what we call, from the outside looking in, ecstasy. What do we call it from the inside? Nothing. It is a sigh. Language is transcended in love.)
So we know by thinking, and we know by loving. Each faculty is good and each has its proper object. The two glories of man are science and friendship. Science is how we keep the Garden; friendship is what the Garden is FOR. (see Genesis 1 and 2)
There are, of course, volumes to write in further subdividing thinking and loving, but this one simple distinction, allowing epistemology to follow ontology, is foremeost.
I suspect your reaction on this thread - that there is only one "right" answer which is your own - is shared by many though not expressed by many. After all, if a person did not believe he had the right answer, why would he embrace it at all?
Obviously though, there are many here who disagree with you. I am one. Nevertheless, it is important to me to know how and why you arrive at your conclusions! That is why we keep saying that there is no 'right' or 'wrong' answer to the question posed.
Instead of simply saying "belief" you say "mere belief". And again, in the second sentence, you presume that "beliefs" can be subjected to proofs. But generally speaking, a proof requires an observer status apart from that that which is being observed. Whereas in Christian faith, the Spirit Himself indwells - the "proof" is His person which abides in the believer and makes him a new person altogether. Thus the proof is of the same order as Descartes' cogito ergo sum - He thinks in me and I in Him, I know Him personally - He is.
So, go ahead and apply your skeptics' tests and demand your proofs - you will never meet God that way and will only estrange yourself from Him. In the meantime, your body of knowledge will accrue to the maximum limit of your mind.
I, on the other hand, will receive understanding according to God's will. My mind will form no limitation to my increase in knowledge according to His will.
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