How do we know if we know something?
Most people have opinions on topics but how many people have knowledge? How would we recognize knowledge in the first place? What qualifies as knowledge? There are some things that I believe but how can I be certain that I’m not simply mistaken? I don’t want to open my mouth if I’m just going to pollute the world with misinformation. I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s my duty or responsibility to know what I’m talking about when I decide to run my mouth.
Comments (83)
The brain accrues sensory data of the world in manner of complexity so sophisticated that we can't comprehend it. It sends that data through recurrent neural networks to be interpreted across multiple structures and systems within the brain all at once, and stored for retrieval. That data informs your behavior, and through that behavior you gain more and more of an understanding as those neural networks build coherent conceptual abstractions that are tested in the real world for objectivity via behavioral application in a never ending feedback loop. So, for example, you posted this message here on the philosophy forum, and I'll know that you have responded to me the moment I see that you have done so. And then, if we continue interacting, I'll build a better and better understanding of you and your positions as I accrue sensory data from interacting with you as a force in the world the produces said data, in a continual back and forth loop of interaction until we stop.
Of course. Where else would I turn? Has any other system produced actionable knowledge?
Well, if you really think about it, there's not anything that you ever do for your entire life that doesn't fall into the realm of action. You could be in a coma, and as long as you aren't brain-dead, your brain is processing info and completing whatever tasks it can to maintain homeostasis, which, is exactly what it was designed for. So, the question then becomes, what knowledge have I ever accrued that isn't applicable, or consistent to and with that? If the mere fact of thinking is not only action, but enough action even to consume enormous amounts of calories, when has anything I've thought about, let alone discovered to be true, not something actionable? I quite literally can't think of anything. Everything seems to fall in that category. What do you think about that?
One way to know is experience -- a person talking has some or a lot of experience in it. If you got vaccinated, you know the side effects and how long they last. You could pass this information around. In fact, that's how the medical authorities know the side effects of a drug -- people experiencing it.
Bingo. That's where stuff gets fun. That being because, such standards come from abstractions, which come from data accrued. Meaning, standards, measurements, and values are self-generated concepts that are abstracted from data as it builds, in regards to given domains of inquiry that we accrue it in. So, for example, I've played and composed music for a little over ten years now. It took me about three years to start being able to use my knowledge base to create songs of my own. Another two or so to create songs that sounded good, and then another two or three to create songs that sounded really good and that had substantive poetry over it for lyrics. All that time my standards grew in accordance with internally set desires for achievement, in commensurate fashion with data accrued. And as I built my data networks I made them happen and reached for more on a feedback loop. That's where those come from.
Now apply that whole process to what you know about the history of science, or philosophy across time. Kinda cool, eh?
Correct me if I’m wrong but it sounds like you’re using empiricism to verify the validity of empiricism. Doesn’t that seem circular?
But how do you verify the validity of experience? Do you need another experience? If you use experience to verify the validity of experience then that seems a bit circular.
By simply accompanying the person to the vaccine clinic and seeing the needle emptied in his upper arm.
Seriously? Watch a surgeon operate then. How's that for experience?
But how do you know that your experiences are reliable or that you are interpreting them correctly?
I’m not a skeptic.
So if a surgeon told you about the surgery he just performed and which you just watched performed, you would still be skeptical of the account of the surgeon?
No, empiricism doesn't need validation, it is itself the validation process. Used when one needs only to employ it as a concept in a pursuit of a goal. Such a proposition is like saying, "it sounds like you're using telescopes to validate the use of telescopes." The answer is of course, that is contradictory. If the telescope needed to be validated by itself, it wouldn't be the telescope. Empiricism is used to measure accuracy of one's conceptual faculties. I make an abstraction, I put the abstraction into action and empiricism is what is used to analyze the results. So, in the telescope case, I would generate the abstraction "telescope," use my knowledge and craft skills to achieve the standard I set for what that concept means, then empirically analyze the results for achievement of those standards. Make sense?
And also remember when it comes to circularity, or question beggeing. Such does not apply to sound propositions, or valid propositions. Both are always tauological in nature. For example: A=A always true, always begging the question: sound. Same is true for human as a physical living entity in their capabilties. Circular only applies to our concepts, not our actual physical methods as living beings with an ever working brain that is collecting data ad infinitum.
How do you know that the telescope actually exists? What if it was just a mirage?
Because I conceptualized it, built it, and tested it for the standards I wished to build it with, namely telescope features.
What if it was just a mirage...... Easy, go touch it and use it.
Just real quick. The definition of "know": be aware of through observation, inquiry, or information.
The way I'd know if it were a mirage, would be exactly the way that the mirage as a proposition in my mind would arise: observing something that generates the concept of the possibility. You've asked the same question twice. Both imply the need for empirical observation after the initial question arises.
I did that for the sake of clarity. I hope you’ll pardon me.
How will you know if I will, unless I do?
But how do you know that all of this actually took place? What if you were hallucinating or dreaming and awoke to find yourself in a world where none of that ever took place?
I hope you will even if I can’t verify what took place in your heart of hearts.
Because I observed it through multiple data streams across time.
Quoting Average
The moment you introduce a scenarion like this, you are taking the person out of the empirical realm, and then asking them how they knew something when hallucinating. How about this. I bet you everything you own, that you will wake up tomorrow, forfending any tragedy, and notice that this message was left to you by Garrett Travers the empricist, and there's no amount of hypothetical propositions you can posit that will change it. And I also guarantee that I will know as much too. That's because the data streams that have been informing my life for months, are exactly as my waking mind arranged them to be. Again to know is to : be aware of through observation, inquiry, or information.
Meaning, to not know, is for those things not to have happened, that's how you know you don't know. Just think about the things you don't know. They fall directly into that category. Stuff you don't know, because you've never accrued any data on it.
Hope. Now, that's the true mirage. Which you know, intuitively.
I could ask you how you know that this definition isn’t completely worthless but it seems tangential. I’d prefer to ask you what you mean by information or inquiry. But I suppose I’ll start with observation. What qualifies as an observation in your view? Do you use the word like others do? Meaning that it refers to something nebulous like someone’s opinion.
Because it's actually just a symbolic term we've ascribed to the objective phenomenon of accruing data, and using that data to refine our behaviors. The word comes after the phenomena.
Quoting Average
Information: facts provided or learned about something or someone.
inquiry: an act of asking for information.
See the feedback loop here?
know: be aware of through observation, inquiry, or information.
Information: facts provided or learned about something or someone.
inquiry: an act of asking for information.
All on repeat forever.
Quoting Average
The observation is of itself so. It is qualified as a phenomenon, just as a tree is that exists, doesn't to be qualified, it's self-emergent. Empiricism is how I test the abstractions from those self-emergent data accruing phenomenon. To ask the question "how do you qualify it," is to have already answered it by knowing you asked the question. You couldn't ask a question unless the proposition had already been accepted as verified data of something you could do. Which is why you probably can't speak mandarin, and can't even attempt it. That's any language one can't speak.
Quoting Average
No. Words have meaning. Jus define them, and you have a reference frame to orient your thoughts.
But how do you discern fact from fiction? If it’s with more “information” then I’m sorry but I just can’t see how that isn’t circular.
I’m not a nerd so don’t really know what data is. It sounds like a synonym for information and I’ve already outlined my thoughts on that in my previous response.
I honestly don’t understand why this is problematic.
Quoting Garrett Travers
That would make all knowledge “actionable” regardless of what “system” produced it.
Isn’t empiricism a concept?
Sensory data is so vague it could include the so called “sixth sense”. What is a sense? What is nonsense? I’m just taking the piss by the way.
Why not? Answer me, god damn it! Answer me! :grin:
Why do you believe this?
Pray tell, edify us as to what it is that you (seem to) know.
Then this is not about the OP anymore. If you wanted to discuss justified belief, be explicit. And I say this because in the OP, it reads like you wanted to sift though good and bad information and how to go about that. This is different from justified true belief.
Obviously, you have some idea of what is true or false, else you wouldn't be questioning the information you come upon. Why don't you start there, define what ought to be true. Then, you can critique how we dish out "truths", which could be misinformation.
I don’t know what you mean by “ought”.
Probably I shouldn't use ought. But must. What must be true if xyz argument is sound and valid.
You’re not really referring to a specific argument. Also I’m not a logician. But from what I know about soundness in arguments it means that the premises are true and the argument is valid. My understanding of validity is that the conclusion can’t possibly be false if the premises are true. I’m not sure if I answered your question.
And yet we do every day. We couldn't interact with others, hold down a job, study or walk down the street safely if we didn't know pragmatically what is true or false. The fact that I can drive a car means I have knowledge of true and false when it comes to negotiating roads and traffic. If not, I would run into a bus or some other inconvenience.
If one were to take a radical view that everything is an illusion, all I can say to that is I have no choice but to believe it is real? What other plausible option do we have?
I think we should talk more often about our values than our knowledge, because I think many of the errors in truth that we make (especially the deliberate ones) are informed by our worldviews and desires, much more than they are informed by a sincere understanding of truth.
For example, I value creative and critical thinking above (most) else, so the above paragraph aligns strongly with my worldview. Any investigation into truth I undertake will be informed by my desire not to be constrained into thinking boxes or dead ends (like the dead end imposed when one "attains" knowledge. Knowledge means [sadly] there are no more questions).
With this in mind, I assert that people who claim to have knowledge are always deceiving themselves or us, or both, and that they aren't very adventurous in their thought (and that that's a bad thing). Is this assertion informed by knowledge? Certainly! [Or so I will devotedly purport to everyone on whom I wish to extend my worldview, including myself].
I would not be surprised if the whole apparatus of truth and knowledge was ultimately ONLY a rhetorical device. That's how everyone seems to use it anyway.
I try to avoid using truth and knowledge as rhetorical devices.
How am I supposed to take these sentences seriously? You say that have knowledge that informs your assertion but then you claim that anyone who claims to have knowledge is deceiving themselves or us, or both.
When you say [or think] something its whatever.
When you say [or think] something that's also true it is thought to have more merit.
It's mostly only a guess but I think that truth was basically naturally selected for as a valued concept because of this practical appeal. That's why I think truth and knowledge [could be] reducible to nothing more than a rhetorical device whether you try to avoid using it as one or not.
You aren't supposed to take it seriously
I don’t think that everything is an illusion. But if you don’t have a choice when it comes to what you believe then it doesn’t seem like you have any freedom.
The theme of freedom (where did that come from?) has never interested me. Life feels like free choice, That'll do me.
I don’t know a lot about pragmatism so I won’t be able to truly understand your argument until I take the time to investigate the subject.
I was using the word in its ordinary sense not the philosophical one. There is some overlap but basically it means if your belief about the world works then it is pragmatically true.
To each his own I suppose.
Quoting Tom Storm
Correct me if I’m wrong but according to your own understanding of pragmatic truth a car accident would render your beliefs pragmatically false. That’s the only reason I said anything.
I explained my view of this re-read it. I won't explain it again.
I read your view of this, explain it again. I won’t re-read it.
Good riddance.
Take care.
What do you mean?
Your [s]job[/s] duty is to justify your position then.
I am speaking in general. What must be true if xyz is sound and valid -- certainty is true.
Somehow, I've gotten tired of discussing JTB (justified true belief). It's been talked to death in another forum for years.
:up:
Well I suppose you can always discuss something else with someone else.
Idk. If you’re only interested in what “feels” true I don’t know why you decided to discuss the subject of what is actually true. I made it explicit that I was interested in how we know if we know something. I was not interested in feelings. I was interested in information and knowledge.
Nowhere did I say I am only interested in what feels true. You really need to read more closely.
Or you could exploit its nature and introduce a twist. That would be something.
Exploit the nature of what? What kind of twist do you have in mind?
What I wrote:
Quoting Tom Storm
Unpacking that, all I am saying is what people like Sam Harris have said - we may not have free choice, but it sure feels like we do. For me that will do given that I have no control about it.
At no point did I say feelings are all that matter or suggest that knowledge isn't possible. Epistemology is a minefield of a subject.
Fair enough.
It’s definitely not my favorite.
I mean how else can you breathe life into JTB? Do you have an idea of how to revive this epistemological view?