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As philosophical as a philosophy topic can get, the Realizing Resonance topic for November is the Philosophy of Knowledge. The study of knowledge is actually a significant branch of philosophy called epistemology, which seeks to define knowledge, explain how we come to acquire it, and how we know it. The analytical disputes in epistemology are tricky and subtle, surrounding such abstract problems of justified true belief, reliability in acquisition of knowledge, and whether knowledge is internal or external. There is your a priori knowledge which comes to you without experience, and your a posteriori knowledge which comes to you with experience. There is your analytical knowledge which you get just from knowing the definitions of words, like in the proposition, “my grandfather was my father’s father”, and then there is your synthetic knowledge which you get from logical inference, as in the proposition, “my grandfather fought in World War II.” Or maybe the line between analytic and synthetic knowledge is hopelessly blurry. In the world of epistemology you may encounter empiricists, rationalists, idealists, constructivists, foundationalists, relativists, and skeptics. What I know is that this is fairly irrelevant to most people.
Don’t worry, I am not intending to get too deep into the traditional topics of epistemology. Rather, I want to take an unorthodox look at knowledge, from the perspective of personal knowledge sets. I believe that knowledge is unique to each person, with an individual possessing a set of knowledge distinct from any set of knowledge possessed by another, just like their fingerprints are distinct. As long as we are alive and conscious our knowledge sets are dynamic and always changing, whether we are learning, forgetting, or just adding another day to our personal autobiography. Our knowledge sets are structured by our physical reality and mortal circumstances, contextualized by our culture and language, and maintained by our intentional attention and concern. Novel inspiration springs forth from our internal interactions with our personal knowledge sets and acts as our muse for creation and invention, spurring a complex feedback process of knowledge set construction and evolution. I don’t see my view of knowledge as a version of epistemic relativism though, but something more like epistemic asymmetry.
So my Resolution to Read for November is…
Philosophy and Computing: An Introduction
by
Luciano Floridi
Philosophy and Computing covers the history of information technology and its implications, delving into the digital world of the internet, multimedia, databases, and artificial intelligence (AI). The book was published in 1999, so it may seem a bit dated for the subject matter, considering that this predates social networking and smartphones. However, I plan for this to be a precursor to reading Floridi’s new book, The Philosophy of Information which I am putting on my Christmas list. In the meantime I expect Philosophy and Computing is going to be an excellent and relevant read despite the significant changes since it was published. Floridi has suggested that humanity is undergoing a fourth revolution in the way we see ourselves as beings, that our identities as human beings are coming to be defined in terms of information exchangers he has dubbed inforgs. The first three revolutions in human self-understanding were the Copernican, the Darwinian, and the Freudian. After Copernicus humans no longer saw themselves at the center on the universe, after Darwin humans no longer saw themselves as outside the animal kingdom, and after Freud humans no longer saw themselves in control over even their own mind and consciousness. The pivotal figure for Floridi in the fourth revolution is Alan Turing. While I read Philosophy and Computing this month it will provide interesting inspiration for my intended topic of knowledge.
Happy Readings!
Jared Roy Endicott
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