A few notes of warning and guidance before we begin:
The TOK essay provides you with an opportunity to become engaged in thinking and reflection. What are outlined below are strategies and suggestions, questions and possible responses only for deconstructing the TOK titles as they have been given. They should be used alongside the discussions that you will carry out with your peers and teachers during the process of constructing your essay.
The notes here are intended to guide you towards a thoughtful, personal response to the prescribed titles posed. They are not to be considered as the answer and they should only be used to help provide you with another perspective to the ones given to you in the titles and from your own TOK class discussions. You need to remember that most of your examiners have been educated in the logical positivist schools of Anglo-America and this education pre-determines their predilection to view the world as they do and to understand the concepts as they do. The TOK course itself is a product of this logical positivism as are the responses given by artificial intelligence programs such as ChatGPT.
There is no substitute for your own personal thought and reflection, as well as your own experience of being in a TOK course, and these notes are not intended as a cut and paste substitute to the hard work that thinking requires. Some of the comments on one title may be useful to you in the approach you are taking in the title that you have personally chosen, so it may be useful to read all the comments and give them some reflection.
My experience has been that candidates whose examples match those to be found on TOK “help” sites (and this is another of those TOK help sites) struggle to demonstrate a mastery of the knowledge claims and knowledge questions contained in the examples. The best essays carry a trace of a struggle that is the journey on the path to thinking. Many examiners state that in the very best essays they read, they can visualize the individual who has thought through them sitting opposite to them. To reflect the struggle of this journey in your essay is your goal.
Remember to include sufficient TOK content in your essay. When you have completed your essay, ask yourself if it could have been written by someone who had not participated in the TOK course (or by the Chat GPT bot). If the answer to that question is “yes”, then you do not have sufficient TOK content in your essay. It is this TOK content that will distinguish your essay from an AI response. Personal and shared knowledge, the knowledge framework, the ways of knowing and the areas of knowledge are terms that will be useful to you in your discussions.
Here is a link to a PowerPoint that contains recommendations and a flow chart outlining the steps to writing a TOK essay. Some of you may need to get your network administrator to make a few tweaks in order for you to access it. Comments, observations and discussions are most welcome. Contact me at butler.rick1952@gmail.com or directly through this website.
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B-8nWwYRUyV6bDdXZ01POFFqVlU
A sine qua non: the opinions expressed here are entirely my own and do not represent any organization or collective of any kind. Now, down to business.
Prescribed Essay Titles
1. Are facts alone enough to prove a claim? Discuss with reference to any two areas of knowledge.
In deconstructing the key terms of this title, we find that we will need to discuss the ‘facts alone‘, ‘enough‘, ‘prove‘, and ‘claim‘. We will also have to address the word ‘are‘ i.e., the ‘being’ of ‘facts’; for how this ‘being’ is understood and interpreted is the context in which and from which what are called ‘facts’ are derived and upheld, and are the basis in which and from which they will derive their meaning or meaningfulness.
‘Facts’ are considered to be ‘objective’ pieces of information that can be observed, measured, and/or verified. Observation is primarily based on sight and hearing, though the other senses can be involved. The recent discoveries of the James Webb telescope, for instance, are based on observations made of the far reaches of space. They are, and will, revolutionize the theory and thinking in astrophysics; they are an extension of the human eye.
That which is called a ‘fact’ is based on empirical evidence (observation), logical deductions (through the principle of reason), or established truths (axioms and laws that pre-determine how something will be viewed and understood). Facts possess a certain degree of reliability or surety and can be ‘counted on’ to reveal some truths regarding things. These truths are widely accepted within a given framework or area of knowledge, and all that is can be placed (and is placed) one way or another into an area of knowledge. However, facts by themselves do not always guarantee the complete understanding or proof of a claim. They may illuminate the things or situations dimly. The Big Bang Theory of the origin of the universe is being placed into question by the discoveries of the James Webb Telescope, for instance. Evidence and explanations that the theory once provided will now have to be revised. Revisions of the concepts of time and space will need to be provided. Despite this, facts do provide a foundation (but it is only one possible foundation…there could be others); but how they are interpreted and contextualized are crucial in determining their significance and importance.
A knowledge ‘claim‘ is a statement or assertion, the proffering of a judgement. Statements may be made through words or speech or they can be made through numbers. “1 + 1 = 2” is a statement or assertion in which “=” is the judgement. “2” is not the judgement but the outcome which results from the judgement. It is either correct or incorrect. The judgement “=” derives from how a “1” is viewed, interpreted and understood. The viewing and understanding will determine how judgements are to be made within the context of the field that we call the ‘theory of numbers’. “Theory” comes to us from the Greek word theoria which means ‘to view’, and it was particularly related to the theatre, the ‘viewing place’. The viewing and the understanding (interpretation) are prior to the judgements or knowledge claims that are made or can be made within the context from which they are derived. The philosopher Kant once said: “Judgement is the seat of truth”. It is the judgement which determines whether the things or situations about which they are made will be illuminated or not.
We doubt a claim when we are lacking certainty and reliability regarding those who are making the claim, the sources of the claim, or when the things about which the claim is being made are not sufficiently justified; that is, sufficient reasons have not been supplied for the claim. We cannot “count on” them because they are not “grounded” and the principle of sufficient reason supplies the grounds. When we speak of “grounds”, we are speaking about whether the “evidence” or the “explanation” regarding the thing which is being spoken about is “adequate” or justified. This evidence or explanation will find its “grounds” in the principle of sufficient reason. Reasons must be given for the claims being made; that is, we doubt the ‘facts’ of the claim and if sufficient reasons are not given, we doubt the truth of the claim being made. The reasons provide both the evidence and the explanation, the ‘proof’ that the ‘facts’ are indeed facts. But as Aristotle once said: “For as the eyes of bats are to the blaze of day, so is the reason in our soul to the things which are by nature most evident of all.”
On a shop which sells Antique Hand Bags near here is a sign which reads: “The Shop is not Open because it is Closed”. Such a sign speaks the truth in that the fact is that the shop is closed. However, it does not supply a sufficient reason for the shop’s being closed. The sign is what is referred to as a tautology. No reason is given for the shop’s being closed i.e., is it after hours?, the owner is away on holidays?, the owner is observing a religious festival?, etc. Tautologies are prominent in modern day computer language. We “skip over” knowing the reasons for the things being as they are because we, in fact, believe we already know them for being what they are and as they are. (This is evident in ‘artificial intelligence’ and presents one of its gravest dangers.)
The Greeks began their journey to thought by first “trusting” in that which they were seeking, but they also “doubted”. Doubt was a requisite for thought for it inspired “wonder”. Both doubt and skepticism were requirements for beginning thinking. But the end for the Greeks was to demonstrate why their trust was an appropriate response to the things that are and this trust overcame the doubt and skepticism that initiated their search for knowledge. Our doubt and skepticism, on the other hand, is spurred by the requirement of things and situations giving sufficient reasons for that thing’s or situation’s being what and how it is; and should these not be given, then the thing is not. It becomes something “subjective”. Something subjective does not have being for sufficient reasons cannot be supplied for its being.
We distinguish ‘facts’ from ‘values’ in the Human Sciences and the sciences in general. Science is the theory of the real. This is captured in a quote attributed to Einstein: “Physical concepts are free creations of the human mind, and are not, however it may seem, uniquely determined by the external world.” ‘Values’ are seen as ‘subjective’ while ‘facts’ are seen as ‘objective’. ‘Facts’ derive from ‘the world’ and the viewing of that world as ‘object’, while ‘values’ derive from personal choices that individuals make regarding the objects present within that world. ‘Facts’ are considered the stuff of thought, while ‘values’ are seen as the stuff of emotion and action. From Einstein’s quote, we can see that there are ‘values’ already embedded in any scientific viewing of the world. The statements or assertions of science already contain within themselves the ‘values’ that will determine whether those statements will be correct or incorrect.
The choice of the pursuit of science is the human response to a certain mode or way in which truth discloses or reveals itself. Science arises as a response to a claim laid upon human beings in the way that the things of nature appear i.e., the ‘facts’. It is Being that makes this claim (but, then, what is Being, the ‘are’ of our prescribed title?). The sciences set up certain domains or contexts and then pursue the revealing that is consistent within those domains or contexts. The domain, for example, of chemistry is an abstraction. It is the domain of chemical formulas. To attempt to dwell within the viewing of this domain alone would be akin to madness. Nature is seen as a realm of formulae. Scientists pose this realm by way of a reduction; it is an artificial realm that arises from a very artificial attitude towards things. The ‘fact’ of water has to be posed as H2O. Once it is so posed, once things are reduced to chemical formulae, then the domain of chemistry can be exploited for practical ends. We can make fire out of water once water is seen as a compound of hydrogen and oxygen. In the illustration shown here, we have the chemical formula for the physical composition of Van Gogh’s yellow paint in his “Sunflowers”. While interesting in its being a ‘fact’, it tells us absolutely nothing of the painting itself.
What are the implications of this? The things investigated by chemistry are not “objects” in the sense that they have an autonomous standing on their own i.e. they are not “the thrown against”, the jacio, as is understood traditionally. For science, the chemist in our example, nature is composed of formulae, and a formula is not a self-standing object. It is an abstraction, a product of the mind. (Einstein’s quote again.) A formula is posed; it is an abstraction. A formula is posed; it is an ob-ject, that is, it does not view nature as composed of objects that are autonomous, self-standing things, but nature as formulae. The viewing of nature as formulae turns the things viewed into posed ob-jects; and in this posing turns the things of nature, ultimately, into dis-posables. The viewing of water as H2O is an example of a Rubicon that has been crossed. There is no turning back once this truth has been revealed. That water can be turned into fire has caused restrictions in our bringing liquids onto airplanes, for instance, for they have the capability of destroying those aircraft, but water viewed in such a way cannot be used for baptisms, for instance.
To see Van Gogh’s “Sunflowers” as a ‘painted thing’, an object, is to cease to consider it as a “painting” or work of art that says something more than the mere object itself could possibly say. The “facts” of the painting do not get us closer to what, in fact, the painting is. When art is viewed as an “object”, it ceases to be art; nevertheless, this approach to art as “aesthetics”, or a calculable mode of viewing what is present to the senses, is the prevailing mode of viewing art.
The limitations of facts can be seen in a recent USA Supreme Court decision to strike down Affirmative Action Programs for both corporations and institutions of higher learning citing them as ‘unconstitutional’. The Court viewed affirmative action programs as ‘reverse discrimination’, and that positions on corporate boards or admissions to universities should be based on ‘merit’, since the USA was now (the Court viewed) sufficiently ‘color-blind’ to warrant such a decision in keeping with the ideals presented in the US Constitution. While the Court’s view is a ‘consummation devoutly to be wished’, it ignores ‘the facts’ of the systemic historical racism and oppression of certain ethnic and racial groups that has occurred throughout America’s history. If facts are considered to be objective truths which can be “observed, measured, and verified”, then the Supreme Court’s decision is one that completely ignores ‘the facts’.
The reality of American history can be seen as analogous to the locking of the gates separating 3rd class passengers from 1st class passengers on board the Titanic both before and while the ship was sinking. That most of the survivors were 1st class passengers and most of the dead 3rd class passengers was the inevitable result. The 3rd class passengers did not have access to the too few lifeboats that were available. The building of the USA Interstate Highway system in the 1950s, for example, did not have and still does not have off-ramps to African-American communities in many cases. Examples (evidence) abound of the historical racism that is prevalent in the USA of today. The reality of the USA is that its institutions and infrastructures were, and are, inherently and implicitly racist as was its Constitution. No amount of ‘colorblindness’ will overcome these concrete facts and make them non-racist. Some of the passengers on the Titanic went to their deaths retaining the view that the ship was ‘unsinkable’; the Supreme Court of the USA refuses to recognize and acknowledge (or perhaps it does and would prefer to see the USA as an autocracy) the fact that America has become a ‘failed state’ in its experiment with democracy and that its ship of state is rapidly sinking.
The American Supreme Court example illustrates that interpretation plays a significant role in understanding facts. In our being with others, our politics, our living in communities, different individuals may draw various conclusions or interpretations from the same set of facts that are influenced by their perspectives, biases, and prior knowledge. There are no ‘alternative facts’; there are only alternative interpretations of the facts that are present. Socrates once noted that the opposite of knowledge is not ignorance but madness. In our politics, what is called ‘public opinion’ is shaped by the sources of information that derive from mass media. In considering whether facts are a sufficient foundation for a knowledge claim or assertion, it is crucial to consider the source, methodology, and potential biases when evaluating the validity of the claim based on the presented or selected facts.
Because our understanding of facts is limited in its scope to viewing the world as “object”, their ability to provide a comprehensive understanding of complex contexts and issues is also limited. They often provide only partial information, neglecting the broader context such as was the case in the recent American Supreme Court decision on affirmative action. Facts may answer the “what” and “how” questions, but they often fall short in addressing the “why” and “what then” aspects of a claim. In areas of knowledge like history and the social sciences, facts alone are insufficient to explain phenomena or validate claims, and this is primarily due to the fact that it is human beings who are the creators of these areas of knowledge and are the subject matter of these areas of study. Interpretation, contextualization, and critical analysis are necessary to fill the gaps and establish a coherent understanding in these two areas of knowledge and it is here that errors can occur.
Facts are often misused or misrepresented to support false or misleading claims, particularly in political contexts where power and its maintenance is usually involved and is ultimately the goal. Fraudulent knowledge claims often occur where truth is not what is desired but the power and recognition of social prestige is in operation. Logical fallacies, such as cherry-picking evidence or drawing hasty generalizations (e.g. Fox News’ coverage of the January 6 Capitol riots), can undermine the credibility of an argument, even if it is based on factual information. Therefore, the ability to reason and critically analyze the available facts is crucial to avoid misinformation and reach valid conclusions. (It should be noted that “information” is understood here as “that which is responsible for the form so that that which is generated or produced, perceived and understood can inform” i.e., in-form-ation).
2. If “the mathematician’s patterns, like the painter’s and the poet’s, must be beautiful” (G.H. Hardy), how might this impact the production of knowledge? Discuss with reference to mathematics and the arts.
This is a very challenging title for it asks you to consider what the beautiful is and how the “patterns” of mathematics are similar in their beauty to those patterns used by a poet or a painter. The subsequent question is “how this might impact the production of knowledge”. The difficulty arises from the fact that the dominant form and understanding of mathematics today is algebraic calculation which finds its origins in the German philosopher Leibniz’s finite calculus. This calculus is related to our viewing of the world as “object”.
We often hear that ‘beauty is in the eye of the beholder’, but this begs the question “What then is beholding”? When such an assertion is made, the assumption being made is that beauty is ‘subjective’ and that its recognition and appreciation is in the ‘holding’ or ‘grasping’ of that which is brought forth to presence, to “being” (“be-“) by the ‘subjective’ ego cogito of the French philosopher Descartes. This “bringing forth to presence” is what we mean by “pro-duction”, and this bringing forth may be natural (“produce” e.g., crops) or through human beings in their “works” (i.e., paintings, buildings, etc.) The Greek word for this bringing forth is poiesis from which our word poetry derives. The process of ‘bringing forth’ or production led to ‘perfection’ or completion, since nothing further needed to be added to or subtracted from the thing or work that was brought forth. The completed work was itself “knowledge” of the thing from which it derived its name.
Among the Greeks, the Pythagoreans are said to have discovered the “golden ratio”, which is also sometimes called the “golden section”, the “golden mean”, or the “divine proportion” (Encyclopedia Britannica). In Greek, the word “mathematics” meant “that which can be learned and that which can be taught”, and it was a much greater and broader concept than what we understand as mathematics today, although the initial meaning still obscurely prevails in what we call technology today. The Greeks more closely aligned what we understand as mathematics with arithmos or ‘counting’ or ‘counting on’, and we have derived our word ‘arithmetic’ from this understanding.
For the Pythagoreans, human beings were considered “irrational numbers”, for they believed that this best described that ‘perfect imperfection’ that is human being, that “work” that was “perfect” in its incompleteness. The irrational number (1 + Square root of√5)/2 approximately equal to 1.618) was , for the Pythagoreans, a mathematical statement illustrating the relation of the human to the divine. It is the ratio of a line segment cut into two pieces of different lengths such that the ratio of the whole segment to that of the longer segment is equal to the ratio of the longer segment to the shorter segment. In terms of present day algebra, letting the length of the shorter segment be one unit and the length of the longer segment be x units gives rise to the equation (x + 1)/x = x/1; this may be rearranged to form the quadratic equation x2 – x – 1 = 0, for which the positive solution is x = (1 + Square root of√5)/2), the golden ratio. It should be noted that the Greeks rejected Babylonian (Indian) algebra and algebra in general as being ‘unnatural’ due to its abstractness, and they had a much different conception of number than we have today.
The Pythagoreans and their geometry are not how we look upon mathematics and number today. The Pythagoreans were viewed as a religious cult even in their own day. For them, the practice of geometry was no different than a form of prayer or piety. The Greek philosopher Aristotle called his former teacher, the Greek philosopher Plato, a “pure Pythagorean”.
This “pure Pythagoreanism” is demonstrated in Plato’s illustration of the Divided Line which is none other than an application of the golden mean to all the things that are and how we apprehend or behold them. I am going to provide a detailed example from Plato’s Republic because I believe it is crucial to our understanding of the thinking that has occurred in the West.
At Republic, Book VI, 508B-C, Plato makes an analogy between the role of the sun, whose light gives us our vision to see and the visible things to be seen and the role of the Good in that seeing. The sun rules over our vision and the things we see. The Good rules over our knowledge and the (real) objects of our knowledge (the forms, the ideas or that which brings the visible things to appearance and, thus, to being) and also over the things that the sun gives to vision:
“This, then, you must understand that I meant by the offspring of the good that which the good begot to stand in a proportion with itself: as the good is in the intelligible region with respect to intelligence (DE) and to that which is intellected [CD], so the sun is (light) in the visible world to vision [BC] and what is seen [AB].”
If we put the mathematical statement of the golden ratio or the divine proportion into the illustration (1 + Square root of√5)/2), the 1 is the Good, or the whole of things, and the “offspring of the Good” (the “production of knowledge” of our title) is the square root of 5 which is then divided by 2 (the whole of creation plus the Good or the Divine), then we can comprehend the example of the Divided Line in a Greek rather than a Cartesian manner. Plato is attempting to resolve the problem of the One and the Many here.
The ratio or proportion of the division of the visibles (AB:BC) and the division of the intelligibles (CD:DE) are in the same ratio or proportion as the visibles to the intelligibles (AC:CE). Plato has made BC = CD, and Plato at one point identifies the contents of these two sections. He says (510B) that in CD the soul is compelled to investigate by treating as images the things imitated in the former division (BC). In (BC), the things imitated are the ‘shadows’ of the things as they really are. These are the realms of ‘trust’ and ‘belief’ (pistis) and of understanding or how we come to be in our world.
There is no “subject/object” separation of realms here, no abstractions or formulae created by the human mind only (the intelligence and that which is intellected), but rather the mathematical description or statement of the beauty of the world. In the Divided Line, one sees three applications of the golden ratio: The Good, the Intelligible, and the Sensible or Visual i.e., the Good in relation to the whole line, The Good in relation to the Intelligible, and the Intelligible in relation to the Visible. (It is from this that I understand the statement of the French philosopher Simone Weil: “Faith is the experience that the intelligence is illuminated by Love.” Love is the light, that which is given which illuminates the things of the intelligence and the things of the world. This illumination is what is called Truth. There is a concrete tripartite unity of Goodness, Beauty and Truth.) This tripartite yoking of the sensible to the intelligible and to the Good corresponds to what Plato says is the tripartite being of the human soul and the tripartite Being of the God who is the Good. The human being in its being is a microcosm of the Whole or the macrocosm. (See William Blake’s lines in “Auguries of Innocence”: “God appears and God is Light/ To those poor souls that dwell in night/ But does the human form display/ To those who dwell in realms of day.”)
The golden ratio occurs in many mathematical contexts today and it may give a sense of what Hardy meant in the quote that is the prompt or substance for this title. The golden ratio is geometrically constructible by straightedge and compass, and it occurs in the investigation of the Archimedean and Platonic solids. It is the limit of the ratios of consecutive terms of the Fibonacci number sequence 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13,…, in which each term beyond the second is the sum of the previous two, and it is also the value of the most basic of continued fractions, namely 1 + 1/(1 + 1/(1 + 1/(1 +⋯. (Encyclopedia Britannica)
In modern mathematics, the golden ratio occurs in the description of fractals, figures that exhibit self-similarity and play an important role in the study of chaos and dynamical systems. (Encyclopedia Britannica)
One of the questions raised here is: do we have number after the experience of the physical, objective world or do we have number prior to it and have the physical world because of number? The original meaning of the Greek word mathemata is “what can be learned and what can be taught”. What can be learned and what can be taught are those things that have been brought to presence through language and measured in their form through number. Our understanding of number is what the Greeks called arithmos, “arithmetic”, that which can be counted and that which can be “counted on”. These numbers begin at 4.
The principles of the golden or divine ratio are to be seen in the statue of the Doryphoros seen here. The statue of the Doryphoros, or the Spear Bearer, is around the mid -5th century BCE. Its maker, Polycleitus, wrote that the purpose or end of art was to achieve to kallos, “the beautiful” and to eu (the perfect, the complete, or the good) in the work. The secret of achieving to kallos and to eu lay in the mastery of symmetria, the perfect “commensurability” of all parts of the statue to one another and to the whole. This is pure Pythagoreanism. Some scholars relate the ratios of the statue to the shapes of the letters of the Greek alphabet.
The Egyptian connection to the geometry of the Pythagoreans is of the utmost importance to Western civilization and also to what we are discussing here. The Pythagorean theorem: a2+b2= c2 is the formula whereby two incommensurate things are brought into proportion, relation, or harmony with one another and are thus unified and made the Same i.e., symmetria. What is the incommensurate? Human beings and all else that is not human being are incommensurate. For the Pythagoreans, human beings are irrational numbers. Pi, the circumference of a circle, is an irrational number, and the creation itself is an irrational number because it was viewed as circular or spherical. The human being is a microcosm of the whole of the creation (or what is called Nature) itself.
The meanings of the word “incommensurate” are extremely important here. It is said to be “a false belief or opinion of something or someone, the matter or residue that settles to the bottom of a liquid (the dregs), the state of being isolated, kept apart, or withdrawn into solitude.” An incommensurate is something that doesn’t fit. Pythagorean geometry was the attempt to overcome all of these “incommensurables” in human existence, an attempt to make them fit or to show that they are fitted, to yoke them together. “Fittedness” is what the Greeks understood by “justice”; and the concept of justice was tied in with “fairness” (beauty), what was due to someone or something, what was suitable or apt for a human being. From their geometry, the Pythagoreans were said to have invented music based on the relations of the various notes around a mean i.e., the length of the string and how it is divided into suitable lengths as to allow a harmonic to be heard when it was plucked. This harmony found in music by the Pythagoreans was looked for in all human relations between themselves and the things that are.
When we speak of the “production of knowledge” in the modern sense, we are speaking of technology and the finished products that technology brings forth. “Knowledge’ is the finished or completed ‘work’ that is the result of the “production” that technology ‘brings forth’. Technology comes from two Greek words: Techne, which means ‘knowing’ or ‘knowing one’s way about or in something’ in such a way that one can ‘produce’ knowledge and begin to make something; and logos which is that which makes this knowledge at all possible. We confuse the things or works of technology, the produce of technology, with technology itself. This is not surprising given the origin of the word itself. The word is not to be found in Greek.
| Leonardo da Vinci was a prolific user of the Divine Proportion in his painting, engineering works, and illustrations. The publication of De Divina Proportione (1509; Of the Divine Proportion), written by the Italian mathematician Luca Pacioli and illustrated by Leonardo is one example. Leonardo Da Vinci’s “Vitruvian Man” is intended to be viewed behind the head as a reflection in a mirror. The notes to the drawing are written backwards. The dimensions of the figure are written in ratios: the length of the arms equals the height of the body, etc. so that one gets a square. The Vitruvian Man is similar to the Greek Doryphoros as the “perfection” is the result of the perfect ratios. The attempt here is nothing short of an attempt to “square the circle”! |
Since technology rests upon an understanding of the world as object, an understanding of the world as posable, its mathematics are focused on, for the most part, algebraic calculation which turns its objects into disposables. Whatever beauty an object might have is skipped over (since beauty is not calculable as much as we may try to do so) in order to demand that the object give its reasons for being as it is. The end of technology is power and will to power, and this is why artificial intelligence is the flowering of technology at its height of its realization. It is a great closing down of thinking for it is, ultimately, an anti-logos. There is no question that there is some beauty involved in technology, but it is a beauty that is more akin to a tsunami or a volcanic eruption. It is a terrible beauty and it may lead to our extinction as a species.
3. In the acquisition of knowledge, is following experts unquestioningly as dangerous as ignoring them completely? Discuss with reference to the human sciences and one other area of knowledge.
Title #3 will, undoubtedly, be one of the more popular choices among students this November. Its key terms and phrases are “acquisition of knowledge“, “following experts unquestioningly“, “dangerous“, and “ignoring them completely“. In fact, titles #1, #3, #4, #5, and #6 are all connected and related to each other in a number of crucial ways and this is one of the reasons why I would suggest that the attentive student give consideration to all the thoughts and responses to the titles given here.
“Acquisition” means to ‘get’, ‘to grasp’, to take hold of something and take possession of it. It means ‘that which is responsible for the acquiring or getting of something’. Our wonderful phrase in English, “I get it”, is an example of this grasping and taking possession of something. Usually it is our beginning understanding of something, our “shared knowledge” (historical knowledge) of something. What we grasp or take hold of from others in our discourses with them is “opinion” not knowledge, whether it be from those in our communities who are called ‘experts’ or from those who dwell in the murky communities of QAnon. (The communities are ‘murky’ because they are ‘a-nonymous’ i.e., they have ‘no name’; and, thus, they have no desire to be brought to light, to be brought out into the open. The Ring of Gyges from Republic Bk II and the Ring of Power from Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings illustrate the essence of such groups and the desires of such groups. Both rings provide invisibility (anonymity), immortality (or “the desire for long life”), and power, control or domination. The same elements are shown in the three “deathly hallows” of Harry Potter, but Rowling has mistakenly seen these powers as somehow conducive of good i.e., that Harry is capable of destroying the elder wand after the destruction of Voldemort in not something human beings are capable of without the assistance of outside help, or Chance, according to Plato and Tolkien). This acquiring of what we think is knowledge becomes part of ourselves and who we think we are; and this, in turn, will determine the actions that we will choose to take.
An ‘expert’ is one who demonstrates an ‘expertise’, a ‘know how’, someone who knows their way in, around, or about something. This kind of knowledge was called techne by the Greeks. An expert demonstrates a skill which is particular and singular. If I require an appendectomy, I would not ask my next door neighbour to perform it. I would seek out a surgeon, an expert, someone with ‘know how’. Such common sense rules in matters concerning our health. Why does it not also rule in the health of our living with others in our communities i.e., our politics? (Human Sciences) This is a question which the philosopher Plato asked, and this ‘health’ was considered with regard to our souls. Since the number of us who believe we have a ‘soul’ diminishes with technology’s ever increasing impact on our reflection, contemplation and thinking, we look to the Human Science Psychology (from the Greek psyche meaning ‘soul’ and logos understood as ‘the study of…’) which focuses on the human mind and brain (which are both considered to be the same object of research in some areas of this field). We all believe we are ‘experts’ in politics, and we can find the roots of such belief as having stemmed from the thinking of the French philosopher Rousseau.
It would obviously be ‘dangerous’ for me and to me if I tried to perform the surgery myself or looked to someone who did not have expertise in the field to perform it. We take great caution and are very circumspect when we deal with such matters. Why is such circumspection and caution not exercised in our politics?
In the political realm, the great danger coeval with living in communities is tyranny, and it behooves us to try to find experts on tyranny in order to understand the phenomenon. Such an expert was the Greek philosopher Plato. In Plato’s view, the tyrant is someone who is incapable of recognizing the ‘otherness’ of human beings and is, thus, incapable of giving other human beings ‘their due’. Plato considered them the most unhappy of human beings. The best example we have in the English literature on tyranny is Shakespeare’s Macbeth. Giving others what is ‘owed’ to them, ‘their due’, is what we understand as “justice”. Tyrants see nothing due to other human beings, and they themselves expect a ‘loyalty’ which, if it is not received, will be enforced through fear and the exercise of power. Tyranny is a great danger because when tyranny takes hold, the human beings living in that community are not able to realize their full being as human beings, their full potentialities and possibilities, because they are not rendered their ‘due’. Not being rendered one’s due is what we call oppression.
For the human beings who are subject to tyranny, the danger facing them is that, because their humanity is not recognized, they themselves will cease to be fully human beings. The curious fact is that, within the tyranny, many will be satisfied with this condition. In the analogy we have been using here, they will perform the surgery upon themselves.
The “ignoring of expertise” in the matter of politics carries grave consequences. Socrates once said: “The opposite of knowledge is not ignorance but madness”. Madness is rare in individuals but it is the rule in social collectives. The German philosopher Nietzsche once wrote: “Power makes stupid” and politics is the realm of power. Stupidity is a form of madness. Stupidity is a moral phenomenon, not an intellectual phenomenon. It has to do with actions, not thinking. In my 40 years of teaching, I never came across a ‘stupid’ student; I did come across a few stupid parents, though.
The German priest Dietrich Bonhoeffer, who was hanged by the tyrant Adolf Hitler in 1945, once wrote: “Stupidity is a more dangerous enemy of the good than evil”. He continued: “Against stupidity we are defenseless. Neither protests nor the use of force accomplish anything here; reasons fall on deaf ears; facts that contradict one’s prejudgment simply need not be believed- in such moments the stupid person even becomes critical – and when facts are irrefutable they are just pushed aside as inconsequential, as incidental. In all this the stupid person, in contrast to the malicious one, is utterly self-satisfied and, being easily irritated, becomes dangerous by going on the attack. For that reason, greater caution is called for than with a malicious one. Never again will we try to persuade the stupid person with reasons, for it is senseless and dangerous.”
The ignoring of the opinions of ‘experts’ does not grant freedom and independence. As Bonhoeffer wrote before he was hanged: “The fact that the stupid person is often stubborn must not blind us to the fact that he is not independent. In conversation with him, one virtually feels that one is dealing not at all with a person, but with slogans, catchwords and the like that have taken possession of him. He is under a spell, blinded, misused, and abused in his very being. Having thus become a mindless tool, the stupid person will also be capable of any evil and at the same time incapable of seeing that it is evil. This is where the danger of diabolical misuse lurks, for it is this that can once and for all destroy human beings.” As was stated under Title #1, the ability to reason and critically analyze the available facts provided by experts is crucial to avoid misinformation and reach valid conclusions, and this is particularly so in the political realm.
Plato identified five different political regimes which he ordered from best to worst: 1. monarchy; 2. aristocracy; 3. oligarchy; 4. democracy; and 5. tyranny. Democracy was placed next to tyranny because under democratic regimes, human beings will be ruled by their selfish passions and appetites. Such a rule would not be conducive to human beings’ achieving their best potentials and possibilities with regard to their souls, in Plato’s opinion. A legitimate monarchy was the opposite of an illegitimate tyranny. A legitimate monarch would, if he were a good king, exercise the royal techne of statesmanship. His recognition of others would render, as best as possible, to each what was their due. In the regimes ruled by aristocracies, the ‘aristocrats’ would presumably be the ‘experts’ within that society for they would be the ‘best’ that the society had to offer (which is what the word ‘aristocracy’ originally meant). History shows us many ‘aristocratic’ regimes which were not ruled by the ‘best’. With the arrival of capitalism in the post-Renaissance world, the propertied classes were seen as the best to rule and establish the regime. With the advancement of technology, these propertied classes have taken the form of the military-industrial complex and the bureaucracies related to them.
I have focused on the AOK of the Human Sciences in these notes to this title. This is because the greatest danger to life is war, and war is a matter of politics. In the Arts, we can develop our tastes and opinions based on the opinions of experts (critics) or we can ignore those opinions and formulate our own. The worst that can happen is a heated discussion with family members or with those in a bar once we are too far into our cups. Our nation will not go to war over them. The “culture wars” going on in the USA and elsewhere are over politics and power and who gets to eat what, not over truth and beauty in the Arts.
4. Is it problematic that knowledge is so often shaped by the values of those who produce it? Discuss with reference to any two areas of knowledge.
Title #4 exhibits a number of the same concepts and characteristics as titles #1, #3, #5 and #6. Here, ‘problematic‘, ‘knowledge‘, ‘shaped‘, ‘values‘, and ‘who produce it‘ are key concepts and terms. Of course, ‘is’ and how it is understood is problematic in itself!
What is ‘problematic’ when ‘knowledge’ is considered ‘information’? What values are present when ‘information’ is considered knowledge? As mentioned in an earlier title (#1), ‘information’ means that which is responsible for the ‘form’ so that the data or substance of a statement can ‘inform’ (in – form – ation: 1. -ation from the Greek aitia “that which is responsible for”; that which is the “cause of”; 2. -form: the “shape” or outward appearance of something, in Greek, the eidos of something; 3. in-form: that which makes possible the ‘knowledge’ in the form of a statement that is to be passed over to someone because of the ‘form’ in which it has been placed.) From the question of our title, it is the ‘values’ of those who are putting forth the statement that is responsible for the ‘form’, the ‘shape’ or the outward appearance of the thing (knowledge) that is brought forward or ‘produced’.
What, for example, may be problematic about artificial intelligence? What ‘values’ are inherent in its roots that we should be concerned about? To begin with, historically, the fact that the chief funding for artificial intelligence research in the USA was provided by the Department of Defense should make us wary. What might the values of the DOD be in that it would provide funding for AI? How do those values relate to the essence of artificial intelligence itself? What is the essence of artificial intelligence?
If the apex of technology is cybernetics and cybernetics is the unlimited mastery of human beings by other human beings, then artificial intelligence will be the chief equipment or tool in “the technology of the helmsman” to be used by these helmsmen in their mastery and control of other human beings who will be viewed as ‘resources’ and ‘disposables’. The ‘values’ rooted in technology itself have provided the “open region” to allow artificial intelligence to come into being, just as those ‘values’ have allowed handphones and computers to come into being.
The common instrumental view of technology sees technology as a ‘tool’ or ‘equipment’ like any other and that it can be used for good or ill, and this view persists with regard to artificial intelligence which is also seen as an instrument or tool. As is discussed in this blog, we have seen that technology is more of a “fate”; it is a mode (way or manner) of being in the world that has arisen from particular historical conditions (Western European sciences) and social circumstances (contexts). The view of artificial intelligence examined here arrives from the view of reason (the principle of reason, logic, logistics) and nature (the environment as object) that came from those mastering Western sciences. Such a view cuts human beings off from any notion of a transcendent good (the Sun in Plato’s allegory of the Cave, the discussion in Title #2) and from any notion of a transcendent justice (a standard of justice other than that of our own making). One might say that artificial intelligence and its creation of its virtual worlds is a further degree from the truth and the light of the sun that Plato speaks about in his allegory of the Cave.
The situation in which we find ourselves currently seems obvious: we are faced with calamities concerning the environment, population, resources, and pollution if we continue to pursue the policies that we have pursued over the last few centuries. The attempts to deal with these interlocking emergencies will require a vast array of skills and knowledge; and that is what most of you are being educated towards. Technological mastery will need to be used to solve the problems that technology has created. Artificial intelligence will be used in the solution of these problems, so we can say that the primary mode of artificial intelligence will be action, the performance or doing of some task. The thinking involved in it will already have been completed, even the ‘thinking’ that originates from within itself. Its focus will be on applications.
The realization of the cybernetic future will find its place most securely in the medical profession, particularly the bio-medical field where the practical applications of artificial intelligence are being emphasized. What has been called “late stage capitalism” increasingly attempts to establish itself as “the mental health state” with the necessary array of dependent arts and sciences. The difficult choices which will be necessary in the future are discussed within the assumptions of the ‘values’ and ‘ideals’ which shall direct our creating of history, i.e., our actions. If we are to deal with the future “humanely” (that is, in a “human” fashion), our acts of ‘free’ mastery in creating history must be decided within the light of certain ‘ideals’ so that we can preserve certain human ‘values’ and see that ‘quality of life’ and quantity (economic prosperity) is safeguarded and extended. Clearly, the problem of dealing with these future crises involves great possibilities of tyranny[1] and we must be careful that in meeting these choices and decisions we maintain the ‘values’ of free government.
The way we put the questions/themes that relate to the task of the future, the future of our students (your futures) as the leaders of that future, involves the use of concepts such as ‘values’, ‘ideals’, ‘persons’ or ‘our creating of history’. The use of these concepts obscures the fact that these very concepts have come forth from within the ‘technological world-view’ to give us an image of ourselves from within that within. These terms are used “unthinkingly” from within this “world-view” and do not allow us to gain the openness necessary to be able to discuss the questions in any meaningful way.
To carry out this questioning we have to look at “artificial intelligence as a fate” or a destining of human beings. In expressing the instrumental view of technology, we can see that artificial intelligence and the machines to which it is related are obviously instruments because their capacities have been built into them by human beings; and it is human beings who must set up the operating of those capacities for the purposes that they have determined. Artificial intelligence is the next step in that the machines themselves will develop their capacities from the programs installed within them, but those programs were initially written by human beings based on their ‘values’. All instruments or tools can potentially be used for wicked purposes and the more complex the instrument, the more complex the possible evils. But if we apprehend artificial intelligence as a neutral instrument or tool, can we be better able to determine rationally its potential dangers? That is clearly the first step in coping with these dangers. This view comes from those who uphold an instrumental view of technology. We can see that these dangers lie in the potential decisions human beings make about how and where to use artificial intelligence, and not to the inherent capacities of the machines that have artificial intelligence encoded within them. The research and creation of the machines and the creation of the programs for them is expensive; so it will, undoubtably, be the ‘values’ of the wealthy and powerful which will determine the ends for those machines.
This view is the instrumental view of most of us regarding technology and it is so strongly given to us that it seems like common sense itself. It is the box that we are given and which we must think outside of. We are given an historical situation which includes certain objective technological facts. It is up to us as human beings in our freedom to meet that situation and to shape it with our ‘values’ and ‘ideals’.
Despite the decency and common sense inherent in the instrumental view of technology, when we try to think about what is being said in this view, it becomes clear that that the products of technology such as computers, handphones, artificial intelligence and the various other machines and manifestations of technology are not being allowed to appear before us for what they really are.
Clearly, artificial intelligence and computers are more than their capacities or capabilities. Computers, for example, are put together from a variety of materials, beautifully fashioned by a vast apparatus of fashioners. Their existence has required generations of sustained efforts by chemists, metallurgists, and workers in mines and factories. They require a highly developed electronics industry and what lies behind that industry in the history of science and technique and their reciprocal relations. They have required that human beings wanted to understand nature, and thought the best way to do so was by putting it to the question as object so that it could reveal itself. They have required the discovery of modern algebra and the development of complex institutions for developing and applying algebra. Nor should this be seen as a one-sided relationship in which the institutions necessary to the development of the machines were left unchanged by the discovery of algebra
The existence of artificial intelligence has required that the clever of our society be trained within the massive assumptions about knowing and being and making (the values) which have made that algebra actual. Learning and education within such assumptions is not directed towards a “leading out” but towards “organizing within” (“education” from the Lat. educare “to lead out”; and the Gr. aitia “that which is responsible for or occasions” the “leading out”). This means and entails that those who rule any modern society (the helmsmen) will take the purposes of ruling increasingly to be congruent with this account of knowing. The requirements for the existence of computers and artificial intelligence is but part of the total historical situation which is given to us as modern human beings. The conditions of that historical situation are never to be conceived as static determinants (as something which cannot be changed), but as a dynamic interrelation of tightening determinations (the box gets smaller in terms of choices).
Human freedom is conceived in the strong sense of human beings as autonomous—the makers of our own laws and our own selves from out of our ‘values’. This is also a quite new conception. It is first thought systematically in the writings of the German philosopher Kant. It is also a conception without which the coming to be of our modern civilization would not and could not have been. But it is a conception the truth of which needs to be thought because it was not considered true by the wise men of many civilizations before our own.
In our Cartesian view of the world, we hold a view of the world with neutral instruments on one side and human autonomy on the other. But it is just this view that needs to be thought if we are concerned with understanding the essence of technology, and of understanding the essence of artificial intelligence and of modern instrumentality if we are to see these as being a ‘fate’ or ‘destiny’. When one thinks of ‘values’ and ‘ideals’ from within technology, one cannot ignore the continued homogenization of the central corporations in our everyday lives and the tremendous growth in their power over our lives, including the ability of driving us into wars. (The social media and tech giants and their reciprocal relations to the DOD are examples of this.)
Aristotle has pointed out that human beings are the ‘religious animal’, and the religion for most human beings who have lost any kind of transcendental faith in a god is the ‘belief in progress’. This belief can be described as the good progress of the race in the direction of the universal society of free and equal human beings, that is, towards the universal and homogeneous state. They assert that the technology, which comes out of the account of reason given in the modern European sciences, is the necessary and good means to that end. That account of reason assumes that there is something which we call ‘history’ over against nature, and that it is in that ‘history’ that human beings have acquired their rationality and their values. In the thought of the French philosopher Rousseau about the origins of human beings, the concept of reason as historical makes its extraordinary public arrival. Darwin’s Origin of Species is not possible without, first, the thought of Rousseau. Rousseau is the philosopher of the political Left at the moment.
The modern ‘physical’ sciences and the modern ‘human sciences’ have developed in mutual interpenetration, and we can only begin to understand that mutual interpenetration in terms of some common source from which both sciences found their grounding. That common source is “technology”.
To think ‘reasonably’ about the modern account of reason is of such difficulty because that account has structured our very thinking over the last centuries. Artificial intelligence has its roots in this account of reason (logic as logistics). Because we are trying to understand reason in the very form of how we understand reason is what makes it so difficult. The very idea that ‘reason’ is that reason which allows us to conquer objective human and non-human nature controls our thinking about everything. The root of modern history lies in our experience of ‘reason’ and the interpenetration of the human and non-human sciences that grew from that root. It is an occurrence that has not yet been understood, and it is an event that must come to be thought.
The instrumental understanding of technology simply presents us with neutral instruments that we in our freedom can shape to our ‘values’ and ‘ideals’. But the very concepts of ‘values’ and ‘ideals’ come from the same form of reasoning that created artificial intelligence and built the computers upon which it is based. ‘Artificial intelligence’ and ‘values’ both come from that stance which summoned the world before it to show its reasons and bestowed ‘values’ on the world. Those ‘values’ are supposed to be the creations of human beings and have, linguistically, taken the place of the traditional concept of ‘good’ which was not created but recognized (See the discussion in title #2). Artificial intelligence does not present us with the neutral means for building any kind of society. All their alternative ‘ways’ lead towards the universal, homogeneous state. Our use of them is exercised within that mysterious modern participation in what we call ‘reason’, and it is this participation that is most difficult to think in its origins.
[1] Martin Heidegger in 1935 defined the political movement of National Socialism in Nazi Germany as “the meeting of modern man with a global technology”. Today, we define this coming together of human beings and technology as ‘globalization’. Having an opportunity to change this definition of National Socialism in 1953 with the publication of An Introduction to Metaphysics, Heidegger chose not to do so. This should be a warning to us.
(Note: While the thoughts presented here focus on artificial intelligence, consideration of Titles #1, #3, #5 and #6 will help provide a focus on the particular areas of knowledge that you might choose to examine using the principles in operation here.)
5. Is it always the case that “the world isn’t just the way I is, it is how we understand it – and in understanding something, we bring something to it” (adapted from Life of Pi by Yann Martel)? Discuss with reference to history and the natural sciences.
Title #5 is somewhat tricky in its wording so this response will be directed towards how I interpret the title. We are directed to examine two specific areas of knowledge: history and the natural sciences. From the title, these two areas are to be examined from the role the “I is” plays in “how we understand the world” and what “we bring” to that world so that it may be interpreted and understood. The corollary question asked is “is it always the case?”. This corollary question invites us to examine the paradox or contradiction that is historicism and the nature of truth. Historicism is a way of viewing the world that sees what we call knowledge and any other social and cultural phenomenon as products of human activity in history. It is what we sometimes call “relativism”. Since knowledge is a product of the social and cultural forces at work at a certain period in history, nothing is ever “always the case”. The paradox or contradiction of historicism is whether or not historicism itself is “always the case” and thus the truth of the way and the how that things are including the “I is”.
In the wording of the title, the “I is” is contrasted with the “we are” with regard to what “we understand” and what “we bring” to the world in which we live. How we come to understand and interpret ourselves, the “I is”, is determined by the cultures and societies in which we happen to be born into i.e., the “we”. How we have come to understand what truth is and how we interpret and understand the world around us brings us to our own self-understanding and the questioning of that self-understanding. Our understanding and interpretation of the world will determine what we look up to and what we bow down to. The Greek philosopher Heraclitus once said: “Everything is full of gods”. Here in Bali, this statement is perfectly understandable. In the West, only a few people would have any comprehension of the statement. If there are no gods in things in the West, what has taken their place? A preliminary answer is: “we” have i.e., human beings as a species for it is “we” who create the things and bring them into being. To illustrate this, let’s look more closely at the areas of knowledge of history and the physical sciences or natural sciences.
We will begin our discussion of the natural sciences with two quotes from two of its greatest representatives: Albert Einstein, the founder of relativity physics, and Werner Heisenberg, the founder of the indeterminacy principle and quantum physics.
“Physical concepts are free creations of the human mind, and are not, however it may seem, uniquely determined by the external world.”-Albert Einstein
“What we observe is not nature in itself but nature exposed to our method of questioning. Our scientific work in physics consists in asking questions about nature in the language that we possess and trying to get an answer from experiment by the means that are at our disposal.”–Werner Heisenberg
How we have come to understand and interpret the external world (predominantly in the West, but now worldwide) is through technology. To characterize what modern technology is, we can say that it is the disclosive looking that disposes of the things which it looks at. Technology is the framework that arranges things in a certain way, sees things in a certain way, and assigns things to a certain order: what we call mathematical projection. This is what Einstein means by stating that “physical concepts are free creations of the human mind”. This is what we “bring” to the things. It is a viewing of things in a certain way i.e., within the framework of the mathematical projection.
The looking (the theory) is our way of knowing which corresponds to the self-disclosure of things as belonging to a certain order that is determined from within the framework or mathematical projecting itself. From this looking, human beings see in things a certain disposition; the things belong to a certain order that is seen as appropriate to the things i.e. our areas of knowledge. The seeing of things within this frame provides the impetus to investigate the things in a certain manner. That manner is the calculable. Things are revealed as the calculable. (This is Heisenberg’s ‘manner of questioning’.) Modern technology is the disclosure of things in the natural sciences as subject to calculation. Modern technology sets science going; it is not a subsequent application of science and mathematics, the ‘equipment’ and ‘tools’ of technology. “Technology” is the outlook on things that science needs to get started, the manner of “questioning” that Heisenberg speaks of. Modern technology is the viewing/insight into the essence of things of our world as coherently calculable. Science disposes of the things into a certain calculable order . Again, it is what we ‘bring’ to the things. Science is the theory of the real, where the truth of the things that are, views and reveals those things as disposables.
Technology as our way of being in the world (for both the “I is” and the “we are”) has been accomplished by the determination of what is as ‘object’ and the judgement regarding what we conceive to be the essence of truth, or how things reveal themselves when understood as objects. This is the same for both natural science and history, as well as the human sciences. This technology grounds our age in that through a specific interpretation and understanding of what is (beings/things as objects) and through a specific comprehension of truth (as correspondence, correctness), it gives to our age the basis or ground (its history) upon which it has been and is essentially formed. This basis or grounding holds complete domination over all the things/beings that come to distinguish our age in that it provides the interpretations of what those things/beings are. It is our metaphysics as technology that forms the paradigm that determines how we perceive things/beings in our age and, thus, the methodologies of our sciences as well as our understanding of history. This paradigm is the understanding of the environment, including our whole being-in-the-world (shared knowledge, history) as object. Technology is the meta-physic of the age, the modern age.
History is different from the other Human Sciences, or indeed other sciences in general, in that the knowers or researchers cannot directly observe the past in the same way that the object of research can be observed and studied in the Natural and Human Sciences. We “bring” more of ourselves to our interpretations and understandings of history and its narratives than we do to the narratives of physics, chemistry, and biology, for instance.
“Historiology” is the study of history in general, the search for what its essence is, what its purpose is. It is said by some that the purpose of history is “prophecy”, the ability to predict the future and to prepare for that future. “Historiography”, that is, a study of the writings of history, is not a study of all of the past, but rather a study of those traces or artifacts that have been deemed relevant and meaningful by historians; and this choosing of artifacts and evidence is the most important aspect of the study of history as it attempts to aspire to “scientific research”. This “selection process” is primarily determined and driven by how the “I is” has been previously determined prior to the selection and classifying of artifacts, and it determines what will be “brought” to those artifacts. This is where the importance of “shared knowledge” or “historical knowledge” comes into play; what we call our “shared knowledge” is “history” or “historical knowledge”, and what we choose to select is determined beforehand by our culture.
In the USA, for example, the attempt to give its historical narrative from only a “white selection process” will not shed much light on the truth of that history, particularly its Civil War where more Americans died than in all the wars in which it has since become involved up to the present day. This denial of the history of African-Americans as part of its American history in itself is another indicator of the current American descent towards fascism and tyranny, which begins with the denial of the “otherness” to other human beings, the failure to give other human beings their “due”. (See the discussion in Title #3.)
In the modern, the distinction between the personal or the “I is” knowledge and understanding and our shared or historical knowledge (what we understand and bring to what is called ‘knowledge’) tends to lose its crucial significance due to our belief in progress. It appears that we tacitly assign the same cognitive status to both historical and personal knowledge and this impacts how we understand history and what we feel its importance is to our futures. What we deem to be “historical” first appears and coincides with ratio, calculation, and thought understood as ratio and calculation. What is chosen to be called “history” arises with a pre-determined understanding and definition of what human being is (the animale rationale) and this, in turn, determines what “will be held to account” in the selection of what is deemed to be important in relation to that understanding of human being.
The question of whether history is an art or a science is as old as “historiography” itself. Aristotle in his Poetics distinguishes between the poet and the historian, and the philosopher and the historian. The historian presents what has happened while the poet is concerned with the kind of things that might, or could, happen: “therefore poetry is more philosophic and more serious than history, for poetry states rather the universals, history however states the particulars”. (Poetics 1451a36-b11) The poet aspires to “prophecy”. But isn’t History’s chief purpose to provide guidance for future actions? History might be called pre-philosophic in that it concerns itself with particular human beings, particular cities, individual kingdoms, or empires, etc. The historian must choose between what she has determined to be the important and the unimportant things when writing her report, and in her choices illuminate the universal in the individual event so that the purpose of her recording is meant to be a possession for all times. The acquisition of knowledge is acquired through the universal. You have done much the same in your Exhibition (if you have done it correctly). The presentation is analogical.
The spirit of historicism (the understanding of time as history) permeates every aspect of every text and every approach to the study of and knowledge of the things of our world, and it is particularly present in the IB program. Plato viewed time as “the moving image of eternity”, an infinite accretion of “nows”; we tend to view time as the “progress” of the species towards ever greater perfection, much like how we view the latest models of our technological devices and gadgets as being more “fitted” towards accomplishing our ends and purposes. Our “evolution” and “adaptation”, we believe, are signs of our progress and growth as a species as we move towards ever greater “perfection”, both moral and physical. It is sometimes called “the ascent of man”, but such a concept of human being, as an “ascending” creature, is only possible within the technological world-view.
When we speak of History as an area of knowledge, we are speaking of “human history” not the history of rocks or plants or other objects that are also part of our world. These are covered in the Group 4 subjects as part of the Natural Sciences. History as an area of knowledge deals with human actions in time whether by individuals or communities so it is considered a “human science” for the most part, and the approach to the study of it is a “scientific” one. This attempted approach to the study of history is the same as that carried out in the Natural Sciences wherein history is looked at “objectively” and demands are made of it to give us its reasons. We seek for the “causes” of events. This approach has given rise to one of the complaints against history and how it is studied nowadays: we can only learn about the past; we cannot learn from it. Nor do we today feel that we need to. This dearth of knowledge of history is most in evidence in America, and this is not surprising as America is the heartland of technological dynamism.
6. Faced with a vast amount of information, how do we select what is significant for the acquisition of knowledge? Discuss with reference to the natural sciences and one other area of knowledge.
Title #6 is very similar to title #5, but it differs from that title in that it focuses on the “selection” process involved in the Natural Sciences and another area of knowledge in “the acquisition of knowledge”. In title #5 we noted that the selection process deals with the general or universal and from it comes the acquisition of knowledge i.e., an explanation is provided for the particular object under scrutiny through the application of the categories that correspond with the object.
In Title # 3 we discussed the meaning of acquisition. “Acquisition” means to ‘get’, ‘to grasp’, to take hold of something and take possession of it, to make it one’s own. It means ‘that which is responsible for the acquiring or getting and taking possession of something’. Our wonderful phrase in English, “I get it”, is an example of this grasping and taking possession of something. Usually it is the beginning of our understanding of something, our “shared knowledge” (historical knowledge) of something, and in the sciences this might be the theoretical knowledge that gets the research started. What we grasp or take hold of from others in our discourses with them is “opinion” not knowledge, whether it be from those in our communities who are called ‘experts’ or from those who dwell in the murky communities of QAnon. (The communities are ‘murky’ because they are ‘a-nonymous’ i.e., they have ‘no name’; and, thus, they have no desire to be brought to light, to be brought out into the open which the naming of things does by nature.) This acquiring of what we think is knowledge becomes part of ourselves and who we think we are; and this, in turn, will determine the actions that we will choose to take i.e., the ethics.
Werner Heisenberg, one of the founders of quantum physics, made the following statement regarding the current position of modern physics and the natural sciences in general:
“What we observe is not nature in itself but nature exposed to our method of questioning. Our scientific work in physics consists in asking questions about nature in the language that we possess and trying to get an answer from experiment by the means that are at our disposal.”
In the natural sciences, the method of questioning which Heisenberg speaks of is determined by the mathematical projection which disposes of nature in itself. Because numbers don’t lie (or so we believe), they are projected towards nature in such a way that an “experiment” can be devised wherein results or outcomes can be determined in mathematical statements and the correctness of the numerical applications can be determined. If the results correspond to the mathematical projections, we believe we have acquired knowledge.
Physics constrains nature in its very way of posing nature, in its theoretical stance. Nature is required to report in a certain way and can only report in this way, and the way is determined by the principle of reason expressed in the mathematical projection. In modern atomic physics, unfortunately, Nature is not reporting according to our expectations and so we speak of the crisis of science as to what it conceives knowledge to be. We cannot have knowledge of nature in the way that we have traditionally understood knowledge and in the way that we have traditionally understood Nature. (See the quote from Heisenberg above).
The rigor of mathematical physical science is exactitude. Science cannot proceed randomly. All events, if they are at all to enter into representation as events of nature, must be defined beforehand as spatio-temporal magnitudes of motion. Such defining is accomplished through measuring, with the help of number and calculation. Mathematical research into nature is not exact because it calculates with precision; it must calculate in this way because its adherence to its object-sphere (the objects which it investigates, its selection process) has the character of exactitude. This is the heart of the selection process. In contrast, the Group 3 subjects, the Human Sciences, must be inexact in order to remain rigorous. A living thing can be grasped as a mass in motion, but then it is no longer apprehended as living. The projecting and securing of the object of study in the Human Sciences is of another kind and is much more difficult to execute than is the achieving of rigor in the “exact sciences” of the Group 4 subjects.
While there are some scientists who are genuinely motivated by the search for truth and the acquisition of knowledge in their “selection process” of what object they will study in their research, many are motivated by “vested interests” (where they will find the greatest source of funding) or social recognition and prestige, what may be called “Nobel Prize-itis”. In Book VI of his Republic, the Greek philosopher Plato stated that those who would receive the highest recognition in the Cave would be those who could predict what shadows would follow in the order that they were displayed on the walls of the Cave. On the other hand, some scientists often select their objects of study based on their personal curiosity and passion. They may be drawn to specific topics or phenomena that intrigue them intellectually or align with their expertise. Such curiosity and passion, however, is rarer in the sciences than it is in the Arts.
There are some scientists who consider the relevance and significance of the object of study within their field and the broader scientific community in general, and thus in their societies. They seek topics that address important questions, fill gaps in knowledge, or have practical applications and such scientists are usually looking at the recognition and prestige which could come from such studies. Researchers review existing scientific literature to understand the current state of knowledge in their field. They look for areas where further investigation is needed, unresolved questions, or opportunities for advancement.
The Human Sciences could be called “The Science of Humans”, the knowledge that we have already grounded with regard to what human being is and what human beings are, the starting points from which we can begin our journey towards understanding Human Being and human beings. This “science” originates in, has its grounds in, what we now call “biology”, “the science of” (“logy”) “life” (bios) or living things. The Human Sciences, Individuals and Societies, must take as their starting point the findings of the Natural Sciences. In order for the Human Sciences to begin their study, what human beings are and how they are must already be defined in some preliminary way through the findings of the Natural Sciences. This way of viewing is Western European in origin. Traditionally, it was known as “psychology”. Human beings, as the selected object of study of the Human Sciences, have been defined as animale rationale, the animal that is capable of reason which is demonstrated in its ability to give reasons . We believe our knowledge, and thus our being, comes from the “rendering of an account” of some thing based on the principle of reason: “I know be-cause”, the cause “is”, the cause “being”. We believe we attain the truth of some thing, knowledge of it, through the principle of reason, primarily through one of its sub-principles, cause and effect, and the logic upon which the principle of causality is based.
Two opposing views are present today and are related to the religions or faiths of both camps and determine the “selection process” of what aspect of human being will be the object of consideration: human beings are either the products of modification and chance (evolution) or human beings are “created” beings that have a purpose and destiny for their being. i.e. they have an essence. This clash shows itself in the views of human beings in the evolutionary camp as “ids” (“things”, “it”s) or “Selves”, or in the “created camp” in the view that human beings are not “their own”, as Socrates expresses so beautifully in the Platonic dialogue Phaedo and elsewhere.
Given the vast possibilities and potentialities of possible objects of study in the Human Sciences, practical considerations, such as the availability of resources, funding, time, and expertise, play a role in selecting the object of study among the many products of human activities. In the work environment, human beings are looked upon as “human resources”, for instance, an innocuous sounding term until thought is given to it.
Since the ultimate goal of the technological viewing of the world is cybernetics, the Human Sciences of most interest to the powerful will be those that aid in the unlimited mastery of human beings over other human beings. These will receive the funding and the ability to assess the necessary tools, equipment, or access to specific environments or specimens to conduct their research in the human sciences. It is this viewing, rooted in the technological, that causes me grave concerns about the advent and outcomes of artificial intelligence.
The saying “One mind is enough for a million hands” indicates what has become of the collaborative function that predominates within the bureaucracies and institutions created through technology and determines what the choice of object of study will be (if it can be said to be a choice) in the Human Sciences. Because scientists and researchers need to eat, funding agencies or institutions will also have specific priorities or grant programs that steer scientists towards particular areas of research.
In many instances, scientists will look to solve the many problems that technology itself has created, and so doing may consider the potential societal impact of their research that will give them the recognition and prestige that they desire. They may choose to study objects or phenomena that have practical implications, such as improving human mental health, since technology has resulted in mass meaninglessness for so many human beings (and the sense of “victimhood” which goes along with it). They may address environmental challenges such as the climate change caused primarily by the applications of technology’s equipment and techniques. In doing so, they may become involved in informing policy decisions through their knowledge and understanding of political science.
Theory of Knowledge: An Alternative Approach 