Perspectives Blog Post: Uncertainty is inevitable at the frontiers of knowledge

"Uncertainty is inevitable at the frontiers of knowledge"

My first thought as I read this quote is how it could be truthfully applied to almost any area of knowledge. The word 'frontiers,' implies the beginning of something new, which is always fraught with uncertainty.  I mainly think of science, and people who think that once something has been proven over and over, it is set in stone.  For example, many people believe that global warming is an impending threat to our society; however, they may not consider that the earth experiences different temperatures overtime, and goes through various cycles of heating and cooling.  Although many theories such as gravity are hard to dispute, science is not technically completely certain.  A frontier is a borderline; therefore, this quote could apply to borderline/ 'grey area' information in an area of knowledge.  Uncertainty is inevitable in this field because not everything is defined.  One thing I think this quote might falsely imply is that the uncertainty doesn't exist in other parts of knowledge.  Although it might be significantly less, uncertainty always lingers in knowledge.  Even in seemingly 'set in stone' areas of knowledge such as math and history, there is still a great amount of uncertainty associated with them.  New discoveries that are made through new technology that sometimes contradict what we know to be true.  Overall, uncertainty is inevitable at the frontiers of knowledge, but this extends to knowledge that is seemingly 'proven to be true.'

Ivory Tower KQ

In what ways does emotion and intuition distort truth in human sciences?

A very heated topic in today's news is the true necessity of college as preparation for the workforce. The documentary, "The Ivory Tower," discusses if college is worth the expense and trouble.  My knowledge question, "in what ways does emotion and intuition distort truth in human sciences," is relevant because it addresses the reasons why many people still go to college, despite its (arguably) decreasing relevancy. Emotion and intuition are influenced by society, which for a long time now, has established a baseline that college equals a certain salary or status in society.  Although it might have in the past, and still does to a certain degree, nowadays, there are many more options to create a different path, especially with innovations in technology.  However, society's pressure and status quo's greatly impact emotion, which eventually morphs into one's intuition. This then distorts the actual truth of college's relevancy, which is a main point of the Ivory Tower documentary.  Besides societal norms, personal situations may distort the truth, making parents believe their child has to go to college for a specific reason that will change them forever. Overall, many people go to college for a variety of reasons; one of them being the societal belief that higher education is vital for good quality of life in the future.

Active Experiment vs Passive Observation

There are only two ways in which humankind can produce knowledge: through passive observation or through active experiment. To what extent do you agree with this statement?

Knowledge appears to be such a broad topic that it can be mind-boggling to narrow it down to two categories.  Passive observation involves an observer that makes no impact on the subject or phenomenon of their experiment. In contrast, active experimentation constitutes an involved 'knower,' who manipulates variables in order to arrive at a specific conclusion. Although each type of producing knowledge can provoke different questions about supposed 'active observation' or 'passive experiment,' each type of activity inevitability falls under one of the two categories.

To explain this phenomenon, I can use 'going to school,' as an extended metaphor for learning and producing knowledge.  Activities such as listening to a lecture or watching others do an activity clearly fall under passive observation. Even if a student is involved in a group lab, they are either directly participating or watching someone else do something.  In a group situation, even if someone is reading directions to their group member as they carry out an experiment, it would be characterized as active experiment, because that individual is directly affecting the results of the experiment.  However, if a teacher was doing an experiment in front of the class, and a student yells out something, causing the teacher to get distracted and therefore mess up the experiment, that would be hard to tell.  The student, although passively observing for most of the experiment, would still be considered an active experimenter as they affected the results and became a variable in the outcome.

In my opinion, activities such as homework or doing a worksheet in class would be considered active experimentation, even though they are not the classic or expected form of 'experimenting,' For example, if a student works on a math worksheet, they are essentially experimenting if there answer is right, and testing their brains to see if they understand a certain concept.  Even in a group situation, the student could switch back between passive observation of their peers completing a problem, and active experiment of contributing to a solution.

The notion of a passive experiment is mostly false, as almost any situation would still fit under each category.  Even if you are watching an experiment being done, it is still observation because when you manipulate something, you are automatically becoming involved and thus active in it.  If you low-key observe how long your grass grows in the summer versus the winter as a form of experiment for science fair, the ways the knowledge was produced was still through passive observation. Similarly, active observation would mean that you would be watching something while also taking part in that activity, which is almost impossible.  Overall, almost any situation where humankind produced knowledge can be through passive observation or active experimentation.

That which is accepted as knowledge today is sometimes discarded tomorrow.

This 'famous' quote can be described as the embodiment of modern-day science. With the rapidly changing advances in technology in the twenty-first century, it is hard to state anything as an indisputable fact. Although this quote clearly falls under the category of 'natural sciences,' I think it also applies to areas such as ethics and history.
Although the definition of ethics remains the same, the situations applied to it change constantly. It was once acceptable to treat African Americans as if they were less than a person. Whether or not people in the 19th century considered slavery ethical, the public opinion and popular belief has greatly shifted since then.  This highlights the shift of knowledge (a justified true belief).  The belief that white people were superior was 'accepted' as knowledge, just as the modern-day belief that global warming exists as a major problem in the 21st century.  In a few years, advanced technology or just a shift in public opinion may convince people that it is not actually a great threat.
Another aspect of this topic that the quote leaves out is the ethics of sharing knowledge.  If someone is a genius, do they have the obligation to share their knowledge to the rest of the world, therefore changing some fundamental aspects of knowledge forever? Although the answer to this question is not black and white, it highlights how the shift in knowledge is also not black and white.  The 'answer' to a problem or the solution to a scientific method may be perfectly clear, but it may not be the right time to find it.

Culture in Ethics

To what extent does culture influence ethical decision making? Does ethics fall more in the domain of shared knowledge or personal knowledge?

Culture plays a huge role in ethical decision making.  Among the things that people consider when confronted with an ethical dilemma are their surroundings and what they believe is 'right.'  Although there is somewhat a standard definition of good vs evil and right vs wrong in the world, culture brings upon different variations of that, which would skew someone's ethical decision making.  Someone I know (sounds sketchy its not) was once telling me how she hates driving in Mexico because they generally believe in a "whatever happens happens" attitude because they believe things are meant to be. I have no idea if this is true because I've never been to Mexico but it illustrates a cultural difference about ethics.  One might believe there is no problem with driving like that but others from a different culture might argue that that is ethically wrong because it injures others.  Ethics is under the domain of personal knowledge because it is relatively individual and can depend on experiences. There can also be ties with the other areas of knowledge, such as emotion which can influence ethics. Someone might react differently to the trolley dilemma if they have experiences or read something

University Education Debate: Abstract perspective

Emotion, Reason, Language

The question of free university education could be approached three different ways: through emotion, reason or sense perception. A common emotional response to this question is that free school would help those in need.  It is emotionally satisfying for someone to believe they are helping those in need and that they have compassion for those that have less. It is also easy to only look at the emotional side of wanting to help others and to overlook practicality. ‘Free’ college would have to be funded through taxes, and would likely be a disincentive for some to work as hard as they would if it was their own money.  A student who is barely paying their tuition might work even harder because of the emotional duty they feel to not waste their money. While emotion contrasts with reason in this situation, both ways of knowledge can co-exist. The aspect of reason would dictate that although free college could be nice, it would be the beginning of a slew of other problems such as higher taxes that would gradually lessen the amount of people in high and respected positions.  The government would take so much tax money that people with hopes to become a doctor will not bother going through all the school and investing years of their lives in a profession where their salary will cancel out with those with a bachelor's or less. Human nature dictates that if there is no incentive to work harder, no one will.  Some people will do it anyway because they love being in medicine, but that would not be enough people to sustain the field. Tragedy of the commons also shows that people will act in their own self-interest, which also shows they will want to earn money along with or over emotional reward.  Sense-perception relates to this topic because many people are accustomed to or have the ‘gut-reaction’ of saying that college should be more affordable.  Although almost anyone can agree that tuition is too high across the board, free college will not fix this.  The way emotion, reason and sense perception can work together is with lower tuition, but still with a public/ private system that is in place today.  And then, there is also the ongoing problem of lack of motivation which is a whole different story regarding public schools.

Economics and Science

Is economics a science?

Economics is a science.  Merrium Webster defines science as a “a study of the natural world based on facts learned through experiments and observation.”  In my opinion, this definition mostly encompass the field of economics.  What this definition lacks is the essence of economics, and the non-technical aspects of it that make it fit into the field of economics.   It is true that the some of economics focuses on making assumptions based on both past and current observations.  Economics is still largely based on hard facts from the past; for example, if someone sees a phenomenon or specific system that worked in the past (Reaganomics in the 80's), they can apply it to modern-day.  Even then, it is still a study, and not based on true certainty.  Economics is a science in that it has the principle of fields like biology or chemistry.  It's based, most importantly, on logic and reasoning to make conclusions.  It looks in the past to see the various variables that were manipulated, and most importantly, they study people.  In a free-market, capitalist society, the people are the ones that drive the economy, and are actually harder to study because they can be unpredictable.  This is one of the reasons I think economics should be a highly respected science; it studies humans, which can be the hardest to predict and make conclusions from because of their ability to reason.  

Emotions clarifying knowledge

To what extent does emotion clarify knowledge in (pick an area of knowledge)?

An area of knowledge that embodies emotions as a distinct part of it is music.  Many of the arts have this in common, but music is truly an example of an area of knowledge where emotion is essential to it's success and uniqueness.
From the moment I started taking piano 7 years ago until now, the variety of teachers I have had always tell me one common thing: you need to put more emotion into this piece.  I still do not think I have mastered this vague concept of emotion in piano, but I understand that it is what takes a normal piano player to a great one.  Anyone can play the notes, but it takes a talented individual to make it sound pretty.
It makes sense to me that music is entirely built on emotion.  Even some of the earliest composers (Mozart, Strauss, Chopin etc) wrote their music from emotions they were feeling or simply to describe a person or place and embody it's characteristics through music.  Whether a composers 'point' is received exactly with the listener is irrelevant because they will feel some type of emotion from it.
Emotions have helped me clarify knowledge in piano because if I understand how the song is played, I know it better.  Consequently, when I play in front of an audience, they think that I have better knowledge of the piece because it is being played more professionally.  If I were to play a piece in a monotone and nondescript way, no one would feel any emotion besides boredom.  Although it is debatable whether apathy is an emotion, but it is generally not what composers strive for.

How culture influences perception

To what extent does culture influence perception and/or reason?

Aside from an one's individual family and experience, culture is the most influential factor in the perception.  The same person who grew up in two different cultures would probably not recognize the other's way of lifestyle. Furthermore, they would be nothing like each other!   
Perception is defined as the ability to see, hear or become aware of something through the senses.  The way one hears/sees things is heavily influence by culture.  For example, we all have been taught to see or hear something a certain way just by immersion into our own culture.  In America, it is generally frowned upon to yell in a quiet room or talk very loudly at someone else.  We see it and think "oh, what a jerk."  However, in some other cultures, it may be perfectly acceptable to do that, and if an American were to suddenly be thrown into an atmosphere of weird yelling people, they would be freaked out. This is an example of culture influencing perception, because an American would perceive the yelling people to be very rude.   
The second part of this prompt questions whether culture affects reason.  Culture is still relevant and significant when a person develops reason, but not as much as for perception. Reason is defined as a cause, explanation, or justification for an action of event.  Just as culture influences perception, it also influences reason.  One is not likely to jump off the Golden Gate Bridge in America but in another culture, their reason may compel them to do so.  However, a certain portion of reason is already set from when people are born.  MOST people use their reason to tell between the very basic good and bad.  There are certain things that cannot be impacted to the point where one would change or skew their opinion on them.  

Minute vs. Minute: Should words have multiple meanings?

What would the world be like if everyone spoke the same language? If no one spoke at all?

In a world where communication is so vital to quality of life, it is easy to say that words should have just one meaning.  It would fix aesthetic and logistical problems, and ultimately save time. However, language is not just a tool for communication, it is cultural and has it's own identity.  If each word had only one meaning, a language would loose it's individuality and uniqueness, resulting in a much less interesting world. 

Having lived in Germany for 3 years, I would like to tell people I speak German, but unfortunately I have forgotten most of it.  One word I do remember was oberflächlich, which is loosely described in English as awkward or superficial.  It is an example of a word that gives the language it's own identity and makes it special.  There is no word in English that matches with oberflächlich.  For some people, the unique structures and elements of individual languages alone might lead them to become a linguist. It would likely be a very boring world with less incentive for travel or learning. Although it is necessary to have a 'language of the world' (which is English), it should never replace the other languages.   

If no one spoke at all, the world would likely look like George Orwell's 1984.  So much of human expression and communication is reliant on speaking.  Although some argue that speaking causes many problems, it far outnumbers the them with it's benefits.  For example, one of the reasons I don't like texting is because I have been at the center of misunderstandings where if the words had been spoken, there would have not been a conflict.  At the beginning of the year in HOA, my teacher thought it would be fun to do an icebreaker activity, and we were to get in alphabetical order without speaking.  It was very inconvenient and weird, and even then I saw on a small scale how muddled and bleak the world would be without spoken language.  

Assessing knowledge

Are there reasons to be skeptical of your knowledge claims?

There are many reasons to be skeptical of what we know.  Because much of what we have learned in school, for example, we have not seen ourselves, it is hard to confirm what we know. Some choose to be skeptical about all global matters, while others simply question academics.
One reason to be skeptical is because of the question, 'how can we really know if knowledge exists?' Although the world needs standards to communicate, sometimes they are also questionable and it is hard to find a common ground to base future claims on.
Because the world's population is so large, there are little opportunities and people have little time to attempt to confirm what they know.  Not only is it imposible, but also inconvenient and ineffeciant.  Therefore, we have every right to be skeptical of knowledge.  Information and knowledge in the 21st century is readily available, unlike the past, making it even more likely for people to be skeptical, but not act on it.
One way to circumvent the confirmation problem would be to simply see or experience something for yourself.  However, this is not very convenient or efficient, and would be a great amount of trouble for one to go through just to confirm something trivial.  Therefore, it is important that people have a trusted number or sources; ones that they know are right from what they have seen.  This would greatly minimize the skepticism and provide for a clearer view of the world. 

The Allegory of the Cave: Questions

How does this allegory relate to Plato's likely definition of happiness?

How can we really define education and knowledge if we are living in a metaphorical cave?

How might the allegory of the cave be a representation of life after death and religion?