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How do you know what the weather will be like tomorrow? How do you know how old the Universe is? How do you know if you are thinking rationally?<\/p>\n
These and other questions of the \u201chow do you know?\u201d variety are the business of epistemology, the area of philosophy concerned with understanding the nature of knowledge and belief.<\/p>\n
Epistemology is about understanding how we come to know that something is the case, whether it be a matter of fact such as \u201cthe Earth is warming\u201d or a matter of value such as \u201cpeople should not just be treated as means to particular ends\u201d.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s even about interrogating the odd presidential tweet to determine its credibility.<\/p>\n
Epistemology doesn\u2019t just ask questions about what we should do to find things out; that is the task of all disciplines to some extent. For example, science, history and anthropology all have their own methods for finding things out.<\/p>\n
Epistemology has the job of making those methods themselves the objects of study. It aims to understand how methods of inquiry can be seen as rational endeavours.<\/p>\n
Epistemology, therefore, is concerned with the justification of knowledge claims.<\/p>\n
The need for epistemology<\/strong><\/p>\n Whatever the area in which we work, some people imagine that beliefs about the world are formed mechanically from straightforward reasoning, or that they pop into existence fully formed as a result of clear and distinct perceptions of the world.<\/p>\n But if the business of knowing things was so simple, we\u2019d all agree on a bunch of things that we currently disagree about \u2013 such as how to treat each other, what value to place on the environment, and the optimal role of government in a society.<\/p>\n That we do not reach such an agreement means there is something wrong with that model of belief formation.<\/p>\n We don\u2019t all agree on everything. Flickr\/Frank<\/p><\/div><\/p>\n It is interesting that we individually tend to think of ourselves as clear thinkers and see those who disagree with us as misguided. We imagine that the impressions we have about the world come to us unsullied and unfiltered. We think we have the capacity to see things just as they really are, and that it is others who have confused perceptions.<\/p>\n As a result, we might think our job is simply to point out where other people have gone wrong in their thinking, rather than to engage in rational dialogue allowing for the possibility that we might actually be wrong.<\/p>\n But the lessons of philosophy, psychology and cognitive science teach us otherwise. The complex, organic processes that fashion and guide our reasoning are not so clinically pure<\/a>.<\/p>\n Not only are we in the grip of a staggeringly complex array of cognitive biases<\/a> and dispositions, but we are generally ignorant of their role in our thinking and decision-making<\/a>.<\/p>\n Combine this ignorance with the conviction of our own epistemic superiority, and you can begin to see the magnitude of the problem. Appeals to \u201ccommon sense<\/a>\u201d to overcome the friction of alternative views just won\u2019t cut it.<\/p>\n We need, therefore, a systematic way of interrogating our own thinking, our models of rationality, and our own sense of what makes for a good reason. It can be used as a more objective standard for assessing the merit of claims made in the public arena.<\/p>\n This is precisely the job of epistemology.<\/p>\n Epistemology and critical thinking<\/strong><\/p>\n One of the clearest ways to understand critical thinking is as applied epistemology. Issues such as the nature of logical inference<\/a>, why we should accept one line of reasoning over another, and how we understand the nature of evidence and its contribution to decision making, are all decidedly epistemic concerns.![\"\"](\"https:\/\/cdn.theconversation.com\/files\/180650\/area14mp\/file-20170802-11377-q3liv8.jpg\")
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