knowledge

Assorted References

• diffusion by means of language
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    In language: Transmission of language and culture

    …made it possible for usable knowledge of all sorts to be made accessible to people almost anywhere in the world. This accounts for the great rapidity of scientific, technological, political, and social change in the contemporary world. All of this, whether ultimately for the good or ill of humankind, must…

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• epistemic logic
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    In applied logic: Epistemic logic

    …techniques to the study of knowledge or knowledge claims is called epistemic logic. The field encompasses epistemological concepts such as knowledge, belief, memory, information, and perception. It also turns out that a logic of questions and answers, sometimes called “erotetic” logic (after the ancient Greek term meaning “question”), can be…

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• relation to mind
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    In creativity: Individual qualities of creative persons

    …a sphere of activity or knowledge that requires a high level of ability. For example, in applying their knowledge of computers to the design of the Apple II, inventors Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak revolutionized the computer industry by appealing to individuals as well as businesses. French fashion designer Coco…

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  • In mind: Common assumptions among theories of mind

    …of mind is that of knowledge or knowing. This may be questioned on the ground that, if there were sensation without any form of thought, judgment, or reasoning, there would be at least a rudimentary form of knowledge—some degree of consciousness or awareness by one thing or another. If one…

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philosophy

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  In Western philosophy: Philosophy

  …in construing a system of knowledge, people constantly prefer what is more perfect to what is less perfect—i.e., what is formed and thus recognizable to what is not, what is true to what is false, a sound logical conclusion to a logical fallacy, even an elegant scientific demonstration to a…

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  In Western philosophy: Basic science of human nature in Hume

  …causal principle upon which all knowledge rests represents no necessary connections between things but is simply the result of their constant conjunction in human minds. Moreover, the mind itself, far from being an independent power, is simply “a bundle of perceptions” without unity or cohesive quality. Hume’s denial of a…

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• continental philosophy
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    In continental philosophy: Kant

    …ultimately vindicated the claims to knowledge that more-traditional philosophers had made on its behalf.

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• Descartes’ critique
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    In René Descartes: The World and Discourse on Method

    …works illustrate Descartes’s conception of knowledge as being like a tree in its interconnectedness and in the grounding provided to higher forms of knowledge by lower or more fundamental ones. Thus, for Descartes, metaphysics corresponds to the roots of the tree, physics to the trunk, and medicine, mechanics, and morals…

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    In Cartesianism: The Cartesian system

    …problems concerning causal interaction and knowledge. Given that mind and matter are so radically different, how can the body cause the mind to have sensible ideas? Likewise, how can the mind cause the body to move? How can the mind know the material world by way of sensible ideas, which…

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• distinction from attitude
  • In attitude

    Some apply the term “knowledge” to what are held to be certainties and “attitudes” to what is uncertain, even using them to mean “true” and “false” beliefs, respectively. Another suggestion is that attitudes refer to beliefs that impel action while knowledge is more intellectual and passive.

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• epistemology
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    In epistemology

    …origin, and limits of human knowledge. The term is derived from the Greek epistēmē (“knowledge”) and logos (“reason”), and accordingly the field is sometimes referred to as the theory of knowledge. Epistemology has a long history within Western philosophy, beginning with the ancient Greeks and continuing to the present. Along…

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• Indian philosophy
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    In Jainism: Theories of knowledge as applied to liberation

    …first of five kinds of knowledge (jnana). The second kind, shrutajnana, derives from the scriptures and general information. Both are mediated cognition, based on external conditions perceived by the senses. In addition there are three kinds of immediate knowledge—avadhi (supersensory perception), manahparyaya (reading the thoughts of others), and kevala (omniscience).…

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    In Indian philosophy: Significance of Indian philosophies in the history of philosophy

    …include the question of whether knowledge arises from experience or from reason and distinctions such as that between analytic and synthetic judgments or between contingent and necessary truths. Indian thought, therefore, provides the historian of Western philosophy with a point of view that may supplement that gained from Western thought.…

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    In Indian philosophy: Common concerns

    …Indian philosophers speak of intuitive knowledge, they are concerned with making room for it and demonstrating its possibility, with the help of logic—and there, as far as they are concerned, the task of philosophy ends. Indian philosophers do not seek to justify religious faith; philosophic wisdom itself is accorded the…

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  • 
    In Indian philosophy: Epistemology

    …Samkhya-karika delineates three ways of knowing (pramana): perception, inference, and verbal testimony. Perception is defined as the application of the sense organs to their respective objects (prativishayadhyavasaya). Inference, which is not defined, is divided first into three kinds, and then into two. According to the former classification, an inference is…

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    In Indian philosophy: Jain philosophy

    Knowledge is either perceptual or nonperceptual. Perception is either empirical or nonempirical. Empirical perception is either sensuous or nonsensuous. The latter arises directly in the self, not through the sense organs but only when the covering ignorance is removed. With the complete extinction of all…

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    In Indian philosophy: The Bhagavadgita

    …action with complete nonattachment requires knowledge (jnana) of the true nature of the self, its distinction from prakriti, or Matter (the primeval stuff, not the world of matter perceived by the senses), with its three component elements (sattva—i.e., tension or harmony; rajas—i.e., activity; and tamas—i.e., inertia), and of the highest…

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• Italian humanism
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    In history of Europe: The humanities

    …the good, one must first know it, and so there could be no true eloquence without wisdom. According to Leonardo Bruni, a leading humanist of the next generation, Petrarch “opened the way for us to show in what manner we might acquire learning.” Petrarch’s union of rhetoric and philosophy, modeled…

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• philosophical anthropology views
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    In philosophical anthropology: Early conceptions of the soul

    Of these three types of knowledge—of the external world, of God, and of the soul itself—it is the first that has received most attention from philosophers. Although that priority of interest will be observed in this discussion, the other kinds of knowledge will be touched on in appropriate contexts. (Oddly,…

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    In philosophical anthropology: Plato

    …perception and instead sought authentic knowledge in a very different quarter that would be free from the instability and impermanence of the spatiotemporal world revealed by perception. Plato’s conception of such knowledge was strongly influenced by the rigour of mathematical reasoning and the unchanging character of the objects to which…

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• philosophical feminism
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    In philosophical feminism: Nature and scope of philosophical feminism

    Because knowledge is produced by societies—i.e., knowledge is the result of collaboration among and validation by a community of inquirers—the standards used to evaluate knowledge claims and to identify legitimate topics of inquiry are socially determined, not absolute.5. One’s upbringing and social situation affect how…

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• philosophy of biology and evolutionary epistemology
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    In philosophy of biology: Evolutionary epistemology

    …scope, and limits of the knowledge that human beings can acquire, it is natural to think that evolutionary theory should be relevant to epistemology, the philosophical study of knowledge. There are two major enterprises in the field known as “evolutionary epistemology”: one attempts to understand the growth of collective human…

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