it really was, wasn't it?! I teach undergraduate research methods and have always found epistemological concerns fascinating. I was fortunate to have professor Mary Hawkesworth introduce me to the philosophy of science. But now in an era of resurgent science wars with non-scientists or non-social scientists in positions of political power who have ideological, theological or economic axes to grind, these issues are no longer just intellectually pleasurable abstractions. The very future of the academy and academic freedom, without which epistemology becomes a moot endeavor, is at stake. To say nothing of, say, the planet, or more accurately, its 7.6 billion inhabitants who sort of depend on an inhabitable planet for their existence.
00:40 What is knowledge? When really examined there's a lot of interesting paradoxes and questions. 01:02 What is the verb "to know"? There's multiple usages in the English language but this series focuses on the "knowing a fact" sense of the word. 02:00 Knowledge is a way to be latched onto a fact 02:05 Of the word languages, only about 100 words are universal to them all. "To know" is one of them. 02:40 Knowing vs believing. We instinctively feel some difference between them. Believing is sometimes true or sometimes false. What we know is factual or probable. 03:45 Beyond truth, confidence is another condition of knowing. 04:35 A good basis of justification seems to be a third condition of knowledge. Simply have a belief about a fact doesn't mean one possesses knowledge. 05:30 Is knowledge even possible? Perhaps you're dreaming. This is skepticism.
@@zestastic3359 Either he's impatient or he's/she's being sarcastic; The question here is: Do we truly know what @Dramor is having in his/her mind? What are his/her true emotions regards his/her patience on the video or even the sarcastic nature of him/her? What are his/her intentions? Do we know? Does he/she even know? Is he even a gendered person, is he just a bot/AI sending information through electronic devices? Can/do we have thorough knowledge of his/her it thought process, intentions, ideals, aim, and consider it a fact? Do you guys even know if I'm not just a bot replying to you right now? Can you prove it? Do I even exist for you? The answer is we don't know, we're all agnostic somehow, one way or another.
This reminds me of my Theory of Knowledge class. I think knowledge doesn't necessarily have to be truth, but truth is always knowledge. Facts/knowledge remain so until we know better. Knowledge requires evidence, which could be truth, but belief doesn't but it still could also be truth due to sheer coincidence.
Yes exactly. Knowledge is truth, but I dont believe something can be false. Therefore if you have true knowledge, then you can use it to form an uncertain theory/belief. Else, it is only a theory which is uncertaintly disproven to be practical knowledge until you discover it to be fundamentally true. @@ManchmalGaming
This video gives the impression that waking up in windowless rooms is less upsetting than potential rain :D Pierre is a tough dude, I would totally freak.
That means you're getting smarter because you've increased the scope of what you know you don't know, whereas before you weren't aware there was even anything to know. This is why Socates said "All I know is that I know nothing," and why the people highest on the Dunning-Kruger scale in confidence know the least - they know only just enough to think they have a good handle on the subject when in fact they don't even know how vast their ignorance is. Having some idea of the extents of what you are still yet to understand about a subject makes you more knowledgeable about it than someone who doesn't and already thinks they know everything about it.
As a tutor of English and basic arithmetic, this video will be a perfect introduction to Epistemology for impressionable young people who have questions about falsifiable reality. Hopefully they shall be encouraged to question supernatural myths the human species has clung to over our existence. Much appreciation for the author of this precise explanation of epistemology.
This concept of Philosophy has always piqued my interest, philosophy seems to have answers of every "HOW'S" of life. I am a junior year high school medical student but since I love philosophy, I went on surfing about Philosophy, it's subtopic and found your book on Epistemology! I am soon gonna start reading it.
How can you tell love is not just a chemical process in the brain i.e the releasing of dopamine to produce certain type of emotional behavior in the human brain? Can you prove it? Interesting isn't it? We humans are so creative that we give value and meaning to invaluable and meaningless things when reduced to size and significances. We're fighting for a piece of paper called “money” on a floating rock in an empty space; Funny how a piece of paper could get you food and all the thing you'll ever need to survive, we humans truly are creative and strange beings.
We're all agnostics one way or another my Friend. We're all asking the same question, Science tries to answer the questions but we humans are very limited in terms of knowledge (considering the fact that everything we though to be true is false when reducing to the subatomic world or quantum level). Philosophy questions everything and also can't answer them with decent understanding for everyone, that why Ideologies and concepts and theories are born . I see the same pattern in every scholar category of gaining knowledge -i.e curiousity. We humans are godlike beings because we are both Good and Evil at the same time. We are a bit different and perhaps unique more than animals or any other species in terms of intelligence and discovering the covered Truths. We humans are creative, kind, loving, intelligent, moral, social, raional. But at the same time, we are dreadful, horrible, terrifying, hating, destroying, angry, and so on. We have the properties of a Creator, and reality is truly created in the mind.
@@anub1s954 WOW, I am amazed by your reply to the comment! I agree to your this statement 'Philosophy questions everything and also can't answer them with decent understanding for everyone, that why Ideologies and concepts and theories are born .' The way you framed your reply and whatever intriguing you have written all up there makes you a person I'd appreciate to open my brain with.
There are two different ways the word "know" is used. #1. To have absolute certainty with respect to a claim, statement, or idea. #2. Being familiar with, or aware of something. Knowledge as an absolute certainty is not attainable.
And here in lies the problem of philosophy: you can nearly spend a lifetime studying each word's ontology of the definition to a concept. Justification, veritology (truth), belief formation... these are huge topics!
"Veritology, my arse! Which ass(small donkey) gave you that neologism? Epistemology was also a neologism until it was coined or made up by Scottish philosopher James F. Ferrier (1808-1864) - see also Bolloxology coined by the wizard of Oz, the study of made-up bullshit words, which also forms part of bambooozolism
I would say: The difference between belief and knowledge is that you are more certain if you know it than if you believe it unless it's a religious context. And if you perceive yourself to be more certain, that will help you feel more confident about it. But saying that you know something, and actually knowing something are two potentially different things. It's like hearing it rain, and it raining, are two different things. The latter requiring it to actually be the case.
@@paterfamiliasgeminusiv4623 Double Orts that's the problem with student evaluations. Though I am happy to say I get quite good ones, a faculty member spends years, a lifetime perhaps, to establish the basis to offer a course on a subject. And someone with no other experience with the subject matter is offered a platform from which he or she gets to pronounce judgment without the slightest bit of justification. ("Guilty," says the judge, but offers no defensible explanation as to why.)
It doesn't strike you as at all queer there there might be a "*theory*" of knowledge? Epistemology is pretentialism, a made-up word like the famous Ozian thinkology, and bolloxology is the study of precisely that.
Excellent series... "In truth, knowledge is a veritable treasure for man, and a source of glory, of bounty, of joy, of exaltation, of cheer and gladness unto him. Happy the man that cleaveth unto it, and woe betide the heedless." ~ Bahá'u'lláh
I think I have lived 22 years, that my mother, father and brother exist. That I have learned to juggle and watched 100 episodes of simpsons. But maybe that was all a dream. I'm so confident that it is all real, because it all makes sense. But isn't that true about any dream? Has it never happened, that you feel completely confident that a dream you had was real, when you in actuallity were sleeping? I know I have had a dream like that. Or do I?
Yes! You have the crux of epistamology in my view. It is so natural to think that I have had a dream that felt so real that I took it for reality, so then how can I trust my waking reality to be any more real?
Sometimes you will have a dream with unreal settings e.g sleeping in another room thinking it's yours. I Wonder why it happens. If we tend to trust experience, maybe your sense of self is lessened inside a dream to the point where you can't relate well to past experiences, hence why we don't remember how a dream starts. Yes, I'm assuming self awareness is a key aspect of rationality
Look up René Descartes' "Meditations on First Philosophy", he has a valid point (i.e "I think therefore I am") on distinguishing between dream and reality. Although other parts on how he is able to think in the first place is somewhat credulous.
To know does not exclude the possibility of error. It just means that in our present context, the claim has proven reliable time and again. This is the most we can hope for anyway.
You have to make use of different viewpoints... This way you triangulate the knowledge in question. It takes a while, and therefore patience is a must. As we evolve, we tend to become less patient, especially when considering the 'go, go, go,' mentality of today. This is another reason that reinforces why people don't enjoy thinking... And hence, believe things that are completely irrational.
Feelings. I know that at this moment I feel (for whatever reason) compelled to write this comment. I also know that I feel tired. I also know that I feel hungry. Even if you took the most radical skeptic position that nothing is real and that we don’t exist or are in a simulation, you cannot argue that I don’t know that I feel a certain way. From this acknowledgment of validity of knowledge about one’s feelings you can branch out, but it will increasingly become more difficult to argue its objectivity. But it nevertheless constitutes objective knowledge. Yes, knowledge is attainable.
I'm having trouble trying to put this to words, this makes me think if everything is just perception (what is perception?) and an illusion, and if that we can only know what we know(what is knowing?). How would you even prove this? How do you know that you know what knows mean? what standard are we using? I think I know what this video is trying to communicate, although that would be a paradox right? All of this is very abstract.. knowledge is a paradox.. How will knowing what knowing is benefit me in anyway? Was this understandable?
At 2:20 where the verb "to know" is written in several languages, the japanese translation is written incorrectly. It was written as 知つ('shitsu' which does not exist using this kanji/symbol) instead of its correct form '知る' (read as 'shiru' =to know).
the difference between thinking and knowing is the level of trust in that which you think/know. If you only think, then you can be persuaded by authority (like people whom you trust, or natural phenomena) that it is false. That is not the case with knowledge. When you know something (for example, that the floor you about to step on is solid), you will not hesitate to risk serious injury, or even death, in the case that this knowledge is false.
Epistemology is the most illogical fantasy nonsense I've ever heard. You can't be the justification for what you think you know is true, you can't say that I know evolution is true because I perceive it as true because that would be circular reasoning which is one of the greatest fallacies in an atheistic worldview which states that we are the sole arbitrator of our perceived knowledge. Therefore nothing can ever be known to be true. Get out of here with that nonsense
Epistemology is the most illogical fantasy nonsense I've ever heard. You can't be the justification for what you think you know is true, you can't say that I know evolution is true because I perceive it as true because that would be circular reasoning which is one of the greatest fallacies in an atheistic worldview which states that we are the sole arbitrator of our perceived knowledge. Therefore nothing can ever be known to be true. Get out of here with that nonsense
Jacob pando So you think understanding good information vs bad information is a waste of time? Judging by your channel you are a theist so probably believe that a book you believe is true is the only way to discern true from false. But how is your belief supported in any non-circular way? How have you determined that the book you assume to be true, is actually based on truth? If you are suggesting that 'it just is because', then what you propose offers nothing to any honest discussions about what might or might not be. Do you think that a person who follows the Quran is following the truth? If not, why not? What about a Hindu or Taoist? It isn't just what can be perceived to be true, but about the reliability of the information that is taken into consideration when deciding a truth value. When both you and another person with different beliefs claims 'scripture' to support them, how do you then go about deciding which 'scripture' is the right one? I don't think you quite understand the subject mate, but am happy to have a polite (constructive) discussion about it if you are so inclined.
Since information is knowledge obtained from rigorous study, often evidence based, it seems like you are right. Actually, in some ways information can be more reliable.e.g Scientific information is always more reliable than empirical, because of biases.
I think confidence is misleading. I think it would be more beneficial to replace confidence with how likely one thinks it is to be true. confidence is more of a social indicator I would say but what do i know. knowing vs believing was bang on though and so well explained!
When I said that this is the first time I have looked up epistemology, I meant on RUclips. Of course, epistamology is a branch of philosophy that studies the nature of knowledge, and I have studied this in a unique and deep way. I have a saying, which usually pisses everyone off...but here it is: "Truth is in the eye of the beholder." We think of truth and facts as some sort of objective thing, yet from where does that belief come? I would say two places. One, the 'group' around us says this or that is true, and via social pressure, we believe it. Two, academics and scientists say that this or that is true, and because of citations like this piece of knowledge came from this or that college or university, we tend to believe it. This fact came from Johns Hopkins or Kings College, and so we accept it, but what does that really mean? In simple terms, scientists, academics, and like professionals have to have peer acknowledgement to keep their jobs and paychecks, so how does that really lead to truth? Because it's a club...peer review. People who think as you do, and who need paychecks just like you do, review your work, and it seems to me that they will come up with some hypothesis that is close to what you (the professional) will come up with. So what is Truth, then? We must decide what is truth on our own. Such is a lonely journey, as we must depend on our own, inherent knowledge to come to this realization, but it is a journey well taken, because only when we decide truth for ourselves can we truly come together.
Actually, you've raised an interesting question, but ironically came up with precisely the wrong solution. Truth (to my understanding) represents a conception or description of the world that corresponds as closely as possible to objective reality. There's no doubt that people can disagree on what is true or real... But this disagreement does not alter reality itself. The presumption that there is a single, external, objective reality is just that... an assumption. But without this assumption, there can be no society, no language, no communication, and no science. Our goal is to come as close as we can to describing objective reality as accurately as possible. AND THE ONLY WAY THIS CAN BE DONE IS THROUGH MUTUAL EFFORT, AND SHARED COLLABORATION, as is done in scientific method!! Acting alone, we are helpless slaves to our cognitive biases. Only by combining and pooling our efforts can we ever hope to overcome bias. (And if we restrict our communications to "like-minded" people we're similarly screwed.) So you're welcome to put out your own perceptions of the world for others to evaluate and critique. If your accounting of things has validity, it will eventually become widely accepted as "truth" (or a reasonable facsimile thereof!)
And, I would add that I understand that collective thinking is the general basis for our world. It is not wholly bad, as no thing is 'right or wrong'. But, I think that different types of thinking are necessary to make it a complete system. I have a personal quote here that I think is apropee: the life-blood of a democracy is the dissenter. For without opposing voices, how could there ever be a true democracy? So, the same thing applies to science (since science is a human invention). We need dissenters. It is not an easy path, but I am an individualist in a world of collectivists, and I dissent, when I think it's needed.
@@toddhall4309 There were two replies from you. Now there's only one. But I can still reply to that one. I agree in principle with your comments about dissent, but I still disagree that everyone's opinion is equally worthy. If it's a matter of values, preferences, or faith-based belief, then there's really no basis for dispute or disagreement, but if it pertains to testable, measurable, factual matters then some opinions may be better than others, depending on how well they conform to reality. I agree that everyone is entitled to propose dissenting views, but if their views are not supported by evidence, then they are of little value or importance. There's a common misunderstanding that the "truth" of a scientific claim is immediately obvious from the moment it is proposed. That's not correct. The "truth value" of a scientific claim is established only by testing, confirmation, and eventually consensus. Dissenting views are always possible, but MUST be supported by evidence to have any value. Dissent by itself is not sufficient.
Oh good job. Im proud of you! You have started practicing some combat epistemology. Youve been trying to effect the signal to noise ratio. Its too little too late tho. Ive got enough anchor points. You can maybe jam my radar for a bit, but not much more.
She said that knowledge is latched to the facts. Knowledge is personal and does not need to be related to the facts. In the history of science we have countless cases when something what was considered as knowledge had nothing to do with the facts. Even if I have same common knowledge with other people I reflect this common knowledge trough my mind and I make it personal at lest a bit different. Knowledge is satisfyingly processed information. The difference between believe and knowledge is the rate of our confidence whether we know the fact(s). The professor is quite confused. She apparently comes to believe there is "absolute knowledge" about the facts and wrongfully makes knowledge and facts equal or related. Our knowledge can be closer or further from the facts. I do not use the word "truth" purposefully. The "truth" is more complicated philosophical issue.
High confidence is the only form of truth. High Confidence can only be created by the sight of the rain,not through any other means. Confidence created otherwise will never be as high.
You are on the right track (IMHO), but not quite there. I liked your first sentence, but then it went "downhill". Information provided by the senses is an important source of information about the world, but it is not infallible. In any case, there are many examples where our OWN perceptions are not as reliable as those of knowledgeable (sic) experts. We should simply concede that we do not have access to perfect, complete knowledge or 100% confidence. However, this doesn't mean that we cannot have different degrees of knowledge, which may be ranked according to their accuracy, which I define as their correspondence to reality. Correspondence with reality can be assessed by coherence and consilience (with other elements of knowledge) as well as by trust (in competent, reliable authorities). Neither of these approaches is infallible... but that was our starting point, so it doesn't help us very much to acknowledge that knowledge could be wrong. In any case, we mostly rely on trust most of the time to provide our best understanding of the status of human knowledge. We simply cannot personally experience everything that we claim to know. Unfortunately, many people embrace and trust authorities who are not actually deserving of their trust. And some people place a higher level of confidence in 2500 year-old books than more recent books. But there's nothing we can do about that.
@@MendTheWorld There is no Highest Confidence There are Higher and lower confidences. The amount of condifence is measured through means like coherence. The confidence measured is the Knowledge Religion exists because the means of forming confidence arent limited to established means like coherence But what makes some measure of confidence established and others not? The Fact that there no answers to the above question, will always keep religion alive and well ....better?
Knowledge and Understanding: In the domain of Knowledge there are different types: True, false, questions, distinctions, predictions, contradictions, procedures, nonsense, and the list goes on. In the domain of Understanding where the knowledge type 'procedural' is the how-to instructions included in the body of knowledge that makes up the understanding. You can view your list of understandings by listing all the words you use that end with the suffex ing. Like: Reading, writing, thinking, talking, seeing, believing, typing, tweeting, etc. Understandings are the program code that runs all the things that you do. Understandings consume energy (calories) when operating whereas knowledge does not require extra energy just to remain in state. Its good to know the difference between Knowledge and Understanding. Knowledge Directs, Understanding Affects. The brain organizes knowledge into ten knowledge contexts for every issue in its knowledge library. These contexts are: Name, Authors, Purpose, Environment, Language, Configuration, Operation, Owners, Market, and Value. These are the Ten Directors that control the function of any issue. All procedural knowledge that drives understandings are stored in the Operation Director. You can change your life my meditating on each one of the ten directors individually and doing a house cleaning on the knowledge stored there. Delete the false knowledge and install true knowledge in each of the ten directors. Edit modify and test changes to procedural knowledge in all your understandings.
The video turned around the fact of knowing and its strong relation to weither it is a truth or not, but I am more into discussing '' the person'' who produces this '' knowledge''. Because this has been in my opinion ( I believe) the core issue of knowledge production. an exemple given is this famous idea that '' history is written by the victors '' .
You can know that to know that something exist to be as it is generally accepted to be, or we can know how it exists. Conversely, we can know how that something exists as well, but do we know why that any of it exists as how or that ?
Occam's Razor leaves us with what appears to be the best theory of Knowledge, a Universal definition; 'Knowledge'; "that which is perceived!" To Exist is to be perceived. To be perceived means to Exist. Nothing exists that is not perceived, nothing is perceived that does not exist! Thus, Existence is ALL-inclusive! Reality is predicated upon Existence! Thus, Reality is ALL-inclusive! Truth, being predicated on Reality must, also, be ALL-inclusive! Knowledge IS Truth! Truth IS Knowledge!
You've been saying about 4 types of knowledge: "knowing someone", "knowing a place", "knowing a language" and "knowing a fact" But what about "knowing-how" (like knowing how to play chess)? Is it the same type as "knowing language" or "knowing a fact"? Or it is the fifth type?
"Knowing someone" and "knowing a place" are also referred to as knowledge by acquaintance; knowing-how would include both skills like being able to speak a language and play chess/ride a bicycle. It is certainly not like "knowing a fact", as a fact is just a proposition, which may be expressed in any language.
I want to know if Jennifer Nagel believes in any God, and if she does, how she can tell the difference between knowing it is true, or believing is true.
Thanks! I'm looking for opinions on the following, quite unusual statement+question pair: "The number of questions one can ask about the world is astronomical. How can {a piece of software} contain all those questions?"
i believe that french has two ways to say 'to know' versus our one way to say 'i know.' (savoir and connaître) if anyone is more familiar with this, i would like to know.
Yeah. It gets used for different contexts. Like you would never say je te sais. To say I know you. You would say je te connait. Not quite sure if there is a rule to what the nature of the two words is as there are a lot of cases where both are interchangeable, but you are right to say that the two verbs exist.
Hi. Your explanation of the concept of epistemology is the best. Asking for permission to use this video as a reference for my presentation this week. Thank you. Hoping for a positive feedback.
I'm French and I have a question. We have two kinds of translations for "To Know". They are "Savoir" and "Connaitre". My question is how could we separate the significant meaning of the two? And from your video, what proper verbe should we use/utilize?
What about knowledge as "justified true belief?" Does the justification (i.e. evidence that it is raining) satisfy both a good basis and confidence in the belief? Is evidence from the senses enough, or are we simply brains in vats receiving electrical impulses we perceive as senses?
Jennifer, Regarding Knowledge and Justified True Beliefs-which is where you’re heading-please answer: 1. Yes or no, can someone that does not exist have a Justified True Belief that they do exist? 2. Yes or no, do you exist? If no, then how do you ‘Justify’ the claim that you do not exist? 3. Yes or no, are you certain that you exist? If no, are you saying that it is possible you do not exist? Please ‘Justify’ that. 4. Yes or no, can you have a ‘Belief’ you exist? If yes, please ‘Justify’ that. [Ref. The Mysterious Stranger (last chapter) -Mark Twain] [Ref. The Thirteenth Floor] [Note: Please don’t ref. Rene Descartes or The Matrix] yinYangMountain
+H Tawfik H Tawfik, Well, the answers to these questions are from advanced philosophy and discussed, at length, in a few Stanford papers on philosophy. 1. No. This question was designed to expose the errors is various presuppositions. E.g., something cannot reveal to you that you exist if you actually don’t. [It’s akin to the chicken and egg paradox.] 2. The question is not the “Tautology.” It’s the justification that can become the “Tautology.” 3. This question is designed to explain that if something is ‘known’ than anything unknown is irrelevant. I.e., if you know it, you know it, period. How is not the question. Again, it’s not a “Tautology” until justification is put forth. 4. This question follows the previous and is the “Tautology.” Your justification was circular. [Ref. The Mysterious Stranger -Mark Twain] The error made with almost all students, and even some professors, is not being clear what the ‘you’ existing means. [Ref. Socratic Method.] [Ref. Where and/or who is the ‘you’ in a split-brain patient? Ref. Where would the ‘you’ and/or who is the ‘you’ in a complex multi-level conscious program inside a hypothetical super computer?] If your answers are not universally consistent [Ref. Kant/Hume] you’ve not solved hard solipsism. yinYangMountain
+yinYangMountain 1. I'm not sure why the answer to this is "no" given the fact that the question doesn't seem to hold any meaning. What does it even mean for "someone that does not exist" to "have" something? 2. My mistake, "tautology" was a wrong answer. Rather, the statement "you exist" seems to be analytic in nature and tautological. For there to be a "you", you need to exist. 3. Similar to 2. "I exist" seems to be tautological. 4. I don't get why my justification is circular. The question asks whether I can have a belief I exist. For it to be true, I simply require to fulfill the predicate condition, which I think I did in my previous post. I would greatly appreciate any feedback since I am by no means an expert in these matters and wish to further my understanding. Cheers
+H Tawfik H Tawfik, “1. I'm not sure why the answer to this is "no" given the fact that the question doesn't seem to hold any meaning. What does it even mean for "someone that does not exist" to "have" something?” Original Question: “1. Yes or no, can someone that does not exist have a Justified True Belief that they do exist?” Your answer: “1. Cannot be answered” OK, let’s ask it this way then [J-T-B]: 1a. If it is True [T] that you do not exist, can there be justification [J] you do? No, by definition. [Ref. Law of Non-Contradiction] 1b. If you, H Tawfik, did not actually exist, how could you and/or Jennifer Nagel (the author of this series) reveal to you that you existed? [Ref. Law of Identity] See it now? So, can it be answered? Yes. The answer is, “No.” These questions stem from the problem philosophers, who should know better, have keeping the language coherent and without equivocation from one section of this puzzle to the next. So in the end, H Tawfik, ask yourself if Jennifer has presented a clear epistemology that could be used to justify here ‘knowledge’ of her own existence? “2. […] analytic in nature and tautological. For there to be a "you", you need to exist.” I’ll concede, from a language reference and a purely analytic definition, you have a point. But from a practical standpoint, hard solipsism has not been solved by philosophers; well, not without being highly contested. [Ref. The Omniscience Paradox] [In Mark Twain’s poetic version of solipsism at the ending of The Mysterious Stranger, Twain reveals offers a version of Plato’s Cave; at the end, Chapter 11, we rightly ask, “Does the character (Written in the first-person) Theodor, the protagonist, exist as an actual Theodor?” No.] “4. I don't get why my justification is circular…” My point is that the problem occurs with ‘knowledge’ as examined by Jennifer Nagel. So, we must first ask these questions: - Can something be true that’s false? No. - Can knowledge be false? Strictly speaking, no. E.g., Can you have ‘knowledge’ you are the president of the United States if you are not. No. * The next problem is when philosophy runs headlong into neuroscience [The self is an illusion that is exposed with brain damage and/or split-brain patients] and theoretical complex multidimensional computer code [Ref. The Thirteenth Floor] Seriously, H Tawfik, if you want a hard solipsism head scratcher [the question of what we can know-including if we exist], listen to the ending of The Mysterious Stranger. The punchline is quite bizarre yet profound. It’s a clever twist by Twain-and one the reader-after ten chapters-does not expect. [Note: If you’re a fundamentalist Christian, you’ll probably find it offensive. From a pure philosophical perspective, Twain understood René Descartes dilemma.] Search - RUclips: The Mysterious Stranger and Other Stories by Mark Twain - Chapter 11/12 (read by Ted Delorme) -freeaudiobooks84 Thanks for the great chat, Cheers
Skepticism is the answer to the problem of pseudoscience in our world. Need to find the solution to belief's if we want to get out of this dark age we're currently living in.
I had a question in my degree essay what is the epistemological issues with qualitative research. This lead me here and the only thing I can think of is accepting the answers given by the focus group as the truth without knowing the answers given have not been fabricated and are factually correct.
"It's weird to say 'Alice knows it's raining, but it isn't.' " (3:30) Given the state of civil discourse in the United States during the six years since this video was made, it's no longer weird to say this. All of the conversation in this and the following videos skirt the new reality of a post-truth world: anyone can know anything, and no one is in a position to deny anyone else's knowing. I know whatever I personally want to know, and my knowing is just as valid as anyone else's, no matter what it's basis. Is it time for a philosophical update on Knowledge?
As plato said, you need to observe something in order to know it, by your senses - like sight, hearing, touch, smell and taste. someone knows something if that is something is true. as aristotle said, knowledge can only be attained by careful observaion of the natural world, and reasoned justification. it has to make sense, there needs to be a rational explanation for it, and there needs to be experimental evidence for it, which can either be directly or indirectly obersed through our senses. but the sense doesnt know. it is a medium between the real world and our mind. only if that knowledge gets to our mind, it can be processed as an accurate representation of the nature of reality. that is science. as far as epistemology is concearned, philosophy has lost the game to naural sciences like physics, biology, chemistry. but it is important not to forget where we started of, with total ignorance of that which is generally accepted as basic knowledge. and that is thanks to philosophy. but as socrates said, who was obsessed with knowledge theory: "I know that I don't know - but atleast I know that" which means that he is aware of his own ignorance towards the infinite ocean of potential knowledge. the more you know, the more realize that there have been many things which you didn't know, and there are even more things that you don't know. it's like a circle of ignorace where the mind (the "knowing" part of one self) is the dot in the middle, and the radius the amount of knowledge. this is a pretty accurate visual representation.
Idk why people don't acknowledge intelligent comments and give thousands of likes of stupid comments like "who is here in 2020". Stupid do come in masses.
Hello. I looked up epistemology for the first time ever, and I found this video. I watched 57 seconds of the video, and I already wish to comment. I've spent a great deal of time thinking about the nature and underpinnings of knowledge, and this is what I have come to believe. The ultimate indicator of the veracity of knowledge is this: does it work; does it make our lives better?
but how do you know it works? does working only goes to you? like what if it works for you but not for eveyone else? On what sense is better something?
I love to talk to articulate people who have well thought out ideas, so thanks again for responding. On my journey through life, I have studied much science, though I am not a professional in that field. I'm glad that I'm not such a professional, and the real reason that I did not decide to pursue such things is that formal academics gave me a bad taste in my mouth very early on. In short, I went to university with a craving to learn, and I quickly found out that most people were there to gain credentials in the easiest manner possible. I have independently studied medicine (at an M.D. level) sociology, psychology, anthropolgy, world religion/spirituality, new physics, and in particular, behavioral neurochemistry (at the theoretical level). Along this path, I have seen a few things, and one of the most pivotal things that I have seen is summed up in a quote (from myself). "Every scientist needs a paycheck." Typically with animal/human behavior, one will see that when someone is supported by an entity, that animal or human will then defend that supporting entity. So, considering that either government or large corporations support most (if not all) scientific research, then we have an issue, in my mind, as we have a system supporting individuals who have a strong reason to then support that system back. I call this a 'self-reinforcing loop', and that is something that destroys logic. In essence, psychological/neurochemical reward is so powerful that when people are rewarded, they don't even know that they have come to defend the entity that rewarded them. But, I have an even stronger case for the idea that the logic upon which we base our society is (strongly) biased and therefore flawed. Look at quantum indeterminacy (more commonly known as observer created reality). This is the crux of why I believe the scientific method is an illusion. Quantum indeterminacy has a very high degree of acceptance among physicists...a poll was taken 20 years ago or so, and as I recall 89% of credentialed physicists agreed with that idea as being valid. Quantum indeterminacy is best known through the (mathematically verified) mind experiment of Schrodenger's Cat. A poison pill is dropped at random in a sealed chamber with a cat, and Shrodenger 'proved' that until the cat was obsevered, it would be neither dead nor alive. There's more to it than that, but a full explanation would be even longer. So, it is well accepted scientifically that no (quantumly reduced) reality exists until a sentient being observes an act, and when it is observed the mathematical quantum wave function collapses, reducing myriad possible realities into one, observable reality. So, admittedly, I draw different conclusions from this well accepted experiment than most physicists do. The general thought is that an observer is needed to cause a quantum reduction from possibility into discrete reality but that the awareness of that observer doesn't actually affect that reality. I think that is poppycock, and time will show that the observer does affect that reduction, and therefore reality, just as time showed that in the medical field bleeding people and using leaches didn't actually foster health. So, it is my opinion that via quantum reduction, we see what we want to see or are programmed to see in our own reality, and that simply causes a reality feedback loop that makes us believe that we, as humans, are right. Any scientific experiment is prone to such, and so how can we ever trust even what we can see and touch, as even that may be of our own biased making? And, or course, that then draws into question the nature of knowledge as well. How can we ever know if the knowledge that we hold so dearly is not simply a self-reinforcing feedback loop?
Does knowing something necessarily imply a truth or a fact... The question of knowledge is more about how we can define truth... Truth is a convention an agreement between participant of a language, the rule of the game. Some language give more place to interpretation and judgement, and other almost none, like mathematics... but almost is not enough. The only knowledge we can get access is a kind of strong believe, in my opinion there is no line between knowing and believing.
I may be a little thick in the head but someone please explain something to me: Why cast further doubt if I am standing in the rain and I can clearly see it's raining because I'm getting wet. What is wrong with me settling for "I see it is and I can feel it so I have knowledge that it is raining".
![PHILOSOPHY - Epistemology: The Problem of Skepticism [HD]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/PqjdRAERWLc/mqdefault.jpg)
![PHILOSOPHY - Epistemology: The Problem of Skepticism [HD]](/img/tr.png)
Can we make this the "Jennifer Nagel explains everything perfectly" channel? That introduction was flawless.
How do you know?
What about the introduction makes it flawless?
Can we even know what a flaw is? 🤔
it really was, wasn't it?! I teach undergraduate research methods and have always found epistemological concerns fascinating. I was fortunate to have professor Mary Hawkesworth introduce me to the philosophy of science. But now in an era of resurgent science wars with non-scientists or non-social scientists in positions of political power who have ideological, theological or economic axes to grind, these issues are no longer just intellectually pleasurable abstractions. The very future of the academy and academic freedom, without which epistemology becomes a moot endeavor, is at stake. To say nothing of, say, the planet, or more accurately, its 7.6 billion inhabitants who sort of depend on an inhabitable planet for their existence.
00:40 What is knowledge? When really examined there's a lot of interesting paradoxes and questions.
01:02 What is the verb "to know"? There's multiple usages in the English language but this series focuses on the "knowing a fact" sense of the word.
02:00 Knowledge is a way to be latched onto a fact
02:05 Of the word languages, only about 100 words are universal to them all. "To know" is one of them.
02:40 Knowing vs believing. We instinctively feel some difference between them. Believing is sometimes true or sometimes false. What we know is factual or probable.
03:45 Beyond truth, confidence is another condition of knowing.
04:35 A good basis of justification seems to be a third condition of knowledge. Simply have a belief about a fact doesn't mean one possesses knowledge.
05:30 Is knowledge even possible? Perhaps you're dreaming. This is skepticism.
Oh thanks for this, I really don't have the patience to watch a 5 minute video....
@@FLofHistory That's quite concerning lol. You have a really low attention span
@@zestastic3359 sarcastic
@@famariassoto2079 Sarcasm*
@@zestastic3359 Either he's impatient or he's/she's being sarcastic; The question here is: Do we truly know what @Dramor is having in his/her mind? What are his/her true emotions regards his/her patience on the video or even the sarcastic nature of him/her? What are his/her intentions? Do we know? Does he/she even know?
Is he even a gendered person, is he just a bot/AI sending information through electronic devices?
Can/do we have thorough knowledge of his/her it thought process, intentions, ideals, aim, and consider it a fact?
Do you guys even know if I'm not just a bot replying to you right now? Can you prove it? Do I even exist for you?
The answer is we don't know, we're all agnostic somehow, one way or another.
This reminds me of my Theory of Knowledge class.
I think knowledge doesn't necessarily have to be truth, but truth is always knowledge. Facts/knowledge remain so until we know better. Knowledge requires evidence, which could be truth, but belief doesn't but it still could also be truth due to sheer coincidence.
If it is not true it is a belief or idea.
Yes exactly. Knowledge is truth, but I dont believe something can be false. Therefore if you have true knowledge, then you can use it to form an uncertain theory/belief. Else, it is only a theory which is uncertaintly disproven to be practical knowledge until you discover it to be fundamentally true. @@ManchmalGaming
This video gives the impression that waking up in windowless rooms is less upsetting than potential rain :D Pierre is a tough dude, I would totally freak.
Yeah, that's a jail cell, it's rough.worse than one would think.
I feel even dumber than before I watched this.
That means you're getting smarter because you've increased the scope of what you know you don't know, whereas before you weren't aware there was even anything to know. This is why Socates said "All I know is that I know nothing," and why the people highest on the Dunning-Kruger scale in confidence know the least - they know only just enough to think they have a good handle on the subject when in fact they don't even know how vast their ignorance is. Having some idea of the extents of what you are still yet to understand about a subject makes you more knowledgeable about it than someone who doesn't and already thinks they know everything about it.
Piñata Oblongata
Okay we don’t need a paragraph here...
Good! You're over comming the Donning Kruger effect
Das gut.
@@MainCharacter_Obeyme I think we needed two
Just a healthy joke here. No wonder Pierre is totally pessimistic about things all the time. He lives on a room without any windows.
*in, not on
I don`t trust Pierre.
I think im the only one who immediately thought of the producer lmao
That's a very unhealthy joke.
It could have been worse: a jail cell, perhaps.
As a tutor of English and basic arithmetic, this video will be a perfect introduction to Epistemology for impressionable young people who have questions about falsifiable reality. Hopefully they shall be encouraged to question supernatural myths the human species has clung to over our existence.
Much appreciation for the author of this precise explanation of epistemology.
Supernatural myths we don’t have the knowledge to debunk you mean?
@@paul-d-mann I don't think that's what she means ;-)
If Pierre wakes up in a windowless room, things are definitely going wrong. 😂
This concept of Philosophy has always piqued my interest, philosophy seems to have answers of every "HOW'S" of life. I am a junior year high school medical student but since I love philosophy, I went on surfing about Philosophy, it's subtopic and found your book on Epistemology! I am soon gonna start reading it.
How can you tell love is not just a chemical process in the brain i.e the releasing of dopamine to produce certain type of emotional behavior in the human brain?
Can you prove it?
Interesting isn't it? We humans are so creative that we give value and meaning to invaluable and meaningless things when reduced to size and significances.
We're fighting for a piece of paper called “money” on a floating rock in an empty space; Funny how a piece of paper could get you food and all the thing you'll ever need to survive, we humans truly are creative and strange beings.
We're all agnostics one way or another my Friend.
We're all asking the same question, Science tries to answer the questions but we humans are very limited in terms of knowledge (considering the fact that everything we though to be true is false when reducing to the subatomic world or quantum level).
Philosophy questions everything and also can't answer them with decent understanding for everyone, that why Ideologies and concepts and theories are born .
I see the same pattern in every scholar category of gaining knowledge -i.e curiousity.
We humans are godlike beings because we are both Good and Evil at the same time.
We are a bit different and perhaps unique more than animals or any other species in terms of intelligence and discovering the covered Truths.
We humans are creative, kind, loving, intelligent, moral, social, raional.
But at the same time, we are dreadful, horrible, terrifying, hating, destroying, angry, and so on.
We have the properties of a Creator, and reality is truly created in the mind.
@@anub1s954 WOW, I am amazed by your reply to the comment! I agree to your this statement 'Philosophy questions everything and also can't answer them with decent understanding for everyone, that why Ideologies and concepts and theories are born .' The way you framed your reply and whatever intriguing you have written all up there makes you a person I'd appreciate to open my brain with.
Know is one the most commonly used words because... "I don't know" :D
Underrated comment
There are two different ways the word "know" is used.
#1. To have absolute certainty with respect to a claim, statement, or idea.
#2. Being familiar with, or aware of something.
Knowledge as an absolute certainty is not attainable.
And here in lies the problem of philosophy: you can nearly spend a lifetime studying each word's ontology of the definition to a concept. Justification, veritology (truth), belief formation... these are huge topics!
"Veritology, my arse! Which ass(small donkey) gave you that neologism? Epistemology was also a neologism until it was coined or made up by Scottish philosopher James F. Ferrier (1808-1864) - see also Bolloxology coined by the wizard of Oz, the study of made-up bullshit words, which also forms part of bambooozolism
I would say:
The difference between belief and knowledge is that you are more certain if you know it than if you believe it unless it's a religious context.
And if you perceive yourself to be more certain, that will help you feel more confident about it.
But saying that you know something, and actually knowing something are two potentially different things.
It's like hearing it rain, and it raining, are two different things. The latter requiring it to actually be the case.
you make me want to take a philosophy class in condition it is taught by you. you are a good teacher!
persianprince2012 ha I'm in her class right now
Islandof Summoners i'm jealous :P
you'd be bored pretty quickly, it is only good the first few days, i'd say.
@@paterfamiliasgeminusiv4623 Double Orts that's the problem with student evaluations. Though I am happy to say I get quite good ones, a faculty member spends years, a lifetime perhaps, to establish the basis to offer a course on a subject. And someone with no other experience with the subject matter is offered a platform from which he or she gets to pronounce judgment without the slightest bit of justification. ("Guilty," says the judge, but offers no defensible explanation as to why.)
We're literally studying Nagel in our class so this is awesome
This is awesome, we just started our Theory of Knowledge course.
Please make more on this topic!
It doesn't strike you as at all queer there there might be a "*theory*" of knowledge?
Epistemology is pretentialism, a made-up word like the famous Ozian thinkology, and bolloxology is the study of precisely that.
Excellent series... "In truth, knowledge is a veritable treasure for man, and a source of glory, of bounty, of joy, of exaltation, of cheer and gladness unto him. Happy the man that cleaveth unto it, and woe betide the heedless." ~ Bahá'u'lláh
I think I have lived 22 years, that my mother, father and brother exist. That I have learned to juggle and watched 100 episodes of simpsons. But maybe that was all a dream. I'm so confident that it is all real, because it all makes sense. But isn't that true about any dream? Has it never happened, that you feel completely confident that a dream you had was real, when you in actuallity were sleeping? I know I have had a dream like that. Or do I?
Yes! You have the crux of epistamology in my view. It is so natural to think that I have had a dream that felt so real that I took it for reality, so then how can I trust my waking reality to be any more real?
watch Inception. You will know what to do when you see the movie.
Sometimes you will have a dream with unreal settings e.g sleeping in another room thinking it's yours.
I Wonder why it happens. If we tend to trust experience, maybe your sense of self is lessened inside a dream to the point where you can't relate well to past experiences, hence why we don't remember how a dream starts. Yes, I'm assuming self awareness is a key aspect of rationality
Look up René Descartes' "Meditations on First Philosophy", he has a valid point (i.e "I think therefore I am") on distinguishing between dream and reality. Although other parts on how he is able to think in the first place is somewhat credulous.
To know does not exclude the possibility of error. It just means that in our present context, the claim has proven reliable time and again. This is the most we can hope for anyway.
If only more channels had this kind of substantive content.
Thank you for such a mind-blogging presentation. I'm still a student of psychology and eager to learn more 😊
Glad it was helpful!
If you want to learn psychology from an occult perspective, look into the works of Manly P Hall
Interesting but how do you know that you know that you know??
You have to make use of different viewpoints... This way you triangulate the knowledge in question. It takes a while, and therefore patience is a must. As we evolve, we tend to become less patient, especially when considering the 'go, go, go,' mentality of today. This is another reason that reinforces why people don't enjoy thinking... And hence, believe things that are completely irrational.
We assume we share the same reality and start with logical propositions. Identity, non-contradiction, and excluded middle.
And what do you mean by the I that is asking?
Feelings. I know that at this moment I feel (for whatever reason) compelled to write this comment. I also know that I feel tired. I also know that I feel hungry.
Even if you took the most radical skeptic position that nothing is real and that we don’t exist or are in a simulation, you cannot argue that I don’t know that I feel a certain way.
From this acknowledgment of validity of knowledge about one’s feelings you can branch out, but it will increasingly become more difficult to argue its objectivity. But it nevertheless constitutes objective knowledge.
Yes, knowledge is attainable.
By being punched on the knows
(FACTS OVA FEELINGS). Knowledge is a Garden if it Isn't Cultivated it Can't bee Haversted
I'm having trouble trying to put this to words, this makes me think if everything is just perception (what is perception?) and an illusion, and if that we can only know what we know(what is knowing?). How would you even prove this? How do you know that you know what knows mean? what standard are we using? I think I know what this video is trying to communicate, although that would be a paradox right? All of this is very abstract.. knowledge is a paradox.. How will knowing what knowing is benefit me in anyway? Was this understandable?
At 2:20 where the verb "to know" is written in several languages, the japanese translation is written incorrectly. It was written as 知つ('shitsu' which does not exist using this kanji/symbol) instead of its correct form '知る' (read as 'shiru' =to know).
Outstanding video, Jennifer!
More tools in my toolbox of epistemology.
This was very HELPFUL
Loved this video. I like how it broke down the method or reasoning of going about defining knowledge. Subscribed.
the difference between thinking and knowing is the level of trust in that which you think/know. If you only think, then you can be persuaded by authority (like people whom you trust, or natural phenomena) that it is false. That is not the case with knowledge. When you know something (for example, that the floor you about to step on is solid), you will not hesitate to risk serious injury, or even death, in the case that this knowledge is false.
KNAAWWLEDGEE
+Gijscoman your picture perfectly matches you comment
+Gijscoman tai??
Epistemology is the most illogical fantasy nonsense I've ever heard. You can't be the justification for what you think you know is true, you can't say that I know evolution is true because I perceive it as true because that would be circular reasoning which is one of the greatest fallacies in an atheistic worldview which states that we are the sole arbitrator of our perceived knowledge. Therefore nothing can ever be known to be true. Get out of here with that nonsense
Epistemology is the most illogical fantasy nonsense I've ever heard. You can't be the justification for what you think you know is true, you can't say that I know evolution is true because I perceive it as true because that would be circular reasoning which is one of the greatest fallacies in an atheistic worldview which states that we are the sole arbitrator of our perceived knowledge. Therefore nothing can ever be known to be true. Get out of here with that nonsense
Jacob pando
So you think understanding good information vs bad information is a waste of time? Judging by your channel you are a theist so probably believe that a book you believe is true is the only way to discern true from false. But how is your belief supported in any non-circular way? How have you determined that the book you assume to be true, is actually based on truth? If you are suggesting that 'it just is because', then what you propose offers nothing to any honest discussions about what might or might not be.
Do you think that a person who follows the Quran is following the truth? If not, why not? What about a Hindu or Taoist? It isn't just what can be perceived to be true, but about the reliability of the information that is taken into consideration when deciding a truth value. When both you and another person with different beliefs claims 'scripture' to support them, how do you then go about deciding which 'scripture' is the right one?
I don't think you quite understand the subject mate, but am happy to have a polite (constructive) discussion about it if you are so inclined.
Information+belief=knowledge
yes, that right.
Since information is knowledge obtained from rigorous study, often evidence based, it seems like you are right. Actually, in some ways information can be more reliable.e.g Scientific information is always more reliable than empirical, because of biases.
Are you sure about that?
Thanks for taking your time and share this, for the lack of a better word, knowledge, with us Jennifer.
I think confidence is misleading. I think it would be more beneficial to replace confidence with how likely one thinks it is to be true. confidence is more of a social indicator I would say but what do i know. knowing vs believing was bang on though and so well explained!
Thank you, such a great effort. Your channel has helped me a lot.
Your video is just superb, making mine seem quite modest.
oh thank god for this video, my TOK teacher literally doesn't teach. Thank you so much for making this
Wow, that blew my mind.
Thanks for your contribution.... Stay Blessed
When I said that this is the first time I have looked up epistemology, I meant on RUclips. Of course, epistamology is a branch of philosophy that studies the nature of knowledge, and I have studied this in a unique and deep way.
I have a saying, which usually pisses everyone off...but here it is:
"Truth is in the eye of the beholder."
We think of truth and facts as some sort of objective thing, yet from where does that belief come?
I would say two places. One, the 'group' around us says this or that is true, and via social pressure, we believe it. Two, academics and scientists say that this or that is true, and because of citations like this piece of knowledge came from this or that college or university, we tend to believe it. This fact came from Johns Hopkins or Kings College, and so we accept it, but what does that really mean?
In simple terms, scientists, academics, and like professionals have to have peer acknowledgement to keep their jobs and paychecks, so how does that really lead to truth? Because it's a club...peer review. People who think as you do, and who need paychecks just like you do, review your work, and it seems to me that they will come up with some hypothesis that is close to what you (the professional) will come up with.
So what is Truth, then?
We must decide what is truth on our own. Such is a lonely journey, as we must depend on our own, inherent knowledge to come to this realization, but it is a journey well taken, because only when we decide truth for ourselves can we truly come together.
Actually, you've raised an interesting question, but ironically came up with precisely the wrong solution. Truth (to my understanding) represents a conception or description of the world that corresponds as closely as possible to objective reality. There's no doubt that people can disagree on what is true or real... But this disagreement does not alter reality itself.
The presumption that there is a single, external, objective reality is just that... an assumption. But without this assumption, there can be no society, no language, no communication, and no science. Our goal is to come as close as we can to describing objective reality as accurately as possible. AND THE ONLY WAY THIS CAN BE DONE IS THROUGH MUTUAL EFFORT, AND SHARED COLLABORATION, as is done in scientific method!! Acting alone, we are helpless slaves to our cognitive biases. Only by combining and pooling our efforts can we ever hope to overcome bias. (And if we restrict our communications to "like-minded" people we're similarly screwed.)
So you're welcome to put out your own perceptions of the world for others to evaluate and critique. If your accounting of things has validity, it will eventually become widely accepted as "truth" (or a reasonable facsimile thereof!)
And, I would add that I understand that collective thinking is the general basis for our world. It is not wholly bad, as no thing is 'right or wrong'. But, I think that different types of thinking are necessary to make it a complete system.
I have a personal quote here that I think is apropee: the life-blood of a democracy is the dissenter. For without opposing voices, how could there ever be a true democracy?
So, the same thing applies to science (since science is a human invention). We need dissenters.
It is not an easy path, but I am an individualist in a world of collectivists, and I dissent, when I think it's needed.
@@toddhall4309 There were two replies from you. Now there's only one. But I can still reply to that one.
I agree in principle with your comments about dissent, but I still disagree that everyone's opinion is equally worthy. If it's a matter of values, preferences, or faith-based belief, then there's really no basis for dispute or disagreement, but if it pertains to testable, measurable, factual matters then some opinions may be better than others, depending on how well they conform to reality. I agree that everyone is entitled to propose dissenting views, but if their views are not supported by evidence, then they are of little value or importance.
There's a common misunderstanding that the "truth" of a scientific claim is immediately obvious from the moment it is proposed. That's not correct. The "truth value" of a scientific claim is established only by testing, confirmation, and eventually consensus. Dissenting views are always possible, but MUST be supported by evidence to have any value. Dissent by itself is not sufficient.
Oh good job. Im proud of you! You have started practicing some combat epistemology. Youve been trying to effect the signal to noise ratio. Its too little too late tho. Ive got enough anchor points. You can maybe jam my radar for a bit, but not much more.
this is my prof!!! she is the best!!
Thanks for the lovely explanation.
She said that knowledge is latched to the facts. Knowledge is personal and does not need to be related to the facts. In the history of science we have countless cases when something what was considered as knowledge had nothing to do with the facts.
Even if I have same common knowledge with other people I reflect this common knowledge trough my mind and I make it personal at lest a bit different.
Knowledge is satisfyingly processed information. The difference between believe and knowledge is the rate of our confidence whether we know the fact(s).
The professor is quite confused. She apparently comes to believe there is "absolute knowledge" about the facts and wrongfully makes knowledge and facts equal or related. Our knowledge can be closer or further from the facts.
I do not use the word "truth" purposefully. The "truth" is more complicated philosophical issue.
High confidence is the only form of truth.
High Confidence can only be created by the sight of the rain,not through any other means.
Confidence created otherwise will never be as high.
You are on the right track (IMHO), but not quite there. I liked your first sentence, but then it went "downhill". Information provided by the senses is an important source of information about the world, but it is not infallible. In any case, there are many examples where our OWN perceptions are not as reliable as those of knowledgeable (sic) experts. We should simply concede that we do not have access to perfect, complete knowledge or 100% confidence. However, this doesn't mean that we cannot have different degrees of knowledge, which may be ranked according to their accuracy, which I define as their correspondence to reality.
Correspondence with reality can be assessed by coherence and consilience (with other elements of knowledge) as well as by trust (in competent, reliable authorities). Neither of these approaches is infallible... but that was our starting point, so it doesn't help us very much to acknowledge that knowledge could be wrong. In any case, we mostly rely on trust most of the time to provide our best understanding of the status of human knowledge. We simply cannot personally experience everything that we claim to know.
Unfortunately, many people embrace and trust authorities who are not actually deserving of their trust. And some people place a higher level of confidence in 2500 year-old books than more recent books. But there's nothing we can do about that.
@@MendTheWorld
There is no Highest Confidence
There are Higher and lower confidences.
The amount of condifence is measured through means like coherence.
The confidence measured is the Knowledge
Religion exists because the means of forming confidence arent limited to established means like coherence
But what makes some measure of confidence established and others not?
The Fact that there no answers to the above question, will always keep religion alive and well
....better?
Hume Sounds good to me!
Wonderful Explanation
If I knew that you couldn't waste your time reading and responding to those generous enough to watch and comment, I wouldn't have wasted mine.
"Knowledge is the conformity of Object and intellect" - Averroes
Knowledge and Understanding:
In the domain of Knowledge there are different types: True, false, questions, distinctions, predictions, contradictions, procedures, nonsense, and the list goes on.
In the domain of Understanding where the knowledge type 'procedural' is the how-to instructions included in the body of knowledge that makes up the understanding.
You can view your list of understandings by listing all the words you use that end with the suffex ing. Like: Reading, writing, thinking, talking, seeing, believing, typing, tweeting, etc.
Understandings are the program code that runs all the things that you do.
Understandings consume energy (calories) when operating whereas knowledge does not require extra energy just to remain in state.
Its good to know the difference between Knowledge and Understanding.
Knowledge Directs, Understanding Affects.
The brain organizes knowledge into ten knowledge contexts for every issue in its knowledge library. These contexts are: Name, Authors, Purpose, Environment, Language, Configuration, Operation, Owners, Market, and Value. These are the Ten Directors that control the function of any issue. All procedural knowledge that drives understandings are stored in the Operation Director.
You can change your life my meditating on each one of the ten directors individually and doing a house cleaning on the knowledge stored there. Delete the false knowledge and install true knowledge in each of the ten directors. Edit modify and test changes to procedural knowledge in all your understandings.
The video turned around the fact of knowing and its strong relation to weither it is a truth or not, but I am more into discussing '' the person'' who produces this '' knowledge''. Because this has been in my opinion ( I believe) the core issue of knowledge production. an exemple given is this famous idea that '' history is written by the victors '' .
Kujua is the most interesting thing here for me!
You can know that to know that something exist to be as it is generally accepted to be, or we can know how it exists. Conversely, we can know how that something exists as well, but do we know why that any of it exists as how or that ?
Thank you for a very educative talk. Stay blessed.
My best attempt: Knowledge = Stored associative networks of facts and information that can be recalled.
OMG this is so good. Thank YOU!!!
Is a survey of the semantic meaning of the word 'know' the best entre into an investigation of epistemology?
Occam's Razor leaves us with what appears to be the best theory of Knowledge, a Universal definition;
'Knowledge'; "that which is perceived!"
To Exist is to be perceived. To be perceived means to Exist.
Nothing exists that is not perceived, nothing is perceived that does not exist!
Thus, Existence is ALL-inclusive!
Reality is predicated upon Existence!
Thus, Reality is ALL-inclusive!
Truth, being predicated on Reality must, also, be ALL-inclusive!
Knowledge IS Truth!
Truth IS Knowledge!
Most establish truth first then seek knowledge that supports their truth
Data -->Information --> Knowledge --> Wisdom.
A very good video with helpful illustration. Thank you !
This is a true feat. congratulations and well done!!!
I know I shall watch the future videos in the series. :)
You've been saying about 4 types of knowledge: "knowing someone", "knowing a place", "knowing a language" and "knowing a fact"
But what about "knowing-how" (like knowing how to play chess)? Is it the same type as "knowing language" or "knowing a fact"? Or it is the fifth type?
"Knowing someone" and "knowing a place" are also referred to as knowledge by acquaintance; knowing-how would include both skills like being able to speak a language and play chess/ride a bicycle. It is certainly not like "knowing a fact", as a fact is just a proposition, which may be expressed in any language.
Thanks a ton for starting this series!!
I read Plato's Theaetetus recently, this is a good summery of it, very clear!
Knowledge doesn't work without insight (insight is source to knowledge).
What does confidence and belief have to do with knowledge? Knowledge is truth on a good basis and that's it.
I want to know if Jennifer Nagel believes in any God, and if she does, how she can tell the difference between knowing it is true, or believing is true.
Thanks! I'm looking for opinions on the following, quite unusual statement+question pair:
"The number of questions one can ask about the world is astronomical. How can {a piece of software} contain all those questions?"
i believe that french has two ways to say 'to know' versus our one way to say 'i know.'
(savoir and connaître)
if anyone is more familiar with this, i would like to know.
Yeah. It gets used for different contexts. Like you would never say je te sais. To say I know you. You would say je te connait.
Not quite sure if there is a rule to what the nature of the two words is as there are a lot of cases where both are interchangeable, but you are right to say that the two verbs exist.
Thank you. Where is the next lesson of this to complete it?
You should do audio books. That voice is so soothing.
Hi. Your explanation of the concept of epistemology is the best. Asking for permission to use this video as a reference for my presentation this week. Thank you. Hoping for a positive feedback.
I'm French and I have a question. We have two kinds of translations for "To Know". They are "Savoir" and "Connaitre". My question is how could we separate the significant meaning of the two? And from your video, what proper verbe should we use/utilize?
with my limited English and French I'd vote for - savoir=knowledge/to know; connaitre=recognize - makes more sense?
What about knowledge as "justified true belief?" Does the justification (i.e. evidence that it is raining) satisfy both a good basis and confidence in the belief? Is evidence from the senses enough, or are we simply brains in vats receiving electrical impulses we perceive as senses?
I think it's ' properly' justified true belief per Tom Morris
Actually, evidence cannot 'justify' knowledge. Only argument can.
Yes our senses are good enough because they are reliable and consistant with our reality
could you please add an English subtitles to all of your videos
It Helps a lot to me! Thanks
if you’re absolutely sure of something that you technically don’t know, yet you are correct about it, do you “know” it?
KNOW AND WHEN YOU GET KNOW NOT
DON'T LIE, USE, DO GOOD.
I really like how she is teaching this topic. It is clear, clean, and short. How did she make this video or create this type of presentation?
Jennifer,
Regarding Knowledge and Justified True Beliefs-which is where you’re heading-please answer:
1. Yes or no, can someone that does not exist have a Justified True Belief that they do exist?
2. Yes or no, do you exist?
If no, then how do you ‘Justify’ the claim that you do not exist?
3. Yes or no, are you certain that you exist?
If no, are you saying that it is possible you do not exist? Please ‘Justify’ that.
4. Yes or no, can you have a ‘Belief’ you exist?
If yes, please ‘Justify’ that.
[Ref. The Mysterious Stranger (last chapter) -Mark Twain]
[Ref. The Thirteenth Floor]
[Note: Please don’t ref. Rene Descartes or The Matrix]
yinYangMountain
+yinYangMountain
1. Cannot be answered
2. Tautology
3. Tautology again
4. Yes
I believe I exist justifies 4
+H Tawfik
H Tawfik,
Well, the answers to these questions are from advanced philosophy and discussed, at length, in a few Stanford papers on philosophy.
1. No. This question was designed to expose the errors is various presuppositions. E.g., something cannot reveal to you that you exist if you actually don’t. [It’s akin to the chicken and egg paradox.]
2. The question is not the “Tautology.” It’s the justification that can become the “Tautology.”
3. This question is designed to explain that if something is ‘known’ than anything unknown is irrelevant. I.e., if you know it, you know it, period. How is not the question. Again, it’s not a “Tautology” until justification is put forth.
4. This question follows the previous and is the “Tautology.” Your justification was circular. [Ref. The Mysterious Stranger -Mark Twain]
The error made with almost all students, and even some professors, is not being clear what the ‘you’ existing means. [Ref. Socratic Method.] [Ref. Where and/or who is the ‘you’ in a split-brain patient? Ref. Where would the ‘you’ and/or who is the ‘you’ in a complex multi-level conscious program inside a hypothetical super computer?]
If your answers are not universally consistent [Ref. Kant/Hume] you’ve not solved hard solipsism.
yinYangMountain
+yinYangMountain
1. I'm not sure why the answer to this is "no" given the fact that the question doesn't seem to hold any meaning. What does it even mean for "someone that does not exist" to "have" something?
2. My mistake, "tautology" was a wrong answer. Rather, the statement "you exist" seems to be analytic in nature and tautological. For there to be a "you", you need to exist.
3. Similar to 2. "I exist" seems to be tautological.
4. I don't get why my justification is circular. The question asks whether I can have a belief I exist. For it to be true, I simply require to fulfill the predicate condition, which I think I did in my previous post.
I would greatly appreciate any feedback since I am by no means an expert in these matters and wish to further my understanding. Cheers
+H Tawfik
H Tawfik,
“1. I'm not sure why the answer to this is "no" given the fact that the question doesn't seem to hold any meaning. What does it even mean for "someone that does not exist" to "have" something?”
Original Question:
“1. Yes or no, can someone that does not exist have a Justified True Belief that they do exist?”
Your answer:
“1. Cannot be answered”
OK, let’s ask it this way then [J-T-B]:
1a. If it is True [T] that you do not exist, can there be justification [J] you do? No, by definition. [Ref. Law of Non-Contradiction]
1b. If you, H Tawfik, did not actually exist, how could you and/or Jennifer Nagel (the author of this series) reveal to you that you existed? [Ref. Law of Identity]
See it now? So, can it be answered? Yes. The answer is, “No.”
These questions stem from the problem philosophers, who should know better, have keeping the language coherent and without equivocation from one section of this puzzle to the next. So in the end, H Tawfik, ask yourself if Jennifer has presented a clear epistemology that could be used to justify here ‘knowledge’ of her own existence?
“2. […] analytic in nature and tautological. For there to be a "you", you need to exist.”
I’ll concede, from a language reference and a purely analytic definition, you have a point. But from a practical standpoint, hard solipsism has not been solved by philosophers; well, not without being highly contested. [Ref. The Omniscience Paradox] [In Mark Twain’s poetic version of solipsism at the ending of The Mysterious Stranger, Twain reveals offers a version of Plato’s Cave; at the end, Chapter 11, we rightly ask, “Does the character (Written in the first-person) Theodor, the protagonist, exist as an actual Theodor?” No.]
“4. I don't get why my justification is circular…”
My point is that the problem occurs with ‘knowledge’ as examined by Jennifer Nagel. So, we must first ask these questions:
- Can something be true that’s false? No.
- Can knowledge be false? Strictly speaking, no. E.g., Can you have ‘knowledge’ you are the president of the United States if you are not. No.
* The next problem is when philosophy runs headlong into neuroscience [The self is an illusion that is exposed with brain damage and/or split-brain patients] and theoretical complex multidimensional computer code [Ref. The Thirteenth Floor]
Seriously, H Tawfik, if you want a hard solipsism head scratcher [the question of what we can know-including if we exist], listen to the ending of The Mysterious Stranger. The punchline is quite bizarre yet profound. It’s a clever twist by Twain-and one the reader-after ten chapters-does not expect. [Note: If you’re a fundamentalist Christian, you’ll probably find it offensive. From a pure philosophical perspective, Twain understood René Descartes dilemma.]
Search - RUclips:
The Mysterious Stranger and Other Stories by Mark Twain - Chapter 11/12 (read by Ted Delorme)
-freeaudiobooks84
Thanks for the great chat,
Cheers
Thank you
If I woke up in a random windowless room, Alice's picnic would be the last thing on my mind.
Great video!
Skepticism is the answer to the problem of pseudoscience in our world. Need to find the solution to belief's if we want to get out of this dark age we're currently living in.
I had a question in my degree essay what is the epistemological issues with qualitative research. This lead me here and the only thing I can think of is accepting the answers given by the focus group as the truth without knowing the answers given have not been fabricated and are factually correct.
We start Philosophy in our Second Period and i don't know its still confusing and mind blowing :o
Awesome explanation!
Is she related to Thomas Nagel?
+rmeddy1 Not so far as I know.
+Jennifer Nagel what about Ernest Nagel?
+charmlessman No, sorry.
+Jennifer Nagel oh what a pleasant surprise. Hello there. Good work on the philosophy videos!
Nkl
Wonderful video! I have read even your book on this subject.
"It's weird to say 'Alice knows it's raining, but it isn't.' " (3:30) Given the state of civil discourse in the United States during the six years since this video was made, it's no longer weird to say this. All of the conversation in this and the following videos skirt the new reality of a post-truth world: anyone can know anything, and no one is in a position to deny anyone else's knowing. I know whatever I personally want to know, and my knowing is just as valid as anyone else's, no matter what it's basis. Is it time for a philosophical update on Knowledge?
Suscribed instantly, grreat content
Great introduction. Thank you!
As plato said, you need to observe something in order to know it, by your senses - like sight, hearing, touch, smell and taste. someone knows something if that is something is true.
as aristotle said, knowledge can only be attained by careful observaion of the natural world, and reasoned justification. it has to make sense, there needs to be a rational explanation for it, and there needs to be experimental evidence for it, which can either be directly or indirectly obersed through our senses. but the sense doesnt know. it is a medium between the real world and our mind. only if that knowledge gets to our mind, it can be processed as an accurate representation of the nature of reality. that is science. as far as epistemology is concearned, philosophy has lost the game to naural sciences like physics, biology, chemistry. but it is important not to forget where we started of, with total ignorance of that which is generally accepted as basic knowledge. and that is thanks to philosophy. but as socrates said, who was obsessed with knowledge theory: "I know that I don't know - but atleast I know that" which means that he is aware of his own ignorance towards the infinite ocean of potential knowledge. the more you know, the more realize that there have been many things which you didn't know, and there are even more things that you don't know. it's like a circle of ignorace where the mind (the "knowing" part of one self) is the dot in the middle, and the radius the amount of knowledge. this is a pretty accurate visual representation.
Idk why people don't acknowledge intelligent comments and give thousands of likes of stupid comments like "who is here in 2020". Stupid do come in masses.
Hello. I looked up epistemology for the first time ever, and I found this video. I watched 57 seconds of the video, and I already wish to comment.
I've spent a great deal of time thinking about the nature and underpinnings of knowledge, and this is what I have come to believe.
The ultimate indicator of the veracity of knowledge is this: does it work; does it make our lives better?
but how do you know it works? does working only goes to you? like what if it works for you but not for eveyone else? On what sense is better something?
@@LARRYIsRealForeverWi
You know it works when it makes both yourself and others happy, healthy, and wise.
I love to talk to articulate people who have well thought out ideas, so thanks again for responding.
On my journey through life, I have studied much science, though I am not a professional in that field. I'm glad that I'm not such a professional, and the real reason that I did not decide to pursue such things is that formal academics gave me a bad taste in my mouth very early on. In short, I went to university with a craving to learn, and I quickly found out that most people were there to gain credentials in the easiest manner possible.
I have independently studied medicine (at an M.D. level) sociology, psychology, anthropolgy, world religion/spirituality, new physics, and in particular, behavioral neurochemistry (at the theoretical level). Along this path, I have seen a few things, and one of the most pivotal things that I have seen is summed up in a quote (from myself).
"Every scientist needs a paycheck."
Typically with animal/human behavior, one will see that when someone is supported by an entity, that animal or human will then defend that supporting entity. So, considering that either government or large corporations support most (if not all) scientific research, then we have an issue, in my mind, as we have a system supporting individuals who have a strong reason to then support that system back. I call this a 'self-reinforcing loop', and that is something that destroys logic.
In essence, psychological/neurochemical reward is so powerful that when people are rewarded, they don't even know that they have come to defend the entity that rewarded them.
But, I have an even stronger case for the idea that the logic upon which we base our society is (strongly) biased and therefore flawed. Look at quantum indeterminacy (more commonly known as observer created reality). This is the crux of why I believe the scientific method is an illusion.
Quantum indeterminacy has a very high degree of acceptance among physicists...a poll was taken 20 years ago or so, and as I recall 89% of credentialed physicists agreed with that idea as being valid.
Quantum indeterminacy is best known through the (mathematically verified) mind experiment of Schrodenger's Cat. A poison pill is dropped at random in a sealed chamber with a cat, and Shrodenger 'proved' that until the cat was obsevered, it would be neither dead nor alive. There's more to it than that, but a full explanation would be even longer.
So, it is well accepted scientifically that no (quantumly reduced) reality exists until a sentient being observes an act, and when it is observed the mathematical quantum wave function collapses, reducing myriad possible realities into one, observable reality.
So, admittedly, I draw different conclusions from this well accepted experiment than most physicists do. The general thought is that an observer is needed to cause a quantum reduction from possibility into discrete reality but that the awareness of that observer doesn't actually affect that reality. I think that is poppycock, and time will show that the observer does affect that reduction, and therefore reality, just as time showed that in the medical field bleeding people and using leaches didn't actually foster health.
So, it is my opinion that via quantum reduction, we see what we want to see or are programmed to see in our own reality, and that simply causes a reality feedback loop that makes us believe that we, as humans, are right.
Any scientific experiment is prone to such, and so how can we ever trust even what we can see and touch, as even that may be of our own biased making?
And, or course, that then draws into question the nature of knowledge as well. How can we ever know if the knowledge that we hold so dearly is not simply a self-reinforcing feedback loop?
Klowledge doesn't have to be instrumental, see the difference between instrumental and epistemic rationality.
The problem is the matrix construct sometimes has glitches. In the end you can wake up and believe whatever you want to believe.
Does knowing something necessarily imply a truth or a fact... The question of knowledge is more about how we can define truth... Truth is a convention an agreement between participant of a language, the rule of the game. Some language give more place to interpretation and judgement, and other almost none, like mathematics... but almost is not enough. The only knowledge we can get access is a kind of strong believe, in my opinion there is no line between knowing and believing.
If someone wants to delve more about the basis of this, search for Edmund Gettier's paper, "Is Justified True Belief Knowledge".
Some people are good at teaching and expressing ideas well, some are not. I know that much.
How do you know enough to believe?
How do you know enough to know you know?
Would the study of intelligence be a part of Epistemology? Or would that be under Logic?
I may be a little thick in the head but someone please explain something to me: Why cast further doubt if I am standing in the rain and I can clearly see it's raining because I'm getting wet. What is wrong with me settling for "I see it is and I can feel it so I have knowledge that it is raining".