Freeper Investigation: What kinds of "Knowledge" exist, and how "certain" are the various types?

4/6/2005 | Various Freepers

[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. Logical conclusion: I can prove the Pythagorean theorem is valid and true.
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.
Some clarification is probably in order here. I'm entirely certain that I have a feeling, so there is no doubt at all regarding knowledge of the feeling's existence. But as for what it is that the feeling may be telling me -- that is, the quality of the "knowledge" involved -- there's not much to recommend this as a great source of information. Example: I very often feel that I'm going to win the lottery. Because I'm so often being misled by my feelings, I've listed them dead last on my certainty index

Separate List for theological knowledge:

1. Revelation: Spiritual understanding divinely communicated.
2. Faith: Belief in a revelation experienced by another.

Alamo-Girl’s types of “knowledge” and valuation of certainties:

1. Theological knowledge, direct revelation: I have Spiritual understanding directly from God concerning this issue, e.g. that Jesus Christ is the Son of God - it didn't come from me.
2. Theological knowledge, indirect revelation: I believe in a revelation experienced by another, i.e. Scripture is confirmed to me by the indwelling Spirit.
To clarify: I eschew the doctrines and traditions of men (Mark 7:7) which includes all mortal interpretations of Scriptures, whether by the Pope, Calvin, Arminius, Billy Graham, Joseph Smith or whoever. The mortal scribes (Paul, John, Peter, Daniel, Moses, David, etc.) do not fall in this category since the actual author is the Spirit Himself and He confirms this is so to me personally by His indwelling. Thus I make a hard distinction between the Living Word of God and mere musings - including the geocentricity interpretations of the early church and my own such as in this article.
3. Logical conclusion: I can prove the Pythagorean theorem is valid and true.
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.

js1138’s types of “knowledge” and valuation of certainties

1. Internal emotional state: I feel I'm happy, or I have empathy, compassion or sympathy for you. This is pretty nearly the only thing I am certain of. It's certain even if I am deranged or on drugs, or both. In this category I would place my knowledge of morality, which for AG seems to be expressed as revealed knowledge.
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.

[JWinNC]

" Thank you for bumping by! I look forward to reading your views!"

Just some thoughts...

In our postmodern world, most people have lost touch with truth. Any study of knowledge should begin by studying the nature of truth. The fact that all truth is absolute is shocking to a relativistic world.

As to "types" of knowledge, I would include:

1. Truth, an understanding of the nature of truth:
a. truth corresponds to reality (the Correspondence view of truth)
b. truth complies with the law of bivalence
c. truth complies with the law of non-contradiction
d. truth is absolute
2. Logic/Deductions: Something must be true or must be false based on sound logical deduction.
3. Logic/Inductions/Empirical Data/Scientific Method: Something has a probability of being true based on sound logical induction. Only perfect inductions are 100%.
4. Experience, first hand knowledge: Something is known because it has been personally experienced.
5. Observation, first hand knowledge: Something is known because it has been personally observed.
6. History: Something is known to be true because of historical record.
7. Revelation: Knowledge that is revealed by a higher authority.
8. Faith: Something is known, or trusted to be true, because of one's belief in the source or standard.

JW

[Doctor Stochastic]

It's definitely more than a quibble. "A=A" is an important principle in resolving some seemingly inconsistent things. For example, an electron isn't a wave or a particle, it's an electron.

[Doctor Stochastic]

Every minute a sucker dies; and 1.077 are born.

[Doctor Stochastic]

I would argue that Ginsberg's statements consist of a true statement followed by two non sequiturs. (It seems to take the English plural.)

[cornelis]

Thanks. At 93 certainty is held as a criterium for true knowledge.

Certainty is nice, but if we value it too highly, we wouldn't have politics. It excludes too much of the past and future. Some certainty is found in the order of physical cause and effect and in the order of mathematics. Objectivity is also nice, but this limits knowledge to what is verifiable right now. Things that are going to happen is outside of its scope, unless they can also happen right now. Objectivity of this kind is very exclusive. It may be that your criterium for something called "scientific knowledge" interferes with an understanding of what knowledge includes. Additionally, theological knowledge is not limited to revelation. Neither is revelation exclusive of history.

At 293 you suggest,that 303

[chronic_loser]

And if you have the eyes to observe what is around you in nature, and the ears to "hear" what that means, then you can rationally, "objectively verify" the dual account we have from God Himself, revealed in the Book of Scripture (revelation by Creator), and the Book of Nature (revelation by Creation). Both accounts accord beautifully.>>

Uhhhh... No. The "Book of Nature", for example, does not "accord beautifully" with the Noachian Flood of the "Book of Scripture", for just one example of many. >>>>>>>

precisely the type of sneering halfway informed pompous crap I have heard a thousand times. Usually from someone who has taken freshman chemistry and read exceprts from Henry Morris (from the skeptic tank..., where else?) and assumes he therefore knows all there is to know regarding biblical cosmology. Gratuitous insults and unbacked accusations only work when you are dealing with people who are confused by what "phyla" means.

If you want a personal, up close demonstration of how empirical science is completely baseless as an epistemological foundation, all you have to do is ask.

Empiricism is NOT science, and the smarter scientists know that. It is only the dishonest and dullards who pretend otherwise.

[hosepipe]

[ Every minute a sucker dies; and 1.077 are born. ]

Perfectionists are sick suckers... Nyah.. d;-'~

[cornelis]

At 293, mistakes turn out to be a good excuse to understand better. The abuse of faith is as rampant as the abuse of reason.

[donh]

Second, the fact remains that no matter how much you try to hand-wave it away, there *is* pondering going on, that pondering *is* taking place, and its substrate (whatever it may or may not be) therefore *does* exist. Decartes is vindicated yet again.

Descarte isn't in the least vindicated. Even if you could prove your "pondering" exists, which you can't, why is there any particular reason to believe it is your pondering? Why can't all the manifestations of your pondering that you find so manifestly proving your existence, be the result of some superior being who dreamed you up, complete with your conviction that it must be you who exist, because of your illusion that you are thinking stuff up.

Since you are willing to accept your pondering's supposed existence without proof, why should I regard the notion that some being thought you and your ponderings (or me and my ponderings) up as any less reliable?

[cornelis]

At 303, you cite a papal view that "There exist two realms of knowledge" which do not conflict.

There are two ways these two soures of knowledge coexist or do not conflict:

Either they are (a) part of a dualistic world where they never interact or (b) they are integral and harmonious.

The first view is not Catholic, but it appears to be the view you would prefer.

[Doctor Stochastic]

It is difficult to see how revelations can lead to anything but conflict. If two people to have conflicting revelations, how does one choose which (if either) is "correct"? If one chooses, then the choice method is a superior method of gaining knowledge than the revelations because it can refute one or both.

In practice, we always make this type of judgement. Joan of Arc had (or claimed to have) a relevation that led her to slaughter a bunch of Englishmen; Andrea Yates had (or claimed to have) a relevation that led her to drown her kids. Both were treated (by history if not by the clergy, in Joan's case) as if they acted on their own.

[djf]

Well said. I will offer an expanded view.

A Yanamamo tribesman comes up from the Amazon. He hears about brilliant men at a local university. He enters the math department and walks up to the desk of the man who is heralded as being the best mind at the university.


He asks the prof "What will I have for lunch tomorrow?"

The math prof tells him to get lost. The native insists that the man is deemed wise, so should know or be able to predict the answer.

Now the natives question is a valid question. And we will someday know the answer.

But math can only answer math questions. Physics can answer (some) questions about particles and waves, but none about art or Martha Stewart's housekeeping methods.

So searching for emperical knowledge has somewhat painted us into a corner.

I remember Art Linkletter when he used to interview children. The amount of wisdom and truth that came from some of those toddlers mouths was way beyond many things I've heard from Nobel prize winners!

Just the nature of things, IMHO.

[Doctor Stochastic]

A Labor of Dignity as opposed to the Dignity of Labor.

[Doctor Stochastic]

Nor is Tao Jones the Eternal Tao; just an average one.

[cornelis]

The same difficulty applies to situations in war. Perhaps we should not have stormed the beaches at Normandy. Perhaps we should have taken out Saddam in the Gulf War. Etc., etc.

[Doctor Stochastic]

Only partly. They were able to predict when eclipses wouldn't occur, and when they might occur. It takes theory to predict when they will occur. (I'll that would sound much more pompous in German.)

[chronic_loser]

Descartes announced a tautology, not a predication for existence.

Technically, it is correct to say "doubts exist," nothing more. the "I doubt" is slipped in under the door and is not realized.

Further, even if you DO recognize Cartesian self-awareness as a beginning point for knowledge, there is no escape from solipsism with Descartes. He himself recognized that, and acknowldeged that one had to posit a benificent God who had ordered the cosmos to be congruent with our brains (and vice versa) in order to make meaningful statements about ANYTHING other than our own existence.

It is clear you don't understand Descartes. That is not an insult. I don't understand him either. But it is not wise to swing a club at someone unless you are aware that that very club will wind up taking your own head clean off when you swing it. You need another stick, bubba. DesCartes is NOT your solution.

Now, would you like to remind me why an empiricist treats the sesory inputs from a cosmos that is uncertain and ordered by a neural ganglia of which he is also uncertain into "knowledge" of which he is certain? Is it because some red lights flash on a machine (designed by processes in that uncertain ganglia), or is it because his perceptions of that data are grouped into categories by that same neural gangila and you assume therefore that this has some "real" relationship to the cosmos out there? On what basis do posit such crap?

Glass houses and stones.

[Doctor Stochastic]

False analogy. The reasons for going to war in those cases were not based solely on claims by the instigators: Roosevelt and Bush. Both actions were discussed with others before any overt acts were undertaken.

[cornelis]

True, but revelation is not confined to conflicting visions.

[mathluv]

bttt