Knowledge And Epistemology: The Study Of Knowledge

Socrates once said “To know, is to know that you know nothing. That is the meaning of true knowledge.”(Citation ) The study of knowledge is something philosophers have been conducting from the creation of philosophy. In fact knowledge is one of the perennial topics of philosophy, just as nature of matter in the physical sciences. The discipline of knowledge is known as epistemology(Greek meaning of knowledge and reason). Epistemology is literally defined as means to reason about knowledge, to think about knowledge and to examine knowledge so that we may better ourselves. Philosophers who study knowledge attempt to study what makes up knowledge, the kinds of things one can know, what the limits of knowledge and above all, the age long question

The first condition is often referred simply as belief. Beliefs are things individuals possess. Beliefs aren 't like trees or cars where ones may come across them while taking a stroll through a town square. Beliefs are in the head and generally are viewed as just the way a certain individual 's views the world. If one believes that humans cannot fly, they just think that humans really cannot fly. The statement, “They just think” For many philosophers, is extremely important. It implies that what they think could be wrong. In other words, it implies that the way they think about the world could possible not match up with the way the world really is and so there is a distinction between belief and the next condition, truth. Something is true if the world really is that way. Unlike belief, truth is not in the head, but is “out there.” The statement, “Humans cannot fly” is true if humans cannot fly. The statement in quotes signifies a statement on may make about the world and the second statement describes the way the world actually is. When one believes something, they hold that or accept that a statement or proposition is true. It could be false, and that 's why their belief may not “match up” with the way the world really is. The last condition, Justification, is the more difficult condition to explain. Think of belief as the seed of knowledge and truth is the energy and water of

Most Philosophers talk of individual people being justified, not the ideas or concepts themselves being justified. What this means is that what may count as knowledge for one may not count as knowledge for another. The subjective nature of knowledge partly is based upon the idea that belief are things that individuals have and those belief are justified or not justified. When one thinks about this, it actually does make sense. Someone may have more evidence or different experience than those someone else has, and similarly they may believe things someone else may not or has evidence for something they don 't. Simply put, universal knowledge, which is something everybody knows, may be very hard to come by. Truth, if it exists, is not like Justification. Truth is universal. It 's the way people access knowledge, and it may vary