truth as objective and good

Blake Daniel Brown
Paths to Knowledge/Sr. Seminar
31 January 2009

Truth: What is the Case?

In True to Life, Michael Lynch discusses the concept of Truth. From the beginning he argues that our understanding of truth affects both our personal and our political lives. Without going any further into the book, I reflected on that opening statement. I contemplated what I took to be true beliefs that I had and considered their implications for my life and prima facie agreed with Lynch. Then I delved deeper into the text and he began to discuss the four truisms of truth. My red flags immediately went up and my highly skeptic side came to the fore. Truth is “objective,” “good,” “worthy of inquiry,” “worth caring about for its own sake”; I was concerned because of the many possible pitfalls I thought of concerning each proposition. But I was intrigued, so I read on (plus, it’s an assignment, and I value the “good” of successful and rigorous studentship). In this post, I will discuss truth as “objective”, and truth as “good.”
“Truth is objective.” When I first thought of the objectivity of truth, I couldn’t help but immediately think in absolutes and universals, so I was worried. Lynch apparently holds the same worries though so I was calmed. What I took away from his discussion of the objectivity of truth was essentially that truth is something against which we measure and value. Though we do not know in most any case what the case is absolutely or universally, we are capable of approximating, and it is against lower case “t” truth that we approximate. We are taught, for example, in mathematics that two and two is four. Based on justifiable reasons, i.e. mathematical laws and principles, we can assert and maintain that when two and two occur together, their sum is four. We can tell someone that they are incorrect if they maintain anything else to be the case. Even though we don’t know if universally two and two is four (because we do not have a universal [Godly] perspective) we can justifiably say that according to mathematical laws and principles that two and two is four.
So we conceptualize truth as objective in the sense of reference. Referring to x given principle, or to x justified principle, then y. I have no problem with this, for the most part. Briefly, my problem with this notion is it appears to be asserted on an ineffable ground. What does this mean? We know two and two to be four based on mathematical laws, which are based on what? Consensus; scientific rigor? Maybe my concern is unwarranted, and in many ways I see how my concern is not necessarily a live problem; like, I still maintain that two and two is four anyway. For now, I will let my problem rest and continue on.
Lynch then discusses truth as good. He asserts truth as good based upon the evaluative dimension it necessarily entails. Basically, we value wrong ideas/beliefs as “bad” and right ideas/beliefs as “good.” Lynch discusses that “good” and “bad” aren’t necessarily moral categories; they can be cognitive categories also. Two and two equaling five is a bad cognitive idea/belief. Why? Because in real life two and two do not equal five, and it could even cause harmful side effects to maintain this as the case. In engineering and construction, we must adhere to the “good” cognitive principles of mathematics; otherwise buildings may be improperly constructed, leading to a cave-in or something worse.
What I continue to struggle with in Lynch’s text, is upon what grounds are these truths asserted? Is there an epistemological category I am unaware of that makes possible these assertions? Do we base truth on our experiences of trying out hypotheses until we find one in accord the desired outcome? Is truth based on semantics? Whatever the answer may be, I am interested in further study of this text, and further considerations of truth.

What is the Sea

I am running with the poetics left at the end of our professor's emails, which you all should be familiar with by now; "If you want to teach someone to build a boat, don't give them plans;
help them to love the sea." -- unknown.
Beautiful. Yet, as Professor McCrickerd pointed out, quite meaningless for our needs.

By the title you know what I am attempting to do here, but first I will describe what spurred me to attempt this, so indulge me for the moment (or skip it and read John's post which ain't half bad).
Political Economics 2049, a course I took abroad, approached the material and issues involved with economics in a way that I feel could shed some light on what education should be like. When I was asked earlier today if I had an understanding of 'political economics' I answered, "No, I don't think so." But after flipping through the texts from the course I realized how much I retained, and wondered why I answered this way; it was because the implicit point of the course was there existed no definitive understanding of political economics, the title of one of the texts, which was written by one of the lecturers, is Political Economy: the contest of economic ideas. This contest of ideas is what I believe makes up the Sea.

You see, the instructors within the economic department realized the existence of such a disparity of ideas and felt the issues pertained so strongly, and immediately to their students that they felt it a disservice to explicate any one concept over another, even though each argued fervently, almost desperately, in favor of their own view. More concretely, the issues were/are global warming, sustainable economic growth, globalization of the job market, unsustainable ultra-consumerism, and the increasing tendency of nation-states towards what one instructor called 'socialism' and what another called 'social-capitalism.' Rather than forcing one instructor to dilute their beliefs on the subject or skew the education of the students, they collectively taught, giving me such an understanding that I dared not even claim to fully understand the subject when asked. It was as if someone asked me if I understood the sea. How could one with confidence answer yes to this question? No surfer in the world would claim to understand the sea in its entirety, only their beach, only the ebb and neap of their own tides but not the sea in general. But love of the Sea, indeed, any surfer would answer a resounding 'Yes!' No matter how many times they've cracked their head on unbeknownst coral, been crushed by a wave they should never have caught, the love for the sea remains, though they may never fully understand it.

How? Why? What the hell am I going on about? Wait for it.

The course functioned as 2 one-hour lectures, with a 'tutorial' (small group meeting) once a week as well. The lecturers would rotate; one week with an 'orthodox economist,' one with a 'social economist,' and one with what I can only label as a 'radical.' The last one actually lived what he preached. His house was fully 'sustainable' meaning economically sustainable (ie solar panels, wind power, minimal consumerism of reusable materials...etc). He argued that if we did not take immediate action, within our life-times we would experience great catastrophe economically, environmentally, as well personally--as far as heath factors. His hands were callused from working on his home, his voice broken at times, and his evidence and materials were wheeled in on a cart (which I wouldn't be surprised if he rode home to save on the commute).
At the end of the each instructor's lecture, presentation, or seminar, the seated instructor not presenting would banter the other with what seemed to be questions they had encountered in they're own conversations with each other, judging by the responses. The tutorial functioned as what might be called a lab, where we had to demonstrate both proactive understanding of the material by presenting assigned chapters nuanced in favor of one's own economic view, as well as performative understanding through a formal group debate (my group had to defend the Kyoto Treaty as sufficient for sustainable economic growth in Australia, which I did not agree with but none the less had to perform).
This is how I feel we can get students to love the sea--that is, the contest of ideas--by showing them the deep ends and tossing them in the water with only a life-preserver connected to whichever instructor they might feel akin to in case they can't quite swim on their own.

And no Professor McCrickerd I don't have any evidence:)

Knowing and Understanding

I won't spend a lot of time balking at the definitions of knowing and understanding, but I feel that the definitions that are used (where creative application of knowledge is understanding and the lack of that is considered knowing) become jargon for developing teaching methodology that escapes what I consider to be the general connotations of the two words. I'll explain my definitions of these two words and why I think the language should be revised. However, I don't intend to ford that stream as these terms are generally accepted as such in the context that we are using them. I'll accept them the way they are, but I'm going to complain a bit first. :)

Knowing is associated with Truth to me. Traditionally, it is a step past understanding and exists in the realm of the universal. To know something is to understand the intricacies and subtleties of a particular meme. Further, it is the appreciation of the multiplicity of views that exist pertaining to that meme and a selection of the appropriate view. William James shows us that this is a faulted idea with his introduction of pluralism. A carpenter, physicist, and a cook all view a table differently. The carpenter sees the grain of the wood, feels the hardness of the wood, looks for defects in the workmanship. The physicist sees the table more conceptually in the realm of atoms all bound to form the shape that the table takes. The cook looks at the dimension of the tabletop and considers how many can eat at the table and how much food can the table hold while there are people seated there. All of this merely displays that there is no universally applicable "right" view. In light of this we can slightly change this definition of knowing to selecting the appropriate view given the context. In this way we remove it from the universal and place it firmly in the hands of the particular. Knowing no longer becomes associated with Truth but with truth of the matter at hand.

Understanding to me is merely the first step in the process of knowing. It can be singular in that it appreciates a particular view or it can be plural in that it appreciates multiple views. The failure of understanding is that it doesn't regularly apply appropriately. It may be able to perform a task in the right context but may not recognize the same opportunity in a different one. This also applies in a different way. The understander may appreciate how something is done but is unable to do it. This is kind of the opposite of the definition that we received in the texts. Understanding, in my terms, is best illustrated by John Dewey's notion that knowing is the equivalent of doing. One can understand how to ride a bike (the physics, the mechanics, and/or the aesthetics) without knowing how to do so. While understanding might enhance one's ability to know, it still lacks the ability to produce the perceivable result (in many cases).

The consequences of altering terms in a fashion that is contrary to general public consensus makes concepts opaque for all but the few who are willing to invest the time to engross themselves in the subtleties of technical jargon of the field. Fortunately, I happen to be one of those people in this case. But the problem remains for those who are not as interested. Why should we make things more difficult than they already are? I understand the need to unpack ideas to reduce ambiguity and communicate effectively. However, doing so in a manner that causes an ambiguous term to exit its original domain offers no benefit to communication. That's why we invent new words.

Blake Daniel Brown

Philosophy Senior Seminar

27 January 2009

Possessivity, Performativity, and Proactivity

Perkins discusses forms of knowledge and understanding in the three essays we read. He talks about ways we obtain and use knowledge and how it correlates to understanding, and he does it in a nice, systematic fashion.

To begin, Perkins describes a sort of rudimentary form of knowledge/understanding, which he terms as possessive. The possessive form of knowledge consists of essentially information storage. This type of knowledge is exemplified by such phenomena as mathematical knowledge, political knowledge, knowledge of ethics, etc. What I mean by these exemplifications is that we know that there is a thing that exists called mathematics, and there are rules that govern the discipline, and it is the same with each other discipline and myriad other data bits. Possessive knowledge precedes performative knowledge; it is the building block upon which understanding is built.

Performative knowledge is the sort that allows for responses to questions. So what is the answer to 2 plus 2? Four. Pretty straightforward, I would say. When we perform knowledge, we express the possessive knowledge that we have. But what differentiates performative knowledge from proactive knowledge?

Proactive knowledge demonstrates a more well-rounded and full understanding of the information stored in the brain. Proactive knowledge sees problems that performative knowledge misses. This explains to some extent the difference between knowledge and understanding—when we know something we don’t necessarily use that knowledge, whereas understanding occurs when we apply the knowledge we have to some phenomena to cultivate further knowledge. What this means is that given 2 and 2 equal four, we can recognize that 2 consists of 2 one’s, and therefore, 3 consists of 3 one’s and we can perform higher functions to quandaries we may not have known existed previously. This is still obtuse.

Rather than continuing to unfold my understanding of the difference between knowledge and understanding, let me get back to Perkins’ point of his essays. Perkins advocates teaching for understanding rather than for the purpose of stockpiling data. While compiling information can be useful, we should try to teach and learn in a manner that is conducive to proactive knowledge—knowledge that can apply to many more circumstances than mere possessive or wrote performative knowledge.

I must say I concur with Perkins admonition. When I feel like I know something best, I feel like I can apply that knowledge to many situations rather than typical situations. So I read Philosophy and try to gain a deep understanding of the idea asserted, and try to understand the idea from many angles for the purpose of a more enriched understanding, which corresponds to a more rich life (I hope). These are some preliminary considerations.

Some Preliminary Thoughts...

To begin with, it seems best to start with our definition of understanding. Here I especially like what David Perkins said in “Teaching for Understanding” about knowing being equivalent to the ability to “parrot” information and understanding, in contrast, being the ability to “perform” using information and applying it in unique ways.

This contrast seems crucial for examining understanding as I can imagine it to be quite common for most people to equate understanding something with having knowledge of it. We can also look at the difference as being similar to that of hearing vs. listening. We’ve all been scolded at a young age (and I’m sure probably in adulthood), “I know you hear me, but you’re not listening to me!” This is the difference between knowing and understanding. Hearing happens naturally, reflexively. Listening implies active cognition and focus, however. Here one is taking what is being heard and doing something with it. This doing of something with knowledge is what Perkins is referring to with understanding.

        And perhaps to lead us into our seminar, we could think about this contrast and how it should/shouldn’t guide our educations. Is it good enough to just know, or should understanding be a greater focus in the classroom? How does this apply to areas of study other than philosophy?

Welcome

Okay then, here's a blog for us to post our continuing thoughts brought up in the Senior Seminar. I continue to think about the direction this course is going to take and I'll push things off and toss out where I am and what I'm interested in but then I expect that you all will work to steer this in the direction that we collectively want it to go. So, the first book we have to read is Elgin's Considered Judgment. If you want a quick spin through epistemology, you may want to get the book that I've ordered for the Paths to Knowledge class called True to Life. We'll also, I expect, want to read Understanding Understanding. The task that I'm interested in is trying to figure out what understanding is (how it differs from knowledge, among other things) and then also how to cultivate this in others.

So. one article that I'd like for us to read is called "Beyond Understanding" and then I'm also intrigued by Korsgaard's The Constitution of Agency. I'm not sure it's related, but I think it may be. I've also ordered for the Paths class Tomasello's The Cultural Origins of Human Cognition which we may, or may not, want to read.

Anyway, here's the blog. I'm working on finding a day when we can meet and it looks like we're down to Tuesday or Wednesday. We may, if anyone has conflicts on these days, have to consider either 8am meetings or Sunday meetings.