What can I know with certainty, if anything? What is the source of knowledge?
What is ‘truth’?
In human life, there are many things people think they know with
certainty. Is it really so? Can anybody be really sure about knowing something?
What make us know something? Is there any knowledge in the world that is so
certain that no reasonable man could doubt it? According to Bertrand Russell,
this last question, which at first sight might not seem difficult, is really one of the
most difficult that can be asked. In daily life, we assume many things to be
certain, which after a closer analysis, are found to be less correct than we first
thought.
Knowledge plays a very important part in human lives. In the history of
humankind, it was knowledge that separated common people from the mighty
ones. It was the one’s knowledge that evoked respect, power, or fear from others.
Today, knowledge is more accessible than ever before. There is an obligatory
education system, newspapers, Internet, and scientific journals that are available
for everybody and offer all kinds of information and knowledge. But is
everything what we learn in school or read on the Internet true? Can I be certain
about any knowledge I have gained in my life? It is the theory of knowledge that
deals with these kinds of questions, to distinct things between appearance and
reality, between what things seem to be and what they are. The technical name
for the theory of knowledge is epistemology, which is derived from the Greek
word episteme, meaning “knowledge,” and the suffix ology, meaning “science
of.” In its original sense the word “science” meant “an organized body of
knowledge.” Today, theory of knowledge is an organized body of knowledge
about the knowledge.
The question about the nature of knowledge became very popular for
ancient Greek philosophers who formulated numerous theories concerning it. An
important part of the ancient Greek thinker’s philosophies was the concern about
the origin and nature of the world. These early thinkers were led to the
conclusion that the world is different from what it appears to be. This fact
allowed a new series of disputes about the true nature of reality, and these
disputes generated extended controversy about the nature of knowledge itself.
According to Heraclitus, the world is a thoroughly dynamic system (a “fiery
flux”) in which permanence and stability are something of an illusion. He
claimed that everything moves on and that nothing is at rest. Parmenides, a
contemporary of Heraclitus tried to explain how reality is known, but ended up
with an absolutely surprising view of things. According to Parmenides, thought
and reality are the same and whatever is, is; and whatever is not, is not. Hence,
change cannot occur. A later thinker, Protagoras, turned his back to the idea that
there is an ultimate reality behind appearances and argued that our knowledge
concerns appearances and nothing else. He asserted that man is the measure of
all things, so things that appear to one man may be different to another.
Protagoras’ claims seemed false to Plato. According to Plato, “one cannot
reasonably claim that all knowledge is relative because in doing so one implies
that some of it is not, namely, the knowledge one claims to have.” To allow that
the latter knowledge may also be relative is completely self-defeating, since it
will also allow the alternative claim of Heraclitus and Parmenides that genuine
knowledge is never relative (Aune, 5). Therefore Plato thought that at least some
knowledge is nonrelative.
In developing his ideas, Plato used the views of Heraclitus and
Parmenides. For Plato, the both men were undoubtedly correct in saying that
knowledge is nonrelative and concerns the true nature of reality. Heraclitus’s
idea that the natural world is constant, throughout going change; and
Parmenides’s idea, that true knowledge concerns something eternal and
unchanging both impacted Plato’s thinking. To provide his thoughts, Plato used
geometry as a model for his theory of genuine knowledge. He argued that
circularity, triangularity, and numbers are all know as ideal objects, because they
can be fully understood and defined. No drawn circle is a “perfect circle” and
things in nature merely approximate the shapes of a perfect circle, therefore
mathematical objects, such as the perfect circle, exists only as ideas and may have
genuine knowledge. In addition to these ideal mathematical objects, Plato also
admitted ethical objects as genuinely knowledgeable as well. Such objects are
Courage, Temperance, Piety, and Goodness (Aune, 6). These ethical ideals are
also unchanging, eternal and can be exactly understood. On the other hand, the
lack of human behavior’s perfection makes genuine knowledge of humans
strictly impossible. No man is perfectly good or perfectly courageous and
therefore the ethical qualities of human beings are always matters of degree. Like
drawn circles, human beings are only partially understandable and our view of
them can be characterized only within ideas.
It seems hard to believe that theories formulated 2500 years ago could
have such a big impact on world of philosophy. Plato and his idea, that true
knowledge is restricted to a domain of ideal object and that things in nature are
understandable only approximately, gave a good starting point for other
subsequent thinkers that based their views regarding man and the world on
Plato’s ideas.
Although the entire history of philosophy is very fascinating and full of
powerful ideas, the “breakthrough” came with the modern period and its father
René Descartes. This famous thinker attempted to develop theory of knowledge
that would settle philosophical controversy once and for all. He determined that
he would believe nothing which he did not see quite clearly and distinctly to be
true. He tried to bring everything for himself to doubt and whatever he could
bring to doubt, he would doubt, until he found something that can’t be doubted.
By using this method he found out that the only thing he could be quite certain
about was his own existence. If he is doubting, he must necessarily exist as a
doubter, as a being who does the doubting. You cannot doubt if you do not exist,
if you doubt, you must exist, if you have any experiences whatever, you must
exist. Since he is doubting, he exists; his existence is an absolute certainty to him.
“I think, therefore I am,” he said. Descartes has discovered his absolute certainty,
and on the basis of this certainty he set to work to build up again the world of
knowledge which his doubt had laid in ruins.
Descartes performed a great service to philosophy, but his knowledge is
on the other hand extremely limited in content. He is certain about his existence
whenever he thinks, but he does not know what he is. To facilitate his search for
further knowledge Descartes attempted to identify the distinguishing features of
an indubitable truth. He did this by focusing on the certain knowledge that he
had discovered. He found that his certainty about his existence amounts to no
more than a clear and distinct apprehension of his existence. Apprehension of
this kind must, therefore, be a certain mark of truth; if his apprehension of
something would go wrong, he could not be certain about his own existence.
Therefore, whatever can be apprehended very clearly and distinctly must be true.
Descartes’ approach to knowledge is a good example of what is called
epistemological rationalism. The term rationalism is applying to theories of
knowledge similar to that of Descartes. Taking Descartes as a representative, our
knowledge of reality is an organized structure based on a foundation of certain
truth. The certainty of this truth is known immediately, intuitively, and is
indubitable. So known truth occurs in two kinds: general principles and
particular matters of fact. The truth of general principle include such certainties
as thinking requires a thinker; the truth of particular matters of fact include such
specific intuitions as one has the idea of perfect being. All other knowledge,
including knowledge dependent of use of our senses, is derivative from these
basic certainties.
If Descartes can be taken as a representative for rationalism, than Hume
can be the representative for empiricism. Unlike Descartes, Hume believed that
human knowledge could be ascertained only by the development of the “science
of man,” which would exhibit a man’s thought process and his reasoning. Hume
obtained Isaac Newton’s idea of using experimental method for developing the
“science of man.” Hume claimed that “the only solid foundation we can give to
this science itself must be laid on experience and observation.” (Aune, 40) These
words could be identified as the motto of all following empiricisms. The
empiricists maintained that all our knowledge is derived from experience, while
rationalists maintained that in addition to what we know by experience there are
certain ideas which we know independently to our experience.
According to Hume, a man’s mind consists of impressions and ideas.
Impressions comprise our raw experiences – desires, emotions, feelings and they
give rise to ideas. He describes his theory on the example of pain. A man feeling
pain can recall the memory of this pain less vivid and there is a considerable
difference between the perception of the mind during and after the pain occurred.
Our immediate, raw experience differs from our thoughts in being more vivid
and forceful. According to Hume, “our thoughts may mimic or copy our
impression, but they never can reach the force and vicacity of the originals.”
(Aune, 41) According to these discoveries, Hume distinguishes simple from
complex ideas. Hume assumed that simple ideas build complex ideas by the
means of “compounding, transporting, augumenting, or diminishing.” The
thought that all complex ideas can be analyzed into simple ideas, these simple
ideas are copies of impressions helped Hume to identify that a posteriori
knowledge is gained through experience based on our memories and senses. To
know something, we first need to experience it or observe it.
Some philosophers held the idea that whatever exists, or whatever can be
known to exist, must be in some sense mental. This basic principle forms the
grounds of idealism are generally derived from the theory of knowledge where
things must first satisfy some conditions in order to know them. Bishop Berkeley
was the first philosopher that attempted to establish idealism on such grounds.
He proved that our sense data cannot exist independent of us and must be, at
least partially, ‘in’ the mind. Sense data would not exist if there were no seeing,
hearing, touching, smelling, or tasting. He argued that our perceptions could
only guarantee the existence of things that are immediately known in sensation,
and that to be ‘in’ mind means to be known, and therefore to be mental. Hence
he concluded that only what is in mind can be known and everything outside the
mind can never be known, and that whatever is known without being in
somebody’s mind must be in somebody else’s mind.
For Berkeley, anything that is immediately known, such as things
immediately known in sensations, are called ‘ideas’. For example, seeing a
particular color is an idea. He shows that all we can know about perceiving
common objects, such as an apple, consists of ideas, and he argues that there is
no reason to suppose that there is anything real about the apple except what is
perceived. He states that its being consists in being perceived, and he admits that
the apple continues to exist even when we are not looking at it or when we leave
the room where the apple is situated. This continued existence of the apple is due
to the fact that God still perceives it and the apple consists of ideas in God’s mind,
and stays there as long as the apple continues to exist. According to Berkeley, all
our perceptions consist in partial contribution in God’s perceptions, and because
of this perception different people perceive the same apple but with little
differences.
It is hard to say which philosopher is right in his proposal of a theory of
knowledge. Everybody sees certain problems from different points of view and
with different attitude. If I should state what I think is the correct theory of
knowledge, I would borrow ideas from all of the mentioned theories. I would
take Berkeley’s idea and say that to know something we need both, our senses, to
identify the aspects things, and our mind, to “explain” the aspects of things and
connect them together to build an actual object from theses aspects. But this
would allow things to exist only in the present moment, because our senses
capture the data of a certain object only in the time we are in contact with it.
Therefore, I would use Hume’s idea of impressions and ideas, which states that
our knowing is based on our experience, thus we must first observe a thing and
store it so we can later recall it and so know it. Descartes’ theory “I think,
therefore I am” shows me that things other than myself must also exist. Because
Descartes stated this, he must exist. I think, therefore I am. If Descartes and I
exist, and Descartes and I are the same kind of things, then other kind of things
like us must exist. If different existing people can observe the same thing, then
this thing exists for them. Somebody could argue that two different people
observing a thing at the same time actually don’t observe the same thing because
they don’t describe the thing in the same way. I think this might be the cause of
different expressions, not different perceptions or different interpretations. It is
because people’s definitions of things are very simple and reserved.
The question of knowing things is a really difficult part of philosophy.
Knowing that a physical object, such as table, is situated in the middle of a room,
we achieve two kinds of knowledge about it: knowledge of things and
knowledge of truths. Knowledge of things can be achieved by acquaintance,
which is essentially simpler than knowledge of truths and also logically
independent of knowledge of truths. Knowledge of things can be known by
description and is dependent on some knowledge of truths. We can say that we
have acquaintance when we are directly aware of things. In the table example, I
am acquainted with the appearance of the table that is immediately known to me
through sensation, like when I am touching or seeing the table. Thus, seeing the
color of the table doesn’t make me know the color itself any better than I did
before. I have acquaintance of the things immediately known to me just as they
are, but not the table itself. The knowledge of the table is further known only by
describing the table by means of the sense data. This is called the knowledge of
description, and in order to know anything about the table, we must know truths
connecting it with things which we are acquainted. Thus, all our knowledge
about the table is knowledge of truths, and we do not know the actual table at all.
The only thing we know is that there is an actual object to which the description
applies, but this object is not directly known to us.
As things are concerned, we may know them or not know them. Our
knowledge of truths, unlike our knowledge of things, has an opposite side, called
error. We may conclude wrong inferences from our acquaintance, but the
acquaintance itself cannot be delusive. Unlike the knowledge of truths, for
acquaintance there is no dualism. We may believe what is false as well as what is
true. As long as many people hold different beliefs and opinions, some of them
must be erroneous. So how do I know that my opinion is not erroneous?
According to Bertrand Russell, this is a question of the very greatest difficulty, to
which no completely satisfactory answer is possible. How can we know whether
a belief is true or false? There are three points, which states an attempt to
discover the nature of truth. A true theory of truth: (1) allows truth to have an
opposite, namely falsehood, (2) makes truth a property of beliefs, but (3) makes it
a property wholly dependent upon the relation of the beliefs to outside things.
How can we know what is true and what is false? How can we know
anything at all? Can we say that knowledge could be defined as true beliefs? If
my belief is true, can I concluded that I have achieved knowledge of what I
believed? To give an example, I can guess and say that you own a red Ferrari car.
I can be right, and you really own one, in spite I had no idea what kind of car
you really own. Can I therefore conclude that I have certain knowledge, because
I knew that you have a red Ferrari car? A true belief is not always knowledge. A
true belief cannot be called knowledge if it is deduced from fallacious reasoning,
even if the belief’s premises are true. To know something, the premises must not
only be valid, but must also be known. Therefore, we can say that knowledge is
what is validly deduced from known premises.
Philosophy’s goal like most other studies is primarily knowledge. The
knowledge it seeks is the kind of knowledge, which gives unity and system to
the body of sciences. The kind, that results from a critical examination of our
convictions, prejudices, and beliefs (Russell, 154). The real value of philosophy is
its very uncertainty. Philosophy is unable to tell us with certainty what the true
answer is, but through our questions and doubts, it suggests many new ways
and possibilities. Therefore, philosophy is to be studied, not for the sake of any
definite answers to its questions, but rather to for the sake of the questions
themselves.
Works cited:
Aune, Bruce. Rationalism, Empiricism, and Pragmatism. New York: Random House,
1970.
Nagel, Ernest, and Richard B. Brandt. Meaning and Knowledge. Harcourt, 1965.
Russell, Bertrand. The Problems of Philosophy. Oxford University Press, 1959.
Moore, Brooke Noel, and Kenneth Bruder. Philosophy, the Power of Ideas. McGraw-Hill,
2002.