UNCERTAINTY IS INEVITABLE AT THE FRONTEIRS OF KNOWLEDGE

Knowledge has many components to it. There are many ways of knowing and areas of knowledge. In different areas of knowledge many people had to work with uncertainty to make common knowledge what it is today. They had to use certain ways of knowing in an area of knowledge to discover that knowledge and share it with the world so someone else could go past the original frontier and discover something new. In science, scientists discover things with uncertainty and theories until they find evidence and can prove their discoveries with different ways of knowing. There is always uncertainty with curiosity and discovering something new in any field but it takes courage, patients and much more for people to make the discoveries necessary for our kind's well being.

“WHEN THE ONLY TOOL YOU HAVE IS A HAMMER, ALL PROBLEMS BEGIN TO RESEMBLE NAILS” 

I may be misinterpreting this quote, but I think it means that we as humans have so many tools and don't utilize all of them. We only use one tool for all purposes, and that we overly rely on the one single tool we may have. When we use the hammer to solve problems, we will continuously use the hammer and treat every single problem like nails. In the situation of the theory of knowledge, this means that we may be relying on one certain way of knowing too much, using that way of knowing for all our pursuits of knowledge. We have so many ways of knowing and areas of knowledge to utilize. We could use a combination of intuition and reason together to solve a problem rather than always using just one. A person needs a balance of all the ways of knowing and areas of knowledge to be a well-rounded and level headed person. 

"THERE ARE ONLY TWO WAYS IN WHICH HUMANKIND CAN PRODUCE KNOWLEDGE: THROUGH PASSIVE OBSERVATION OR THROUGH ACTIVE EXPERIMENT." TO WHAT EXTENT DO YOU AGREE WITH THIS STATEMENT?

We discussed this in class quite a bit. We came up with the conclusion that almost everything fits under the category of experiment of observation. If one were to take an area of knowledge such as history, one observes history and passes it down so people of the world learn from it. In math, people experimented with theorems and now others observe them and learn from them. Creation comes from experiment and more people learn from the creation or observe it. The question of emotion and intuition came up as a way that humans gain knowledge. I believe that emotion come from observing others and watching how people react to certain situations. Although both emotion and intuition are more personal to the individual, the individual learns to develop their own intuition and emotion through observing others. In conclusion, I do agree with the statement and believe that it can be stretched to apply to a lot of areas of knowing and ways of knowledge.  

DO WE GENERALLY USE REASON OR EMOTION TO MAKE ETHICAL DECISIONS? WHICH ONE SHOULD WE USE?

In my opinion, we make ethical decisions based on our emotion more so than our reasoning. The definition of ethics is moral principles that govern a person's or group's behavior. Reason is more based on knowledge and facts. Ethics is more subjective depending on the person you are talking to. The presentation on Thursday talked about if animals have rights. All the people that abused animals like dog fights did it based on emotion "because it was fun and made them feel good". They had no real reasoning or facts behind why they did it, but it was just for pure enjoyment. We also save and care for animals because we feel emotional about a creature being hurt or abused. When we make ethical decisions I think we should mostly use emotion but a bit of reason couldn't hurt because sometimes emotions can skew our perception of things so a balance of both is always necessary.   

IS EDUCATION A RIGHT OR A PRIVILEGE?

While education may not be a "fundamental right" under the Constitution, the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment requires that when a state establishes a public school system, no child living in that sate may be denied equal access to schooling. So what about college? Well from the movie "The Ivory Tower" and our discussion it seems like making college free wouldn't be the best option due to the surplus in workers and decrease in workers' positions. I believe that education can still be a right if you pay for it but it doesn't have to cost as much as it does today. The cost for luxury in the facilities must be dropped and students should only have to pay for their education and livable or mediocre living conditions. We also need to strengthen public elementary to high school education so everyone has a shot to get into college. the gap between education in for example South Carolina compared to Virginia is huge. Kids will be left behind in that case when they get to college. The solution is to give everyone equal opportunity to high school and see what they do with the opportunity in college. 

KNOWLEDGE QUESTION BASED ON "THE IVORY TOWER"

In what ways does emotion shape perspective in ethics?

IS ECONOMICS A SCIENCE?

Watch this video to find out!: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0oGzYmXiS9c

I would consider economics as a science. In economics there can be a lot of data set to predict the economic outcome of something. In class, we looked at graphs predicting the economic outcome of the US. This takes a lot of calculation and being aware of other outside influences to predict a certain economic outcome. There are also economic experiments that can be done which could also relate to human sciences. Many people may argue that it involves more math than science, but they are all interrelated and can lead from one to the other, needing each other to make sense. Economics may not fit in an exact science category but it can be involved in a lot of science experiments, practices, and more.  

WHY ARE DIFFERENT EMOTIONS NECESSARY?

In class we talked a bit about the machine that makes you happy forever but the consequence is that we would forget our past. Although being happy is great, being happy all the time isn't. The movie Inside Out shows that all emotions count and should contribute to an overall happy life style. Joy couldn't always fix the problems with happiness. Sometimes Sadness had to come in and make a memory happy with sadness. Overcoming hard situations is what overall makes us happy and stronger. We have to use other emotions such as anger or sadness to overcome them and in the end be happy that we did. If we were happy all the time (like Logan said) are we even happy? Happy would then become our normal and we would never really be happy. Something interesting I noticed in Inside Out was that in the child Joy or happiness lead the emotions, in the mother sadness lead the emotions, and in the father anger lead the emotions. This doesn't necessarily mean the mother is always sad or the father is always angry but as a child grows a mother is always worried or more emotional for them. A father tends to lead with strength or anger. Emotions are important and each takes the reigns at some point to help a person handle any situation. 

TO WHAT EXTENT DOES CULTURE INFLUENCE PERCEPTION AND/OR REASON?

I do believe culture plays a big role in perception and reason (as I have said before in previous posts). I was born in the US but I grew up in an Iranian household where my mother always told me to put myself in other people's shoes. I was always taught things in  both the American and Iranian perspective. I noticed that sometimes I would and still do side with my Iranian roots or bias which definitely influences me differently than others. Like the example I said in class different languages or cultures can say words or phrases in a certain way that can't be conveyed in another language because they experience and see things in their daily lives differently. This is not a bad thing at all! having different cultures influence our thought process can help us put ourselves in other people's shoes and connect better with different cultures OR motivate us to learn more about other cultures. Sometimes I host French students for my boss at work and although I have been studying French my whole life through the American school system, I learn so much about French culture and lifestyle through another kid my age experiencing it and telling me first hand. I get more perspective and understanding of life through  her culture. This changes my American influence or perspective I have learned in French class and I get more of an actual French perspective through a friend.

WHAT WOULD THE WORLD BE LIKE IF EVERYONE SPOKE THE SAME LANGUAGE? IF NO ONE SPOKE AT ALL?

If we all spoke the same language I think it would be quite difficult to gain cultural perspective or have much culture at all. Countries having their own language is a large part of their culture. This also comes with a different thought process depending on which country one comes from. As we said last class, different countries have metaphors or different ways to say a certain phrase or word that other languages and countries don't have (because we don't experience all the same things in the same way). This brings a different view point or perspective of thinking if we lacked having multiple languages in the world. If we had no languages it would be more difficult to communicate our exact feelings or thought process. Without language, I feel as if our species would not be one of the most intelligent creatures on the planet. The use of language is very important in or world due to our complex thought process and diversity of emotions. Through our culture and heritage we use language to convey our perspective and demonstrate our differences in lifestyles. 

ARE THERE REASONS TO BE SKEPTICAL OF YOUR KNOWLEDGE CLAIMS?

I wasn't there last class so I didn't hear the full discussion, but I say that you should be skeptical of your knowledge claims. We talked about the Allegory of the Cave the other day, and how we don't even know if we are in a cave or we somewhat know we are. No one knows everything and everyone can be unsure of themselves. In the video about the sheep, the expert was wrong. We assume the expert should know everything but not necessarily. The expert just has a lower chance of being wrong because they know a lot about a certain subject but they still have the chance of being wrong. I believe perspective is the best fact checker because we as Americans (for example) can believe something is right but if you look at something from another country's perspective they could think differently. 

THE ALLEGORY OF THE CAVE

1. Is having too much knowledge or knowing everything suppressing our curiosity?

2. What is the happy medium? (knowing enough to question and have curiosity but also not knowing everything to have the curiosity)

3. What is being in the cave and how will we know if we are in one?