Epistemology Concepts 2010-2011

Saturday, November 13, 2010

CONCEPT OF INFALLIBILITY - Mathew Kottoor B09015

CONCEPT OF INFALLIBILITY

In epistemology this term is most appropriately used for the epistemic position of a subject vis-à-vis a given subject-matter, more specifically for the impossibility of the subject's being mistaken about that subject matter. Infallibility, from Latin origin ('in', not + 'fallere', to deceive), is a term with a variety of meanings related to knowing truth with certainty.

IN COMMON SPEECH

When a statement, teaching, or book is called 'infallible', this can mean any of the following: it is something that can't be proved false, it is something that can be safely relied on and it is something completely trustworthy and sure. When a person is called 'infallible', this can mean any of the following: Some statements or teachings made by this person can be relied on to be certainly true, all statements or teachings made by this person can be relied on to be certainly true, all information believed by this person is true, this person is free from flaws or defects, especially of a moral nature and this person is always right. These definitions differ widely. In common speech, 'infallibility' can refer to a person (or a group of persons), to an act of teaching by these persons, or to the information being taught. Furthermore, infallibility can refer to the 'absence of error' or to the 'inability to err'. Although these are similar, they are philosophically distinct categories. For example, it is theoretically possible for a person to live their entire life without ever uttering a false sentence, even though they had the ability to err. Infallibility is sometimes used to refer to someone's ability to 'learn' something with certainty. For example, a careful researcher might study a hundred books, each of which contains a few errors, and after carefully judging the statements in these books might deduce the complete, error-free truth. This is referred to as 'learning infallibly' or 'knowing infallibly'. However, this meaning is rarely used. Infallibility is inseparable from human nature as a result of the aspect of the human condition called self-awareness.

IN PHILOSOPHY AND RELIGION

Epistemology, a branch of philosophy, is concerned with the question of what, if anything, humans can know. Some philosophical schools deny that people can know anything; others deny that people can know anything with certainty. Existentialism and skepticism are the examples for that. Other philosophical schools agree that people can know things with certainty. Those are metaphysics, epistemology, reason and logic. In Christianity infallibility is referred to the church teachings. In Islam it referred to the concept of one true God and in Vaishnavism it referred two kinds of beings, fallible (material) and infallible (spiritual).

The sources

REJECTION OF MATERIALISM SUSAIRAJ J. 09039

REJECTION OF MATERIALISM

The primary reason Karl Marx hated religion specifically Judaism and Christianity was that he regarded it as the "opiate of the masses."The Marxist worldview is based on a materialist understanding of life. In popular jargon, "materialism" means an excessive love of material things. However, philosophically, "materialism" means that the only reality is matter, that there is no reality beyond the material world.

That is why, for example, to most leftists it is a great wrong that amid Latin American poverty, the church would build expensive cathedrals. In their view, all that gold and treasure should be spent on the poor. To a person with Judeo-Christian values, on the other hand, while feeding the hungry is a primary value, there are many other values, including the need to feed the soul. Moreover, the fact that many of the world's poor people would prefer having a cathedral to distributing whatever money selling such edifices would provide has disturbed the Left since Marx. To a materialist, the notion that poor people would place non-material concerns over material ones is absurd, if not perverse.

Religious people have values that transcend the material; Marx called religion the opiate of the masses: It keeps the masses from making social revolution by keeping them happy with non-material concerns and non-material rewards. For the heirs of Marx, which is what the Left is, the "good" is not so much a moral, let alone a spiritual, category, as it is an economic one. Hence, the left's preoccupation with economic inequality, taxing the rich, etc. The Left regards itself as morally elevated because of its preoccupation with materialism. Yet religious Americans who reject materialism are far more likely than left-leaning parents in the same socio-economic condition to sacrifice materially in order to have one parent be a full-time parent. Moreover, Judeo-Christian values explain why a religious woman is far more likely to sacrifice materially by giving birth to, rather than aborting, an unplanned child. Even freedom is a higher value to one who holds Judeo-Christian values. That is why the materialist leftist world so often celebrated and continues to celebrate communist regimes.

Those regimes may have rendered their societies prisons, but they reduced material inequality. That is why the founders of America, the place where Judeo-Christian values have flourished, inscribed a verse from the Torah, the primary source of Judeo-Christian values, on the Liberty Bell: Proclaim liberty throughout all the land unto all the inhabitants thereof. Meanwhile, the world is becoming polarized between those who choose to live in the past, embracing myth and superstition, and those who strive to achieve a balanced, tolerant, technical civilization that promotes individual freedom and personal growth. This could erupt into another major world war in the next few years.

The major cause of all of our problems is overpopulation. This issue has yet to be addressed by any country other than China, and religious elements are actively impeding any general solution. In the meantime, precious resources continue to diminish, and the very food chain of life itself is now in peril. We cannot even agree on something as simple as saving the Blue Fin Tuna population by changing our diet for a while. The outcome of these struggles, I believe, will result in a permanent rejection of materialism, and the transformation of the consumer-based economy into something else.

Friday, November 12, 2010

MARCELIAN CONCEPT OF TRUTH - Raju vadicharla 0924607 II MA

MARCELIAN CONCEPT OF TRUTH

What do we mean when we state that we are guided by a love of truth, or that someone has sacrificed himself for to 'the Truth'? These assertions are void of meaning if truth be defined as ' veritas est adequatio rei et intellectus (truth is the adequation of the thing and the intellect)'; they make sense only if truth become a stake to be striven for. There would be no meaning in saying that somebody had died for the adequation of the thing and the intellect.

Marcel tries to ask saying is there any difference between what the truth is and what simply is? Is not obvious that what is true is nothing other than what is, what exists, what is the case; from a certain point of view, the difference between them is non-existent. But only from a certain point of view and more precisely from the perspective of a kind of thinking turned at once towards the object and towards possible action on the object, that is to say thinking along the lines of technique.

According to Marcel, truth is only a single aspect of reality, and is not the whole of reality. Truth may emerge from reality, but reality is more than truth. The fulfillment of truth, or the totality of all truths, may produce an inclusive reality. The universe may realize itself in the fulfillment of truth. However, the universe may also include things which are lacking in truth. Truth is both immanent and transcendent.

Marcel argues that truth is a value or ideal which we may strive for. Feelings may be different from logical propositions in that feelings may be neither true nor false. Judgments of value may be either true or false, but we may not be able to describe a sensation or feeling as either true or false.¹

Marcel argues that feeling is not merely a passive function which is made possible by sensory capability. Feeling is also a mode of active participation in the world. Active participation may be either objective or non-objective. Non-objective participation may include subjective participation. However, non-objective participation may also include intersubjective participation. Intersubjectivity (or shared subjectivity) may bring unity to our being in the world.

Marcel emphasizes that feeling is not passive, and that feeling is participation. However, participation is more than feeling. Participation is active engagement in the world.

According to Marcel, each person may have both an objective identity in the outer world and a subjective identity in the inner world of his or her own thoughts or feelings. A person's subjective identity may be a felt quality of identity which may change in accordance with changes in that person's feelings. A felt quality (or a quality of feeling) may be unanalyzable, because the quality of a person's feelings may be inseparable from the things which that person feels. A felt quality may be a unity of feeling which cannot be dissolved by primary reflection.

Marcel describes contemplation as a mode of active perception which transcends the difference between subjectivity and objectivity. Contemplation is a mode of observation which transcends the difference between the inner world and the outer world. Contemplation is also a mode of participation in the being of whatever is contemplated. Contemplation is an inward regrouping or 'ingathering' of mental resources. To contemplate is to gather one's mental resources in the presence of whatever is being contemplated.

MARCELIAN CONCEPT OF TRUTH

Marcel emphasizes that feeling is not passive, and that feeling is participation. However, participation is more than feeling. Participation is active engagement in the world.

ST.AUGUSTINE'S THE INNER SENSE OF TRUTH BY SILJO CHERIYAKKARA B09005

St.Augustine's work reveals a lifelong quest for the truth and he moved from position to position in an increasingly better understanding of religion. His inner sense of the truth was subject to continuous improvement. If his method of working is analysed it reveals a pattern based on problems and their solutions. Firstly he became aware of the existence of the problem which he then came to understand through study and experience. Secondly he became aware of the solution which was placed in his intellect by the Interior Master. Thirdly he examined the solution in relation to his problem understanding and judged it to be true.

Three understandings are involved in this process which are the understandings of the problem, the solution, and the truth. These understandings were retained more or less permanently in Augustine's intellect. Putting this into the context of the saint's life the statement may be expanded to say that the understandings of all the problems that he ever investigated, and all the solutions he achieved to these problems, were retained in Augustine's intellect. For each problem he solved his understanding of the truth was expanded and improved. In the Augustinian model of the intellect this expanding understanding of the truth is the subjective philosophy. The subjective philosophy which is committed to its own truthful development follows the path of faith seeking understanding.

There is no need here to assume that St.Augustine correctly understood all his problems and, therefore, his solutions were always true. His doctrine of Predestination has been seen by later thinkers to be flawed, and this error may be traced to his incorrect understanding of the problem. It follows that incorrect problem understandings produce false solutions, which agrees with common experience.

The problem arises of the origin of false solutions. It appears that God the Interior Master matches the solution to the problem understanding and incorrect problem understandings can lead to incorrect solutions.　

Error is better than confusion, and false solutions may be seen as a stage on the path to truth, since their shortcomings will become apparent in later experience. For this reason science tests its theories to discover possible errors of understanding. This possibility of error gives the incentive to study the problem carefully since the problem must be understood correctly for the solution to be true.

http://www.augustinianparadigm.com/index.html

"phenomenology of knowledge" vishal 09048

A CRITICAL INVESTIGATION TOWARDS

"PHENOMENOLOGY OF KNOWLEDGE"

Phenomenology points out that prior to all scientific investigations and to all philosophical reflections there is in us a direct original spontaneous knowledge of or contact with reality based ultimately on the fact that each one of us is a being in the world. We know what knowledge is what reality is what the world is even before we start to investigate these problems. This pre reflective uthematic knowledge of reality is always taken for granted, rarely adverted to. It is a fact however that knowledge occurs continually in life and that it is based on a primitive trustful contact with reality. According to phenomenology the knowing activity is intentional. Knowledge is always knowledge about something. Mental states that have content in this fashion are said to be intentional. Knowing intends something which is not the subject. The subject grasps that which is thus intended without explicitly being aware of the act by which the object is known. Yet I am somehow vaguely, implicitly aware of this act. The term phenomenology often is used without a clear understanding of its meaning. Phenomenology has been described as a philosophy, methodology, and method. Furthering confusion, the term phenomenology has been used interchangeably with the term hermeneutics (ie, analyses of the written word).This column will provide a brief overview of phenomenological philosophy, methodology, and method.Phenomenologists believe that knowledge and understanding are embedded in our everyday world. In other words, they do not believe knowledge can be quantified or reduced to numbers or statistics. Phenomonologists believe that truth and understanding of life can emerge from people's life experiences. Although phenomenologists share this belief, they have developed more than one approach to gain understanding of human knowledge.

In 1900 Husserl still thought that the analysis of the subjectivity of consciousness was the task of psychology. But in the first volume of his Ligische Untersuchungen, Husserl already abandoned this relativist subjectivism.

Husserl then makes an attempt to open up a new direction in the analysis of consciousness. It is phenomenological analysis. It begins with asking questions. What so we mean by? What is the meaning f what we have in mind when we judge, affirm, dream, live, etc.? It silences experience provisionally leaves the question of objective reality or of real content outside, in order to turn its attention solely and simply on the reality in consciousness, on the ideal essences. The puts us neither in the plane of subjective representation (psychology) nor of reified essences (metaphysics) but precisely on that of phenomenon.

The phenomenon is not here as for Kant what is opposed to thing in itself. Phenomenology puts reality thing in itself in parenthesis. The phenomenon here is that which manifests itself immediately in absolute consciousness; it is grasped in the intuition that precedes any reflection or any judgment. The phenomenon is that which gives itself in absolute consciousness. The value, the reality or unreality of the phenomena are put in parenthesis. The phenomenological method consists in describing phenomena such as they give themselves, as pure and simple intentions of consciousness, as meanings, to be rendered visible and manifest. In this Wesenchau (essence intuition), the essence is neither ideal reality nor psychological reality, but ideal intention, intentional object consciousness, immanent to consciousness itself.

EMPIRICISM by RONY K.JOHNS(0924609)

EMPIRICISM

Empiricism is a theory which holds that the origin of all knowledge is sense experience. The term also refers to the method of observation and experiment used in the natural sciences. Often, empiricism is contrasted with rationalism, a theory which holds that the mind may apprehend some truths directly, without requiring the medium of the senses. Empiricists tend to emphasize the tentative and probabilistic nature of knowledge, while rationalists tend to be dogmatic and assert they have found a method to discover absolutely certain knowledge. Empiricists see philosophical skepticism as limiting what the human mind can hope to accomplish and as a guide to those areas of inquiry we can usefully apply our talents towards. For most empiricists, experience includes inner experience-reflection upon the mind and its operations-as well as sense perception.

Primarily, and in its psychological application, the term signifies the theory that the phenomena of consciousness are simply the product of sensuous experience, i.e. of sensations variously associated and arranged. It is thus distinguished from Nativism or Innatism. Secondarily, and in its epistemological usage, it designates the theory that all human knowledge is derived exclusively from experience, the latter term meaning, either explicitly or implicitly, external sense-percepts and internal representations and inferences exclusive of any super organic immaterial intellectual factor. In this connection it is opposed to Intellectualism, Rationalism, and Apriorism. The two usages evidently designate but two inseparable aspects of one and the same theory the epistemological being the application of the psychological to the problem of knowledge

. In the traditional view of empiricism it is believed that the mind of the observer plays no role whatsoever in forming knowledge, and that it somehow comes about as more and more 'facts' are discovered. Following the work of Kant and others, this view was modified to allow some role to be given to the mind in forming knowledge, though the problem has always been how to relate the two adequately. In positivism this is solved by the idea of inductivism; the ability to infer general knowledge from particular sensory data. Empiricism of various forms is the dominant epistemology in archaeology; empirical data, achieved mainly through controlled observation, provide the basis of knowledge and are generally kept separate from the distortions of subjectivity and any interpretations made.

According to the empiricist, all ideas are derived from experience; therefore, knowledge of the physical world can be nothing more than a generalization from particular instances and can never reach more than a high degree of probability. Most empiricists recognize the existence of at least some a priori truths, e.g., those of mathematics and logic. John Stuart Mill was the first to treat even these as generalizations from experience. In the philosophy of science, empiricism refers to an emphasis on those aspects of scientific knowledge that are closely related to experience, especially as formed through deliberate experimental arrangements.

FATE OF KNOWLEDGE by Raphy Jose Kadavi (0924608)

FATE OF KNOWLEDGE

Descartes, in order to attain knowledge took back the tactic of skepticism from Pyrrho and Sextus Empiricus. The tactic is to recall cases in which he has misperceived something and then to generalize on that basis that the senses are not to be trusted. According to him, to gain knowledge we must analyze our beliefs into their simplest components and test each of those components by comparing them to self evident truths. Once we have done that, we must reassemble the components that pass the test for truth into the complex belief we began with; or approximations of them if we found false components in our analysis and tests for truth (the Analytical method). What we compare belief-components to are with the truths that we have discerned through application of methodological doubt and discern as self-evident true i.e. ideas that present themselves to us as clear and distinct through the light of reason. Only when the process of analysis, comparison and verification has been successfully completed can we judge something we believe or are inclined to believe to be true belief and hence knowledge, and only when something judged knowledge can it be used to test other beliefs. The process is cumulative and what now needed to proceed is a single self evidently true idea that will serve as his standard for testing the components of all his beliefs.

Then Descartes establishes that he necessarily exists when he thinks; that he is a thing that thinks; and that the ideas he has of material objects; which may or may not exist, enables the derivation of extension as their common defining property. Here his thinking is a property of mind and extension the property of ideas he has of the material objects. The only basis for this invalid conclusion is the Aristotelian Presupposition that substances have defining properties.

Then he distinguishes among ideas that are innate in him and ideas that he conjures up himself. Of those innate ideas his particular interest is on the idea of God.

He through his causal argument proves the existence of God. The basis of this causal argument is that the idea is presented to the mind in a way that makes the eternity of its cause somehow undeniable. The idea is that those who have the idea of God has got it not from themselves.

Then he explains how error occurs, and hence of why error is not God's fault.

The explanation turns on two notions, the first notion is that we have perfectly free will; second is Descart's two step account of perception as involving the entertaining of ideas and the assenting to or rejecting of those ideas.

Here now what is to be noted is the difference between the existence of divine substance and the extended substance. The existence of divine substance is conclusively provable by reason, whereas the existence of extended substance, of matter is as it were another matter. Matter's existence cannot be proven by reason because we have acces to it only through ideas that represent it. As far as Descartes is concerned , the existence of matter follows as a conclusion from the premises stating God's existence and perfect goodness, but the soundness of that conclusion is dependent on the truth of the premises, and problems with the ideas of perfection and with conception of existence as a property render those premises problematic enough that the conclusion remains problematic.

Hence the fate of knowledge is to stay limited to the perfection of ideas.

TRANSCENDENTAL IDEALISM OF FICHTE by Jinto Velasseril (B09046)

TRANSCENDENTAL IDEALISM OF FICHTE

Fichte tried to dissolve the antithesis between the ego and thing-in -itself by identifying all reality with ego. For every judgment implied the affirmation of the self or ego. This ego means not merely subjective human consciousness which Fichte called the Absolute. For, if the affirmation is taken in itself abstracting from the special object of the judgment, it implies no limit this absolute ego, which is the beginning of all consciousness, simply points itself: am I. This is called thesis because it consists in a simple placing of self. This self posting or thesis of ego must necessarily engender an anti thesis. This anti thesis means the non ego without which the self posting of the ego cannot be understood. A third and final step necessarily follows which is called synthesis .this consists in the identification of the ego and non ego subject and object in the primeval consciousness of the absolute ego. Human consciousness is but a participation of this absolute subjectivity attained in the course of the dynamic evaluation of ego.

The initial step in this transformation was taken by Fichte , author of the Wissenschaftslehre (Science of Knowledge) Noticing that the Kantian account of experience creates a vital tension between the roles of pure intelligence and pure object as noumenal realities, Fichte argued that the balance between the two cannot be maintained. We are, instead, driven to choose one of two alternative views: to emphasize the knower and ignore the known as a thing in itself, or to ignore the knower in order to focus on the reality of the known. Fichte chose the former, idealistic course, believing it alone capable of securing the freedom required for an adequate account of morality.

According to Fichte, then, all philosophy and all reality begins with the transcendental ego, the elusive but purely active noumenal self, identifiable only in an indefinitely repeated reflection upon primary experience ("think on one who thinks on one who . . ."). This conscious being expand itself infinitely to comprehend everything, limited in its scope only by the logical categories and the regulative principles they entail. Hence, for Fichte, objects exist only as the objects of consciousness, believed by some individual ego in its restlessly active pursuit of knowledge.

Since an individual ego of this sort just is the active self as moral agent, Fichte supposed that morality follows directly from its nature. Once again, the ego expands infinitely to do everything, yet is consistently limited by its own legislation of the moral law. Since all egos are subject to precisely the same conditions, universal agreement to their moral precepts is assured. At the social level, this implies individual membership in a society of like-minded selves, a primitively socialist spirit akin to that exhibited in the French Revolution, of which Fichte was a vocal supporter. By eliminating all references to material objects as even potential things in themselves, Fichte left room for nothing but minds in the noumenal realm. Thus, although he regarded himself as a loyal follower of Kant, Fichte significantly modified the master's thought by regarding it as inescapably committed to transcendental idealism.

Sources:

Chackalackal, class note

www.philosophy pages.com

IDEALISM OF DESCARTES by Udaya Bhaskar 0924610

IDEALISM OF DESCARTES

The term idealism in its broadest sense denotes the philosophical position that ideas are primary and lie at the very foundation of reality, knowledge, and morality, while non-ideal entities are secondary and perhaps even illusory. Strands of idealistic thought can be found in ancient and medieval philosophy, but modern idealism begins in the wake of Rene Descartes, whose method of doubt problematized the relation of the mind to the material world and thus raised questions about how ideas "inside" the mind can be known to interact with or correspond to any material, extended thing "outside" the mind.

Descartes deals with issues of Idealism when he encounters the Dream Argument; in it he ponders whether reality or life itself is imaginary and unreal. He argues that sometimes when he dreams, his dreams are "as real as his waking life," and that it is difficult to know whether he is sleeping or dreaming and hence the line between the two is blurred to the extent that no clear distinction exists between the two. Furthermore, he asks the question, "How do I know that I know."

Descartes believes that the world could very well be a creation of our mind; he also happens to believe that he as person is real and therefore exists. This seems contradictory and self-defeating, but Descartes has some very sound arguments to make. Descartes now popular phrase, "I think, therefore I am," presents a case of realism which is a welcome break from the overall idealistic nature of Meditations. To explain this point, Descartes argues that, "doubt is a kind mode of thought; so, I cannot doubt that I think- I can't think that I don't think; and so, I exist as a thinking thing."

Descartes also further argues that he can doubt the existence of the physical world but not his own. "He concludes that his self or mind or soul must be an immaterial being." According to Descartes, the mind is "chuck full of innate ideas and rational principles which God put there and which determine that we judge in the ways that we do." Hence, Descartes credits God for giving him faculties and ability to know about things and also alleges that God will not allow him to be deceived. This ability to perceive things as endowed by God is what he takes as his reason for perceiving material objects. He further claims, "This faculty of imagination is that which enables me to form ideas of objects at particular time." To differentiate minds from physical bodies, Descartes argues that minds don't have size and shape are hence not "divisible" which leads him to conclude that "minds must be immaterial."

Descartes explains that the First Meditation describes how it is possible to have an attitude of doubt about the nature of all things; the Second Meditation explains how the mind discovers that it must necessarily exist, and explains how the mind can have a concept of the soul; the Third Meditation provides a proof of the existence of God; the Fourth Meditation describes the difference between truth and error; the Fifth Meditation provides another proof for the existence of God; and the Sixth Meditation describes how knowledge of the human mind and of how the mind can be guided by God leads to valid knowledge of material objects and of the physical world.

A criticism that may be made of how Descartes explains that knowledge is possible of material things is that his assertion that the world may be created by God exactly as we perceive it does not prove that the world is in fact created exactly as we perceive it.

Descartes says that we can know true reality when we have clear and distinct ideas. Clear and distinct ideas prove the existence of God. But the existence of God proves the validity of clear and distinct ideas. These statements are not adequately defined or validated He also says that we cannot be deceived in our perceptions by God, but he admits that our own perceptual or intellectual limitations can cause us to be deceived by the appearances of material things. Descartes' subjectivism, method of systematic doubt, and view of metaphysical dualism regarding mind and body were an important influence on the development of philosophy.