Well think about it. How many facts do you believe because you have preformed the experiments yourself, and how many do you believe because scientists or scientific publications have told you to believe them? How many things do you believe because a person you trust tells you? We look down on hearsay, but in reality a huge portion of knowledge is hearsay. It is just hearsay that has been legitimized by power.
Knowledge is legitmized information whether you except it or not. It would be an enormous limit on what peopel could know if they would have to experience everything themselves.
First off, you are confusing belief and knowledge. Belief is what you were talking about with the religion example; they produce belief. Knowledge is beliefs that match reality.
Knowledge has nothing to do with social power, and your science example has a better explanation. We believe the things published in journals and said by scientists because expert opinion is strongish evidence for truth. Hearsay is usually worthless because most people’s beliefs are not formed by a causal entanglement process with reality. Science hearsay is produced by causal entanglement, so we take it as good evidence.
Most of what we know is based on doing the experiments ourselves. I didn’t read the layout of my house from a science journal, I didn’t read about the color of my socks from a science journal, I didn’t learn how to make a good stew from a science journal. The only type of knowledge we get from academic science is general theories about how the processes of reality work, and that is a very small subset of knowledge. We learn about that stuff from academia instead of on our own because it is more efficient for one person to do the experiment and publish than for all of us to build particle accelerators in our backyards.
Your argument stinks of trying to get us to accept some definition of knowledge so you can use it for other purposes that we wouldn’t agree with otherwise. Give up; jedi word tricks will not work on us. See 37 ways that words can be wrong.
In fairness, the question of what knowledge is is a rather subtle one: the Justified True Belief framework has certain problems. I’m personally inclined to dismiss that whole tangle of epistemological debate as hopelessly confused and just treat the word as referring to concept-clusters associated with strong evidence (and you seem to be doing something similar, if your second paragraph is anything to go by). That being said, though, all the standard senses of the word I’m aware of do seem to approach the idea of a reliable mapping between concepts and predictable reality from some angle.
That Gettier stuff looks like another place where non-bayesian epistemology goes off the rails.
We can forget about the philosophers’ confusion, tho; We know enough about knowledge to say that religious belief is not knowledge because it doesn’t match reality (and isn’t produced by causal entanglement).
Note I said a “huge portion of knowledge.” There is sensory knowledge as you have pointed out, but my point was that there are also institutions and individuals that produce knowledge outside of your sensor experience that you readily accept. When you read an academic paper you do not repeat all the experiements contained within it and its review of the literature. It would be inefficent. You accept because it is in an academic journal or because person X tells you it that it is reliable and true.
But to some extent even sensory knowledge is filtered through the institution of langauge.
When I read an article in a scientific journal, I don’t independently verify it. Nor did I independently verify my science textbooks. But some experts in the field have made predictions that I can easily verify.
Take some thermodynamics, some fluid dynamics, and some metallurgy. Voila, steam engines (and railroads). Add some chemistry. Voila, internal combustion engines (and cars). Add some aerodynamics. Voila, airplanes.
All of those tools are easy to verify. Your particular usage of “knowledge” makes it seem like answering “Will this plane fly?” is fundamentally similar to “Was Jesus one substance with the Father?” “Belief” seems like a better word for that similarity. Even if “knowledge” encompasses both, the two questions have extremely important differences, so we need a word to describe the category that includes the first question but not the second.
Phenomenological knowledge- is knowledge that you actively perceive
Political knowledge- is knowledge that is accepted due to its relation to some structure of power (parents, church, country, God, etc)
All of those tools are easy to verify.<
They are easy for you to verify because you have the tools to verify them. Whether it is due to economic, motivational, or biological reasons, not everyone has the tools to verify knowledge. You see it as easy because we are talking about a sphere of knowledge you are well-endowed in.
Some evidence really is universalizable. I assert that anyone in my physical position (without regard for upbringing) would agree that the light turned on, the ball fell, and the car drove.
Just because communities are imagined and the Meiji Ishin was not a restoration of any prior historical circumstances doesn’t imply that physics is imagined or that it lacks correspondence with the world.
Sure some information is. But you cannot deny that there is a huge body of information we accept to be truth soley based on the authority that provides it. For example, I could know using my senses that either the sun or the earth moves because I can see a change in the position of the sun as the day goes on. But it is impossible for me, or any other person, to know just from my sensory experience that the earth revolves around the sun (given the practical constraints of my life).
How do I know the earth revolves around the sun? I trust a network of people who tell me it does. How does that network know? They trust the non-humans they work with (machines most likely) that provide consistent results given pre-legitimized mathematical formula.
There is a large body of knowledge that we accept without any sensory information on the subject.
Here’s a link to the ways to calculate distances of various objects. Many of the earlier proofs (like heliocentrism) can be proved by experiments that are within your capacity.
Here’s a list of various putative phenomena. Many, like astrology, don’t work. Some, like quantum electrodynamics, do work, as shown by the fact that computers work. So, there are practical and verifiable differences in the world based on the truth or falsity of predictive theories.
But you cannot deny that there is a huge body of information we accept to be truth soley based on the authority that provides it.
In practice, almost all information (schooling, etc.). So what? Information that we learn from scientific (i.e. accurate prediction) processes is universalizable, at least to the extent that the scientist complies with the scientific rules. (That rules out Lysenkoism as universalizable). That’s the point of the examples that I listed. Experts say that GPS works because relativity is true, and GPS works. If you start analyzing relativity using power relations, you can question GPS or question the veracity of the experts. But GPS manifestly works. So, suspect the experts. But suspect them of what? Providing technology that works? They don’t deny. Using magic? Is that really the best explanation?
pre-legitimized mathematical formula.
What?!? Mathematics is non-empirical. If you are unsure whether 2 + 3 = 5 based on power relations, how do you explain the consistency of reality? Power relations are the method of analyzing moral truths. I accept that the line between moral and scientific truths is sometimes blurry, but there is a difference between those categories.
there is a huge body of information we accept to be truth soley based on the authority that provides it.
We accept science hearsay because it is based on interacting with reality. It’s not really a matter of authority so much as causality. One of the causal nodes just happens to look like authority, and you seem to think this has some significance. It doesn’t.
But it is impossible for me, or any other person, to know just from my sensory experience that the earth revolves around the sun (given the practical constraints of my life).
Then it’s mighty odd that anyone knows that the earth goes round the sun, seeing as someone had to know it with sensory experience in the first place. And if I don’t know it based on sensory experience, then how do I know? Is it a random anomaly that I happen to believe it? No. I believe it because my sensory experiences provide lots of evidence, and yes some of this evidence is expert opinion.
given pre-legitimized mathematical formula.
What is pre-legitimized?
There is a large body of knowledge that we accept without any sensory information on the subject.
Have you read the sequences? Political knowledge is bogus because it is based on something other than bayesian causal entanglement. There’s no such thing as knowledge not produced by bayes structure.
I don’t understand your point about not everyone having the tools. Can you clarify?
Yes. I am sorry I did not clarify that. For me it is assumed that legitimized knowledge includes self-legitmized knowledge because the self is clearly a major authority in a person’s life.
I am writing too fast and not taking into account that you all do not have a background in sociology or anthropology.
Well think about it. How many facts do you believe because you have preformed the experiments yourself, and how many do you believe because scientists or scientific publications have told you to believe them? How many things do you believe because a person you trust tells you? We look down on hearsay, but in reality a huge portion of knowledge is hearsay. It is just hearsay that has been legitimized by power.
Knowledge is legitmized information whether you except it or not. It would be an enormous limit on what peopel could know if they would have to experience everything themselves.
First off, you are confusing belief and knowledge. Belief is what you were talking about with the religion example; they produce belief. Knowledge is beliefs that match reality.
Knowledge has nothing to do with social power, and your science example has a better explanation. We believe the things published in journals and said by scientists because expert opinion is strongish evidence for truth. Hearsay is usually worthless because most people’s beliefs are not formed by a causal entanglement process with reality. Science hearsay is produced by causal entanglement, so we take it as good evidence.
Most of what we know is based on doing the experiments ourselves. I didn’t read the layout of my house from a science journal, I didn’t read about the color of my socks from a science journal, I didn’t learn how to make a good stew from a science journal. The only type of knowledge we get from academic science is general theories about how the processes of reality work, and that is a very small subset of knowledge. We learn about that stuff from academia instead of on our own because it is more efficient for one person to do the experiment and publish than for all of us to build particle accelerators in our backyards.
Your argument stinks of trying to get us to accept some definition of knowledge so you can use it for other purposes that we wouldn’t agree with otherwise. Give up; jedi word tricks will not work on us. See 37 ways that words can be wrong.
In fairness, the question of what knowledge is is a rather subtle one: the Justified True Belief framework has certain problems. I’m personally inclined to dismiss that whole tangle of epistemological debate as hopelessly confused and just treat the word as referring to concept-clusters associated with strong evidence (and you seem to be doing something similar, if your second paragraph is anything to go by). That being said, though, all the standard senses of the word I’m aware of do seem to approach the idea of a reliable mapping between concepts and predictable reality from some angle.
That Gettier stuff looks like another place where non-bayesian epistemology goes off the rails.
We can forget about the philosophers’ confusion, tho; We know enough about knowledge to say that religious belief is not knowledge because it doesn’t match reality (and isn’t produced by causal entanglement).
I know that my shoes are tied (having just glanced down to verify).
Does this fact have the blessing of the scientific establishment? Is it not a fact? Is it not knowledge?
I would say that I have knowledge that my shoes are tied, and that it has not been legitimized (or, indeed, considered) by “power”.
Edited to add: Unless you contend that I constitute “power”—in which case I would like to agree, but please convince the rest of the world.
Note I said a “huge portion of knowledge.” There is sensory knowledge as you have pointed out, but my point was that there are also institutions and individuals that produce knowledge outside of your sensor experience that you readily accept. When you read an academic paper you do not repeat all the experiements contained within it and its review of the literature. It would be inefficent. You accept because it is in an academic journal or because person X tells you it that it is reliable and true.
But to some extent even sensory knowledge is filtered through the institution of langauge.
When I read an article in a scientific journal, I don’t independently verify it. Nor did I independently verify my science textbooks. But some experts in the field have made predictions that I can easily verify.
Take some thermodynamics, some fluid dynamics, and some metallurgy. Voila, steam engines (and railroads).
Add some chemistry. Voila, internal combustion engines (and cars).
Add some aerodynamics. Voila, airplanes.
All of those tools are easy to verify. Your particular usage of “knowledge” makes it seem like answering “Will this plane fly?” is fundamentally similar to “Was Jesus one substance with the Father?” “Belief” seems like a better word for that similarity. Even if “knowledge” encompasses both, the two questions have extremely important differences, so we need a word to describe the category that includes the first question but not the second.
Phenomenological knowledge- is knowledge that you actively perceive Political knowledge- is knowledge that is accepted due to its relation to some structure of power (parents, church, country, God, etc)
They are easy for you to verify because you have the tools to verify them. Whether it is due to economic, motivational, or biological reasons, not everyone has the tools to verify knowledge. You see it as easy because we are talking about a sphere of knowledge you are well-endowed in.
Some evidence really is universalizable. I assert that anyone in my physical position (without regard for upbringing) would agree that the light turned on, the ball fell, and the car drove.
Just because communities are imagined and the Meiji Ishin was not a restoration of any prior historical circumstances doesn’t imply that physics is imagined or that it lacks correspondence with the world.
Sure some information is. But you cannot deny that there is a huge body of information we accept to be truth soley based on the authority that provides it. For example, I could know using my senses that either the sun or the earth moves because I can see a change in the position of the sun as the day goes on. But it is impossible for me, or any other person, to know just from my sensory experience that the earth revolves around the sun (given the practical constraints of my life).
How do I know the earth revolves around the sun? I trust a network of people who tell me it does. How does that network know? They trust the non-humans they work with (machines most likely) that provide consistent results given pre-legitimized mathematical formula.
There is a large body of knowledge that we accept without any sensory information on the subject.
Here’s a link to the ways to calculate distances of various objects. Many of the earlier proofs (like heliocentrism) can be proved by experiments that are within your capacity.
Here’s a list of various putative phenomena. Many, like astrology, don’t work. Some, like quantum electrodynamics, do work, as shown by the fact that computers work.
So, there are practical and verifiable differences in the world based on the truth or falsity of predictive theories.
In practice, almost all information (schooling, etc.). So what? Information that we learn from scientific (i.e. accurate prediction) processes is universalizable, at least to the extent that the scientist complies with the scientific rules. (That rules out Lysenkoism as universalizable). That’s the point of the examples that I listed.
Experts say that GPS works because relativity is true, and GPS works. If you start analyzing relativity using power relations, you can question GPS or question the veracity of the experts. But GPS manifestly works. So, suspect the experts. But suspect them of what? Providing technology that works? They don’t deny. Using magic? Is that really the best explanation?
What?!? Mathematics is non-empirical. If you are unsure whether 2 + 3 = 5 based on power relations, how do you explain the consistency of reality? Power relations are the method of analyzing moral truths. I accept that the line between moral and scientific truths is sometimes blurry, but there is a difference between those categories.
We accept science hearsay because it is based on interacting with reality. It’s not really a matter of authority so much as causality. One of the causal nodes just happens to look like authority, and you seem to think this has some significance. It doesn’t.
Then it’s mighty odd that anyone knows that the earth goes round the sun, seeing as someone had to know it with sensory experience in the first place. And if I don’t know it based on sensory experience, then how do I know? Is it a random anomaly that I happen to believe it? No. I believe it because my sensory experiences provide lots of evidence, and yes some of this evidence is expert opinion.
What is pre-legitimized?
So?
Have you read the sequences? Political knowledge is bogus because it is based on something other than bayesian causal entanglement. There’s no such thing as knowledge not produced by bayes structure.
I don’t understand your point about not everyone having the tools. Can you clarify?
You have been inconsistent about this. You did say,
But you also said,
which is what I commented on, and which seems to be speaking of “knowledge” generally. You then later doubled down with:
Did you mean instead, “knowledge includes any legitimized information”?
Yes. I am sorry I did not clarify that. For me it is assumed that legitimized knowledge includes self-legitmized knowledge because the self is clearly a major authority in a person’s life.
I am writing too fast and not taking into account that you all do not have a background in sociology or anthropology.