Friday, October 11, 2019
Are Some Ways of Knowing More Likely Than Others to Lead to Truth? Essay
Most people believe that money makes the world go round. But scholars believe otherwise. It is the knowledge of how to acquire wealth and of how to make the most of it is really the decisive factor. Humans couldn’t have mastered this world with all its richness in resources and mysteries without ample knowledge of how to do so. It is the gift of knowledge that has set humans apart from any other living species. So it is just proper that scholars delve into studying the concept of knowledge for us to understand it better.                        To be more specific, this school of thought is called the â€Å"Theory of Knowledge.†Theory of knowledge is also known as Epistemology. What is so special about Theory OF Knowledge is that it is widely considered as the most important sub-field of philosophy. The Theory of knowledge had made significant advancements since it was first formally studied. But even though it has already presented many different ways to obtain the â€Å"truth†, many still ask: Are some ways of knowing more likely to be successful to lead to the â€Å"truth†than other methods (Ways of Knowing).            Scholars have dedicated their studies for the further advancement of the Theory of Knowledge. They have gone through countless debates and research for the advancement of the field. This is because of the demand for better understanding is ever-increasing as humanity progresses. The truth is what everyone wants. What makes things difficult for scholars studying the Theory of Knowledge is that many philosophers also argue that the â€Å"truth†cannot be contained, it cannot be resolved, it is unattainable. However, the Theory of Knowledge counters the argument by presenting to us five ways of knowing that could assist us in obtaining the truth. The five ways of knowing are logic, revelation, language, sense, and emotion. Let us give further details about the five ways of knowing and see if one can be the best way of getting to the truth (Butchvarov 1970). Sense            For psychologists, sense or perception pertains to the processes that involve the acquisition, organization, interpretation, and selection of information acquired through the bodily senses. These conventional senses that we are familiar with are namely sight, taste, touch, smell, and hearing. Sensory information is basically acquired through sensory organs that can be found in the human anatomy. We can be easily familiarized with this particular way of knowing because we put it into use on a daily basis. We use our eyes to view colors, we can tell the difference in taste between an ice cream and fish, we use our hands to feel rough and smooth surfaces, we use our ears to listen to music. These are practical things we do everyday that we put into use to â€Å"know†, to obtain truth (Gibson 1966).            Beyond the five senses that we are familiar with, there are also addition to the classical senses like temperature, balance, pain, and other recently studied sense that would be too technical to discuss in this paper.            Maurice Merleau-Ponty, a French phenomological philosopher, argues that sense is the foundation of all knowledge and sciences. Even though sense itself cannot give meaning to the objects it â€Å"senses†in this world, the person is able to give meaning from his or her own consciousness. The use of the senses requires constant use for it to give meaning to the objects in this world. As we put into practice our senses, we develop what is called â€Å"mental models.†As the word suggests, as sensory information is sent to our brain, we develop models that we can use as reference if ever the senses encounter the object again. It is like making imprints in our brain about the things around us.            With the use of sense as an approach to obtaining truth, humans can obtain the truth, or at least have an idea, by using the brain’s capabilities. In simpler terms, with the use of senses, humans make the full use of what they intrinsically have, our very own bodies.            The only drawback I can offer about using senses to obtain truth is that we can’t always gain access to the objects involved in our queries. For example, if we hear a radio advertisement about ice cream stating that it is sweet, we can’t validate the claim since we are only using hearing, we don’t actually taste the real thing. Logic            If we go into the etymology of the word â€Å"logic†, we could unearth meanings like reasoning, argument, idea, principle, and thought. It is primarily concerned with the validity of inferences. It is considered a branch of philosophy. Immanuel Kant argued that logic should be a science devoted to studying judgments (Russel 1917).            Logic, like senses, also makes use of the capabilities of the human brain. If we use this as an approach to obtain truth, logic assesses all possible arguments, eliminates all improbable answers to come up with the most convincing.            Logic can be a very efficient way to obtain truth. Actually, it is as used as senses, also in a daily basis. But oftentimes we come across things that our minds can’t comprehend. This is because logic, like sense, makes use of what we already know. So if we use logic in questions about the existence of ghosts, we hastily jump to conclusion that they don’t exist because it defies logic. The problem here is that there are people who believe in the existence of ghosts. So the existence of two different â€Å"truths†makes either feeble. Language             Language is basically our means of communication. It particularly refers to the use of various forms of communication and the set conventional rules that governs its usage (Crystal 2001).            Personally I wouldn’t use language to derive truth. Humans have developed the use of language far more than any specie could have. Humans have become so adept in using language that we can easily manipulate it. If language is used in combination with logic and reasoning, humans can make â€Å"truths†come out of nowhere. Moreover, there is the concept of â€Å"lying†that can lead us farther from the truth.            For example, if there is a trial in court. The lawyers from the two opposing parties have different interest. They defend their arguments with adept use language. The problem may arise if the innocent party, shall I say was outspoken by the opposing party. Then the judge was impressed by the adept use of language even though the opposing party was just presenting lies all the time, just speaking them in a very eloquent manner. Thus the verdict will just be decided by how words were used. The verdict will be considered the truth however it is far from the real thing. Emotion            There are so many definitions for the word emotion. Actually, there is no universally agreed term for the word emotion. According to the APA Dictionary of Psychology, it is a complex reaction pattern that a person uses to approach a significant and personal matter.            Perhaps feelings would make the subject of emotions much simpler. Feelings are the experiences that come with emotions. Feelings are very useful tools for obtaining truth. Humans have this unexplainable ability to know things just be using their feelings. There are such ambiguous concepts such as gut-feel and motherly instincts (Cornelius 1996). But the problem with using feelings to obtain truth is that emotions and feelings are very prone to be biased. Also since emotions are complex in nature, it will also provide us complex results. I believe that the truth should be unbiased before it is presented or accepted.            For example, I will use the courtroom scenario again, the truth is that the defendant really did the violation he is accused of. He then delivered a very empathic speech that convinced the jury. The decision of the jury had a great impact on the final verdict. Once again, it failed to obtain truth as the jury felt that the defendant was innocent. After all, a feeling is only a feeling and certainly not necessarily the truth. Revelation            And last but definitely not the least, we have revelation as a way of knowing. Revelation, as the word suggests, is about a disclosure that has been provided by a divine being. What has been disclosed is something initially unknown and implausible for humans to uncover. We can also call this divine intervention. The realizations and messages disclosed during revelations transcend the known boundaries of human comprehension. We are familiar with revelations as it happened to the most famous prophets that later on became the proponents of the world’s most popular religions. Most of the instance that the revelations happen to the prophets is when they are in a meditating or in a trance state. Some accounts of revelations happen in dreams. But revelations are not exclusive to great prophets. Actually there are much many accounts of revelation to normal people (Franz 1975).            Probably the best example of the use of revelations is on the holy books of the world’s most popular religions. These holy books are distributed around the globe in countless copies. The religions devout followers live their lives according to the words of these scriptures. It is because these people believe these words to be the truth. That these words are the very words of God himself. Many may challenge the level of truthfulness of these holy scriptures. But if they take in consideration what we’ve learned in theory of knowledge, we will discover we shouldn’t challenge the validity of these scriptures. We are talking about faith here, faith is something that can’t be easily shattered within a person. When we say that a certain belief is someone’s faith, that automatically counts as that someone’s truth. Conclusion            Sense and logic could have been the best ways to knowing the truth. However they both fell short as both of them have certain limitations. Both of these ways of knowing is relying much to the capabilities of the brain, which we know as of now is very limited.            Language and emotions are too complex to put into use of obtaining the truth. And the problem was both of them often leads to a biased truth, which we can’t categorize as a genuine truth.            As the best ay of knowing the truth, I preferred it through revelation. The other ways of knowing the truth made me realize how hard it is to obtain truth. Also, the word faith comes with the rod revelation. I believe we should be faithful to what is true. I’m aware that it is still difficult to prove revelations through physical evidence. But we don’t need any of that evidence if we get our goal, the truth. Maybe the truth is really far from the reaches of our comprehension. Maybe if we explore more the possibilities of revelations may it be through religious meditations or simple dreaming. Works Cited Butchvarov. The Concept of Knowledge. Evanston, Northwestern University Press. 1970 Cornelius, R. The science of emotion. New Jersey: Prentice Hall. 1996 Crystal, David. The Cambridge Encyclopedia of the English Language. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press. 2001 Gibson, James J. The Senses Considered as Perceptual Systems. Boston. 1966 Raymond Franz. The Appropriate Time for God to Act. Crisis of Conscience,.1975. pp. 237–253 Russell, Bertrand. Mysticism and Logic. London. Allen and Unwin. 1917 Ways of Knowing. Problems of Knowing and Linking Questions. 7 January 2008
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