Theories of knowledge

Robert Reid, Knowledge (1896). Thomas Jefferson Building, Washington, D.C.

See also: Epistemology

The eventual demarcation of philosophy from science was made possible by the notion that
philosophy's core was "theory of knowledge," a theory distinct from the sciences because it was
their foundation Without this idea of a "theory of knowledge," it is hard to imagine what
"philosophy" could have been in the age of modern science.

Richard Rorty, Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature

The definition of knowledge is a matter of ongoing debate among philosophers in the field of
epistemology. The classical definition, described but not ultimately endorsed by Plato,[3] specifies that a
statement must meet three criteria in order to be considered knowledge: it must be justified, true, and
believed. Some claim that these conditions are not sufficient, as Gettier case examples allegedly
demonstrate. There are a number of alternatives proposed, including Robert Nozick's arguments for a
requirement that knowledge 'tracks the truth' and Simon Blackburn's additional requirement that we do
not want to say that those who meet any of these conditions 'through a defect, flaw, or failure' have
knowledge. Richard Kirkham suggests that our definition of knowledge requires that the evidence for the
belief necessitates its truth.[4]
In contrast to this approach, Wittgenstein observed, following Moore's paradox, that one can say "He
believes it, but it isn't so," but not "He knows it, but it isn't so." [5] He goes on to argue that these do not
correspond to distinct mental states, but rather to distinct ways of talking about conviction. What is
different here is not the mental state of the speaker, but the activity in which they are engaged. For
example, on this account, to know that the kettle is boiling is not to be in a particular state of mind, but to
perform a particular task with the statement that the kettle is boiling. Wittgenstein sought to bypass the
difficulty of definition by looking to the way "knowledge" is used in natural languages. He saw
knowledge as a case of a family resemblance. Following this idea, "knowledge" has been reconstructed as
a cluster concept that points out relevant features but that is not adequately captured by any definition. [6]
Communicating knowledge
Los portadores de la antorcha
Sculpture by Anna Hyatt Huntington about the transmission of knowledge from one generation to the
next
(Ciudad Universitaria, Madrid, Spain)
Symbolic representations can be used to indicate meaning and can be thought of as a dynamic process.
Hence the transfer of the symbolic representation can be viewed as one ascription process whereby
knowledge can be transferred. Other forms of communication include observation and imitation, verbal
exchange, and audio and video recordings. Philosophers of language and semioticians construct and
analyze theories of knowledge transfer or communication. [citation needed]
While many would agree that one of the most universal and significant tools for the transfer of knowledge
is writing and reading (of many kinds), argument over the usefulness of the written word exists
nonetheless, with some scholars skeptical of its impact on societies. In his collection of essays

Technopoly, Neil Postman demonstrates the argument against the use of writing through an excerpt from
Plato's work Phaedrus (Postman, Neil (1992) Technopoly, Vintage, New York, pp 73). In this excerpt the
scholar Socrates recounts the story of Thamus, the Egyptian king and Theuth the inventor of the written
word. In this story, Theuth presents his new invention "writing" to King Thamus, telling Thamus that his
new invention "will improve both the wisdom and memory of the Egyptians" (Postman, Neil (1992)
Technopoly, Vintage, New York, pp 74). King Thamus is skeptical of this new invention and rejects it as a
tool of recollection rather than retained knowledge. He argues that the written word will infect the
Egyptian people with fake knowledge as they will be able to attain facts and stories from an external
source and will no longer be forced to mentally retain large quantities of knowledge themselves (Postman,
Neil (1992) Technopoly, Vintage, New York,pp 74).
Classical early modern theories of knowledge, especially those advancing the influential empiricism of
the philosopher John Locke, were based implicitly or explicitly on a model of the mind which likened
ideas to words.[7] This analogy between language and thought laid the foundation for a graphic conception
of knowledge in which the mind was treated as a table (a container of content) that had to be stocked with
facts reduced to letters, numbers or symbols. This created a situation in which the spatial alignment of
words on the page carried great cognitive weight, so much so that educators paid very close attention to
the visual structure of information on the page and in notebooks. [8]
Media theorists like Andrew Robinson emphasise that the visual depiction of knowledge in the modern
world was often seen as being 'truer' than oral knowledge. This plays into a longstanding analytic notion
in the Wester intellectual tradition in which verbal communication is generally thought to lend itself to the
spread of falsehoods as much as written communication. It is harder to preserve records of what was said
or who originally said it usually neither the source nor the content can be verified. Gossip and rumors
are examples prevalent in both media. As to the value of writing, the extent of human knowledge is now
so great, and the people interested in a piece of knowledge so separated in time and space, that writing is
considered central to capturing and sharing it.
Major libraries today can have millions of books of knowledge (in addition to works of fiction). It is only
recently that audio and video technology for recording knowledge have become available and the use of
these still requires replay equipment and electricity. Verbal teaching and handing down of knowledge is
limited to those who would have contact with the transmitter or someone who could interpret written
work. Writing is still the most available and most universal of all forms of recording and transmitting
knowledge. It stands unchallenged as mankind's primary technology of knowledge transfer down through
the ages and to all cultures and languages of the world. [citation needed][disputed discuss]
Situated knowledge
Situated knowledge is knowledge specific to a particular situation. It is a term coined by Donna Haraway
as an extension of the feminist approaches of "successor science" suggested by Sandra Harding, one
which "offers a more adequate, richer, better account of a world, in order to live in it well and in critical,
reflexive relation to our own as well as others' practices of domination and the unequal parts of privilege
and oppression that makes up all positions."[9] This situation partially transforms science into a narrative,
which Arturo Escobar explains as, "neither fictions nor supposed facts." This narrative of situation is
historical textures woven of fact and fiction, and as Escobar explains further, "even the most neutral
scientific domains are narratives in this sense," insisting that rather than a purpose dismissing science as a
trivial matter of contingency, "it is to treat (this narrative) in the most serious way, without succumbing to
its mystification as 'the truth' or to the ironic skepticism common to many critiques."[10]

Haraway's argument stems from the limitations of the human perception, as well as the overemphasis of
the sense of vision in science. According to Haraway, vision in science has been, "used to signify a leap
out of the marked body and into a conquering gaze from nowhere." This is the "gaze that mythically
inscribes all the marked bodies, that makes the unmarked category claim the power to see and not be
seen, to represent while escaping representation." [9] This causes a limitation of views in the position of
science itself as a potential player in the creation of knowledge, resulting in a position of "modest
witness". This is what Haraway terms a "god trick", or the aforementioned representation while escaping
representation.[11] In order to avoid this, "Haraway perpetuates a tradition of thought which emphasizes
the importance of the subject in terms of both ethical and political accountability". [12]
Some methods of generating knowledge, such as trial and error, or learning from experience, tend to
create highly situational knowledge. One of the main attributes of the scientific method is that the theories
it generates are much less situational than knowledge gained by other methods. [citation needed] Situational
knowledge is often embedded in language, culture, or traditions. This integration of situational knowledge
is an allusion to the community, and its attempts at collecting subjective perspectives into an embodiment
"of views from somewhere." [13]
Knowledge generated through experience is called knowledge "a posteriori", meaning afterwards. The
pure existence of a term like "a posteriori" means this also has a counterpart. In this case that is
knowledge "a priori", meaning before. The knowledge prior to any experience means that there are certain
"assumptions" that one takes for granted. For example if you are being told about a chair it is clear to you
that the chair is in space, that it is 3D. This knowledge is not knowledge that one can "forget", even
someone suffering from amnesia experiences the world in 3D. [citation needed]
Even though Haraway's arguments are largely based on feminist studies,[9] this idea of different worlds, as
well as the skeptic stance of situated knowledge is present in the main arguments of post-structuralism.
Fundamentally, both argue the contingency of knowledge on the presence of history; power, and
geography, as well as the rejection of universal rules or laws or elementary structures; and the idea of
power as an inherited trait of objectification.[14]
Partial knowledge
One discipline of epistemology focuses on partial knowledge. In most cases, it is not possible to
understand an information domain exhaustively; our knowledge is always incomplete or partial. Most real
problems have to be solved by taking advantage of a partial understanding of the problem context and
problem data, unlike the typical math problems one might solve at school, where all data is given and one
is given a complete understanding of formulas necessary to solve them. [citation needed]
This idea is also present in the concept of bounded rationality which assumes that in real life situations
people often have a limited amount of information and make decisions accordingly.
Intuition is the ability to acquire partial knowledge without inference or the use of reason.[15] An
individual may "know" about a situation and be unable to explain the process that led to their knowledge.
Scientific knowledge
The development of the scientific method has made a significant contribution to how knowledge of the
physical world and its phenomena is acquired. [16] To be termed scientific, a method of inquiry must be
based on gathering observable and measurable evidence subject to specific principles of reasoning and
experimentation.[17] The scientific method consists of the collection of data through observation and

experimentation, and the formulation and testing of hypotheses.[18] Science, and the nature of scientific
knowledge have also become the subject of Philosophy. As science itself has developed, knowledge has
developed a broader usage which has been developing within biology/psychologydiscussed elsewhere
as meta-epistemology, or genetic epistemology, and to some extent related to "theory of cognitive
development".
Sir Francis Bacon, "Knowledge is Power"
Note that "epistemology" is the study of knowledge and how it is acquired. Science is "the process used
everyday to logically complete thoughts through inference of facts determined by calculated
experiments." Sir Francis Bacon was critical in the historical development of the scientific method; his
works established and popularized an inductive methodology for scientific inquiry. His famous aphorism,
"knowledge is power", is found in the Meditations Sacrae (1597).[19]
Until recent times, at least in the Western tradition, it was simply taken for granted that knowledge was
something possessed only by humans and probably adult humans at that. Sometimes the notion might
stretch to (ii) Society-as-such, as in (e.g.) "the knowledge possessed by the Coptic culture" (as opposed to
its individual members), but that was not assured either. Nor was it usual to consider unconscious
knowledge in any systematic way until this approach was popularized by Freud.[20]
Other biological domains where "knowledge" might be said to reside, include: (iii) the immune system,
and (iv) in the DNA of the genetic code. See the list of four "epistemological domains": Popper, (1975);
[21]
and Traill (2008:[22] Table S, page 31)also references by both to Niels Jerne.
Such considerations seem to call for a separate definition of "knowledge" to cover the biological systems.
For biologists, knowledge must be usefully available to the system, though that system need not be
conscious. Thus the criteria seem to be:

The system should apparently be dynamic and self-organizing (unlike a mere book on its own).

The knowledge must constitute some sort of representation of "the outside world", [23] or ways of
dealing with it (directly or indirectly).

Some way must exist for the system to access this information quickly enough for it to be useful.

Scientific knowledge may not involve a claim to certainty, maintaining skepticism means that a scientist
will never be absolutely certain when they are correct and when they are not. It is thus an irony of proper
scientific method that one must doubt even when correct, in the hopes that this practice will lead to
greater convergence on the truth in general.[24]
Religious meaning of knowledge
In many expressions of Christianity, such as Catholicism and Anglicanism, knowledge is one of the seven
gifts of the Holy Spirit.[25]
The Old Testament's tree of the knowledge of good and evil contained the knowledge that separated Man
from God: "And the LORD God said, Behold, the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil"
(Genesis 3:22)

In Gnosticism divine knowledge or gnosis is hoped to be attained.

(Vidya Daan) i.e. knowledge sharing is a major part of Daan, a tenet of all Dharmic Religions.
[26]
Hindu Scriptures present two kinds of knowledge, Paroksh Gyan and Prataksh Gyan. Paroksh Gyan
(also spelled Paroksha-Jnana) is secondhand knowledge: knowledge obtained from books, hearsay, etc.
Prataksh Gyan (also spelled Prataksha-Jnana) is the knowledge borne of direct experience, i.e.,
knowledge that one discovers for oneself.[27] Jnana yoga ("path of knowledge") is one of three main types
of yoga expounded by Krishna in the Bhagavad Gita. (It is compared and contrasted with Bhakti Yoga
and Karma yoga.)
In Islam, knowledge (Arabic: , ilm) is given great significance. "The Knowing" (al-Alm) is one of the
99 names reflecting distinct attributes of God. The Qur'an asserts that knowledge comes from God
(2:239) and various hadith encourage the acquisition of knowledge. Muhammad is reported to have said
"Seek knowledge from the cradle to the grave" and "Verily the men of knowledge are the inheritors of the
prophets". Islamic scholars, theologians and jurists are often given the title alim, meaning
"knowledgable".[citation needed]
In Jewish tradition, knowledge (Hebrew: da'ath) is considered one of the most valuable traits a person
can acquire. Observant Jews recite three times a day in the Amidah "Favor us with knowledge,
understanding and discretion that come from you. Exalted are you, Existent-One, the gracious giver of
knowledge." The Tanakh states, "A wise man gains power, and a man of knowledge maintains power",
and "knowledge is chosen above gold".
As a measure of religiosity (in sociology of religion)
According to the sociologist Mervin Verbit, knowledge may be understood as one of the key components
of religiosity. And religious knowledge itself may be broken down into four dimensions:

content

frequency

intensity

centrality

The content of one's religious knowledge may vary from person to person, as will the degree to which it
may occupy the person's mind (frequency), the intensity of the knowledge, and the centrality of the
information (in that religious tradition, or to that individual

The Knowledge Problem

Studying knowledge is something philosophers have been doing for as long as philosophy has been around. Its one
of those perennial topicslike the nature of matter in the hard sciences--that philosophy has been refining since
before the time of Plato. The discipline is known as epistemology which comes from two Greek words episteme
(episthmh) which means knowledge and logos (logoV) which means a word or reason. Epistemology literally means

to reason about knowledge. Epistemologists study what makes up knowledge, what kinds of things can we know,
what are the limits to what we can know, and even if its possible to actually know anything at all.
At first this might seem like one of those topics that gives philosophy a bad name. After all, it seems kind of silly to
ask whether we can know anything since is obvious we do. It's even more silly when you consider that to even ask
the question, you must assume you know something! So why have some of the greatest minds the world has ever
produced spent such a great deal of time on the subject? In this article Ill consider this question.
Do We Know Stuff?
In order to answer that question, you probably have to have some idea what the term know means. If I asked,
Have you seen the flibbertijibbet at the fair today? Id guess you wouldnt know how to answer. Youd probably
ask me what a flibbertijibbet is. But most adults tend not to ask what knowledge is before they can evaluate whether
they have it or not. We just claim to know stuff and most of us, I suspect, are pretty comfortable with that. There are
lots of reasons for this but the most likely is that we have picked up a definition over time and have a general sense
of what the term means. Many of us would probably say knowledge that something is true involves:

Certainty it's hard if not impossible to deny

Evidence it has to based on something

Practicality it has to actually work in the real world

Broad agreement lots of people have to agree it's true

But if you think about it, each of these has problems. For example, what would you claim to know that you would
also say you are certain of? Lets suppose youre not intoxicated, high, or in some other way in your right mind
and conclude that you know there is a computer in front of you. You might go further and claim that denying it
would be crazy. Isnt it at least possible that youre dreaming or that youre in something like the Matrix and
everything you see is an illusion? Before you say such a thing is absurd and only those who were unable to make the
varsity football team would even consider such questions, can you be sure youre not being tricked? After all, if you
are in the Matrix, the robots that created the Matrix would making be making you believe you are not in the Matrix
and that youre certain you arent.
What about the broad agreement criterion? The problem with this one is that many things we might claim to know
are not, and could not be, broadly agreed upon. Suppose you are experiencing a pain in your arm. The pain is very
strong and intense. You might tell your doctor that you know youre in pain. Unfortunately though, only you can
claim to know that (and as an added problem, you dont appear to have any evidence for it eitheryou just feel the
pain). So at least on the surface, it seems you know things that dont have broad agreement by others.
These problems and many others are what intrigue philosophers and are what make coming up with a definition of
knowledge challenging. Since its hard to nail down a definition, it also makes it hard to answer the question that
heads this section.
So, What is Knowledge?
Okay, a definition is tough to come by. But philosophers have been attempting to construct one for centuries. Over
the years, a trend has developed in the philosophical literature and a definition has emerged that has such wide
agreement it has come to be known as the standard definition. As with most things in philosophy, the definition is

controversial and there are plenty who disagree with it. But as these things go, it serves as at least the starting point
for studying knowledge.
The definition involves three conditions and philosophers say that when a person meets these three conditions, she
can say she knows something to be true. Take a statement of fact: The Seattle Mariners have never won a world
series. On the standard definition, a person knows this fact if:
1.

The person believes the statement to be true

2.

The statement is in fact true

3.

The person is justified in believing the statement to be true

The bolded terms earmark the three conditions that must be met and because of those terms, the definition is also
called the tripartite (three part) definition or JTB for short. Many many books have been written on each of the
three terms so I can only briefly summarize here what is going on in each. (I will say up front though that
epistemologists spend most of their time on the third condition.)
Belief
First, beliefs are things people have. Beliefs arent like rocks or rowboats where you come across them while
strolling along the beach. Theyre in your head and generally are viewed as just the way you hold the world (or
some aspect of the world) to be. If you believe that the Mariners never won a world series, you just think that the
Mariners really never won a world series. If you read that last sentence carefully, youll notice I wrote you just
think. For many philosophers, this is important. It implies that what you think could be wrong. In other words, it
implies that what you think about the world may not match up with the way the world really is and so there is a
distinction between belief and the next item in our list, truth. There are some philosophers--notably postmodernists
and existentialists--who think such a distinction cant be made. See the section below on Postmodernism for an
overview of this idea. Some philosophers argue that a good test for showing what you really believe is to look at
how you behave. People will generally act, they argue, according to what they really believe rather than what they
say they believedespite what Dylan says.
Truth
Something is true if the world really is that way. Truth is not in your head but is out there. The statement, The
Mariners have never won a world series is true if the Mariners have never won a world series. No, I didnt just
repeat myself. The first part of that sentence is in quotes on purpose. The phrase in quotes signifies a statement we
might make about the world and the second, unquoted phrase is supposed to describe the way the world actually is.
The reason philosophers write truth statements this way is to give sense to the idea that a statement about the world
could be wrong or, more accurately, false (philosophers refer to the part in quotes as a statement or proposition).
Perhaps you can now see why beliefs are different than truth statements. When you believe something, you hold that
or accept that a statement or proposition is true. It could be false thats why your belief may not match up with the
way the world really is.
Justification
If the seed of knowledge is belief, what turns belief into knowledge? This is where justification comes in (some
philosophers use the term warrant to refer to this element). A person knows something if theyre justified in

believing it to be true (and, of course, it actually is true). There are dozens of competing theories of justification and
there is little consensus about which is the right one. Its sometimes easier to describe when a belief isnt justified
than when it is. In general, philosophers agree that a person isnt justified if their belief is:

a product of wishful thinking (e.g. I really wish you would love me so I believe you love me)

a product of fear or guilt (e.g. youre terrified of death and so form the belief in an afterlife)

a product of guesswork

formed in the wrong way (e.g. you travel to an area you know nothing about, see a white spot 500 yards
away and conclude its a sheep)

a product of dumb luck (e.g. you randomly form the belief that the next person you meet will have hazel
eyes and it turns out that the next person you meet has hazel eyes)

Justification is hard to pin down because beliefs come in all shapes and sizes and its hard to find a single theory that
can account for everything we would want to claim to know. You might be justified in believing that the sun is
roughly 93 million miles from the earth much differently than you would be justified in believing God exists or that
you have a minor back pain. Even so, justification is a critical element in any theory of knowledge and is the focus
of many a philosophical thought.
[Incidentally: while JTB is generally considered a starting point for a definition, it by no means is the final word.
Many philosophers reject the JTB formulation altogether and others think that, at the very least, JTB needs to be
fixed up somehow. Regarding this latter category, a small paper written by a philosopher named Edmund Gettier
really kicked off a brouhaha that made philosophers doubt that JTB was sufficient for knowledge. Gettiers paper
was roughly two and a half pages long (almost unheard of in philosophy) but has become so important that the
issues he raised are known as The Gettier Problem. Im writing a series for Philosophy News in which I attempt to
tackle some of Gettiers challenges. You can read those articles here (these are not for the general reader but if you
skim the first couple of articles, they may help frame some broader issues in epistemology).]
People at the Center
You might notice that the description above puts the focus of knowing on the individual. Philosophers talk of
individual persons being justified and not the ideas or concepts themselves being justified. This means that what
may count as knowledge for you may not count as knowledge for me. Suppose you study economics and you learn
principles in the field to some depth. Based on what you learn, you come to believe that psychological attitudes have
just as much of a role to play in economic flourishing or deprivation as the political environment that creates
economic policy. Suppose also that I have not studied economics all that much but I do know that Id like more
money in my pocket. You and I may have very different beliefs about economics and our beliefs might be justified
in very different ways. What you know may not be something I know even though we have the same evidence and
arguments in front of us.
So the subjective nature of knowledge partly is based on the idea that beliefs are things that individuals have and
those beliefs are justified or not justified. When you think about it, that makes sense. You may have more evidence
or different experiences than I have and so you may believe things I dont or may have evidence for something that I
dont have. The bottom line is that universal knowledge something everybody knowsmay be very hard to
come by. Truth, if it exists, isnt like this. Truth is universal. Its our access to it that may differ widely.

Rene Descartes and the Search for Universal Knowledge

A lot of people are uncomfortable with the idea that there isnt universal knowledge. Philosopher Rene Descartes
(pronounced day-cart) was one of them. When he was a young man, he was taught a bunch of stuff by his parents,
teachers, priests and other authorities. As he came of age, he, like many of us, started to discover that much of what
he was taught either was false or was highly questionable. At the very least, he found he couldnt have the certainty
that many of his educators had. While many of us get that, deal with it, and move on, Descartes was deeply troubled
by this.
One day, he decided to tackle the problem. He hid himself away in a cabin and decided to get to the bottom of it. He
resolved to doubt everything of which he could not be certain. Since it wasnt practical to doubt every belief he had,
Descartes decided that it would be sufficient to subject the foundations of his belief system to doubt and the rest of
the structure will "crumble of its own accord." He first considers the things he came to believe by way of the five
senses. For most of us these are pretty stable items but Descartes found that it was rather easy to doubt their truth.
The biggest problem is that sometimes the senses can be deceptive. And after all, could he be certain he wasnt
insane or dreaming when he saw that book or tasted that honey? So while they might be fairly reliable, the senses
dont provide us with certaintywhich is what Descartes was after.
Next he looked at mathematics. If certainly is to be found, it must be here. He reasoned that the outcome of
mathematical formulas and theorems hold both in dreams and in waking so at the very least, it fares better than the
senses. But he developed an argument from which he could not spare math. Suppose there is an evil genius, he
thought, that is supremely powerful and clever and was bent upon deceiving Descartes and developed
mathematics as a device to carry out his evil deceptions (the popular movie, The Matrix should be coming to mind
about now). Descartes found there was no way to rule this possibility out. Whether its highly unlikely or not isnt
the point. Descartes was looking for certainty and if there is even a slim possibility that hes being deceived, he had
to throw out mathematics too.
Unfortunately, this left Descartes with no where to turn. He found that he could be skeptical about everything and
was unable to find a certain foundation for knowledge. But then he hit upon something that changed modern
epistemology. He discovered that there was one thing he couldnt doubt: the fact that he was a thinking thing. In
order to doubt it, he would have to think (he reasoned that its not possible to doubt something without thinking
about the fact that youre doubting). If he was thinking then he must be a thinking thing and so he found that it was
impossible to doubt that he was a thinking being.
This seemingly small but significant truth led to his most famous contribution to Western thought: cogito ergo sum
(I think, therefore I am). Some mistakenly think that Descartes was implying with this idea that he thinks himself
into existence. But that wasnt his point at all. He was making a claim about knowledge. Really what Descartes was
saying is: I think, therefore I know that I am.
The story doesnt end here for Descartes but for the rest of it, I refer you to the reading list below to dig deeper. The
story of Descartes is meant to illustrate the depth of the problems of epistemology and how difficult and rare
certainty is, if certainty is possiblethere are plenty of philosophers who think either that Descartes project failed
or that he created a whole new set of problems that are even more intractable than the one he set out to solve.
Postmodernism and Knowledge
The term "postmodern" has been applied to many things including art, music, and clothing. In this overview, I'm
talking only about postmodern epistemology. Postmodern epistemology is difficult to pin down because, almost by
definition, it is resistant to being defined. Generally, though, it means taking a specific, skeptical attitude towards

certainty, and a relative view of belief and knowledge. Postmodernists see truth as much more fluid than classical (or
modernist) epistemologists. Using the terms we learned above, they reject the idea that we can ever be fully justified
in holding that our beliefs line up with the way the world actually is. We can't know that we know.
In order to have certainty, postmodernists claim, we would need to be able to "stand outside" our own beliefs and
look at our beliefs and the world without any mental lenses or perspective. It's similar to wondering what it would be
like to watch ourselves meeting someone for the first time? We can't do it. We can only meet someone for the first
time as us so we have that experience only from "inside" our minds and bodies. Since its not possible to stand
outside our minds, all the parts that make up our minds influence our view on what is true. Our intellectual and
social background, our biases, our moods, our genetics, other beliefs we have, our likes and dislikes, our passions
(we can put all these under the label of our "cognitive structure") all influence how we perceive what is true about
the world. Further, say the postmodernists, it's not possible to set aside these influences or lenses. We can reduce the
intensity here and there and come to recognize biases and adjust for them for sure. But it's not possible to completely
shed all our lenses which color our view of things and so it's not possible to be certain that we're getting at some
truth "out there." And now we can see why postmodernists tend to eschew definition. Notice that as soon as a
postmodernist makes a claim about the truth and knowledge they seem to be making a truth statement! If all beliefs
are seen through a lens, how do we know the postmodernists beliefs are "correct?" That's a good question and the
postmodernist might respond by saying, "We don't!" But then, why believe it? Because of this obvious problem,
many postmodernists attempt to simply live with postmodernist "attitudes" towards epistemology and avoid making
too many truth claims. To be sure, Postmodernists do tend to act like the rest of us when it comes to interacting with
the world. They drive cars, fly in airplanes, make computer programs, and even write books! But how is this
possible if they take such a fluid view of truth? Postmodernists don't eschew truth in general. They reject the idea
that any one person's beliefs about it can be certain. Rather, they claim that truth emerges through community
agreement. Suppose scientists are attempting to determine whether the planet is warming and that humans are the
cause. This is a complex question and a postmodernist might say that if the majority of scientists agree that the earth
is warming and that humans are the cause, then that's true. Notice that the criteria for "truth" is that scientists agree.
To use the taxonomy above, this would be the "justification condition." So we might say that postmodernists accept
the first and third conditions of the tripartite view but reject the second condition: the idea that there is a truth that is
"out there." Rather, truth is a product of people in a given community meeting the third condition and it is not
something separate from that. When you think about it, a lot of what we would call "facts" are determined in just
this way. For many years, scientists believed in a substance called "phlogiston." Phlogiston was stuff that existed in
certain substances (like wood and metal) and when those substances were burned, more phlogiston was added to the
substance. Phlogiston was believed to have negative weight, that's why things got lighter when they burned. That
theory has since been rejected and replace by more sophisticated views involving oxygen and oxidation. So, was the
phlogiston theory true? The modernist would claim it wasn't because it has since been shown to be false. It's false
now and was false then even though scientists believed it was true. Beliefs about phlogiston didn't line up with the
way the world really is, so it was false. But the postmodernist might say that phlogiston theory was true for the
scientists that believed it. We now have other theories that are true. But phlogiston theory was no less true then than
oxygen theory is now. Further, they might add, how do we know that oxygen theory is really the truth? Oxygen
theory might be supplanted some day as well but that doesn't make it any less true today.
So postmodernism generally adheres to the following:
1.

Everyone comes to belief with a cognitive structure that cannot be set aside.

2.

Our cognitive structure serves as a lens through which we view the world. Because of this, knowledge is
said to be perspectival or a product of our perspective.

3.

Since the evaluation of our beliefs is based on our cognitive lens, it's not possible to be certain about any
belief we have. This should make us tentative about truth claims and more open to the idea that all of our
beliefs could be wrong.

4.

Truth emerges in the context (or relative to) community agreement.

So What, Who Cares?

Well most of us arent like Descartes. We actually have lives and dont want to spend time trying to figure out if
were the cruel joke of some clandestine mad scientist. We can get by just fine, thank you, without having to think
about all this stuff. But we actually do actually care about this topic whether we know it or not. A bit of reflection
exposes just how important having a solid view of knowledge actually is and spending some focused time thinking
more deeply about knowledge can actually help us get better at knowing.Really, knowledge is a the root of many
(dare I say most) challenges we face in a given day. Once you get past basic survival (though even things as basic as
finding enough food and shelter involves challenges related to knowledge), were confronted with knowledge issues
on almost every front. Knowledge questions range from larger, more weighty questions like figuring out who our
real friends are, what to do with our career, or how to spend our time, what politician to vote for, how to spend or
invest our money, should we be religious or not, to more mundane ones like which gear to buy for our hobby, how to
solve a dispute between the kids, where to go for dinner, or which book to read in your free time. We make
knowledge decisions all day, every day and some of those decisions deeply impact our lives and the lives of those
around us.So all these decisions we make about factors that effect the way we and others live are grounded in our
view of knowledgeour epistemology. Unfortunately few spend enough time thinking about the root of their
decisions and many make knowledge choices based on how they were raised (my mom always voted Republican so
I will), whats easiest (if I dont believe in God, Ill be shunned by my friends and family), or just good, old
fashioned laziness. But of all the things to spend time on, it seems thinking about how we come to know things
should be at the top of the list given the central role it plays in just about everything we do.
In Sum
Ive only been able to scratch the surface on this massive but immensely interesting
discipline. Much of what Ive written in this article just sets up the classical investigation into
what knowledge is. I recommend that you pick up one or more of the books in the list below
to dig deeper. Who knows, maybe youll come to know that what you thought you knew you
didnt really know and, perhaps, come to know some new things.
Updated March, 2014:

Removed reference to dated events

Removed section on thought experiment

Added section on Postmodernism

Made minor formatting changes