Group items tagged

"Epistemology is the study of the nature, source, limits, and validity of knowledge.  It is especially interested in developing criteria for evaluating claims people make that they "know" something.  In particular, it considers questions such as: What is knowledge?  What is the difference between knowledge and opinion or belief?  If you know something, does that mean that you are certain about it?  Is knowledge really possible?"

Some philosophers before Locke had suggested that it would be good to find the limits of the Understanding, but what Locke does is to carry out this project in detail. In the four books of the Essay Locke considers the sources and nature of human knowledge. Book I argues that we have no innate knowledge. (In this he resembles Berkeley and Hume, and differs from Descartes and Leibniz.) So, at birth, the human mind is a sort of blank slate on which experience writes. In Book II Locke claims that ideas are the materials of knowledge and all ideas come from experience. The term 'idea,' Locke tells us "…stands for whatsoever is the Object of the Understanding, when a man thinks" (Essay I, 1, 8, p. 47). Experience is of two kinds, sensation and reflection. One of these - sensation - tells us about things and processes in the external world. The other - reflection - tells us about the operations of our own minds. Reflection is a sort of internal sense that makes us conscious of the mental processes we are engaged in. Some ideas we get only from sensation, some only from reflection and some from both.

Nice introduction to Personal and Shared Knowledge along with the IBO keynote with the animated Venn diagrams.

"Our society is divided into castes based upon a supposed division between theoretical knowledge and practical skill. The college professor holds forth on television, as the plumber fumes about detached ivory tower intellectuals. The felt distinction between the college professor and the plumber is reflected in how we think about our own minds. Humans are thinkers, and humans are doers."

"A weekly show where knowledge junkies get their fix of trivia-tastic information. This week we have the incredibly knowledgeable Michael Stevens, from Vsauce, to look at some common inaccuracies found in scientific illustrations. "

But this wacky stunt performed on Stewart's 'Indigenous Architecture through Indigenous Knowledge' dissertation was all done for a reason. It was designed to raise awareness about the 'blind acceptance of English language conventions in academia' and to also make a statement about Aboriginal culture and colonialism.

"combinatorial creativity"

Dr. Bronowski thought that the uncertainty principle should therefore be called the principle of tolerance. Pursuing knowledge means accepting uncertainty. Heisenberg's principle has the consequence that no physical events can ultimately be described with absolute certainty or with "zero tolerance," as it were. The more we know, the less certain we are.

"Platonists believe that there is a universal truth underlying all of mathematics. Formalists believe all of mathematics can be defined by a set of predefined rules. Ever wonder about the deeper significance of these two critical mathematical philosophies? Using thought experiments like the Allegory of the Cave and the Barber's Paradox, the great mathematics popularizer and author of Is God a Mathematician?, Mario Livio, untangles these two didactic ways of viewing the world and the very nature of human knowledge."

"In delivering aid to drought-stricken California last week, President Obama and his aides cited the state as an example of what could be in store for much of the rest of the country as human-caused climate change intensifies. But in doing so, they were pushing at the boundaries of scientific knowledge about the relationship between climate change and drought. While a trend of increasing drought that may be linked to global warming has been documented in some regions, including parts of the Mediterranean and in the Southwestern United States, there is no scientific consensus yet that it is a worldwide phenomenon. Nor is there definitive evidence that it is causing California's problems."

An investigation into critical thinking

Since 1955, The Journal of Irreproducible Results has offered "spoofs, parodies, whimsies, burlesques, lampoons and satires" about life in the laboratory. Among its greatest hits: "Acoustic Oscillations in Jell-O, With and Without Fruit, Subjected to Varying Levels of Stress" and "Utilizing Infinite Loops to Compute an Approximate Value of Infinity." The good-natured jibes are a backhanded celebration of science. What really goes on in the lab is, by implication, of a loftier, more serious nature.

"Next time you tell a story to someone, don't be upset if they don't believe you, because what you may not know, is that occasionally you can't even believe your own memories!  Yes, that's correct, even your own memories can deceive you.  The concept of false memories is well supported in scientific research.  People generally think of their memories as something like an accurate recording that documents and stores everything that happens with perfect accuracy.  In reality, human memory is very prone to inaccuracies."

"There's been a range of interesting reactions to my piece on Pete Seeger's question about whether confidence in science as a source of human progress is underpinned by fact or faith. Some readers may have missed that the discussion was not about confidence in science as an enterprise, but confidence that benefits would always accrue to society from applications of scientific knowledge. "