Rocco D’Ambrosca: 05/19/2010
Introduction
The focus of this paper will be twofold. The first section will address the epistemic distinction between a priori and a posteriori knowledge, to show that only a posteriori knowledge exists. The second section will address the views of rationalists and empiricists in light of the argument presented in the first section, offering in turn, a new conception of knowledge. Overall, I will argue against the existence of a priori knowledge and rationalism as a theory of knowledge, while developing empiricism into a more complete and full account of knowledge acquisition; resulting in a new conception of knowledge called Meditivism.
Section I
The aim of this first section will be to define the epistemic distinction between a priori and a posteriori, in an attempt to dismiss a priori as a method of knowledge acquisition. The subject of a priori and a posteriori knowledge has been one of the oldest problems in philosophy. The greatest dispute has been in identifying examples of each and trying to draw distinction between them. Albert Casullo in his article, “Revisability, Reliabilism, and A Priori Knowledge”, tries to address the topic of a priori knowledge in an attempt in, “(1) providing an illuminating characterization of the concept of a priori knowledge; and (2) providing cogent reasons for believing that some of our knowledge is indeed a priori.” (Casullo). My efforts in this first section will be to show why he has failed and why everyone before him and after, will continue to fail at capturing a characterization of a priori knowledge and in proving that any knowledge is a priori. In short, it is the simple definition of a priori knowledge that prevents any such knowledge from existing.
My method of attack will be to present examples of typically defined a priori knowledge, show how some of these examples are not knowledge, and how others are in fact not a priori, but instead a posteriori. A priori is typically defined as knowledge gained through reason, without the need for experience; while a posteriori is defined as knowledge gained through experience (A priori meaning, “prior to”, and a posteriori meaning, “subsequent to”, both in reference to our acquisition of knowledge). Bruce Russell in, “A Priori Justification and Knowledge”, says, “A priori knowledge is knowledge that rests on a priori justification. A priori justification is a type of epistemic justification that is, in some sense, independent of experience.” (Russell). Russell continues to say, “Standard examples of propositions known a priori include: a bachelor is an unmarried male; 2 + 3 = 5” (Russell).
Casullo in his attempt to explore and analyze the concept of a priori knowledge through the epistemological lenses of revisability and reliabilism, defines a priori knowledge as, knowledge acquired independent of time. He is forced to do this based on the general definition of a priori knowledge as, “that which is known without experience”. Since all experience happens through the passage of time, for something to be known without experience, it must be known independent of time. Hence, for a priori knowledge to exist, we would have to exist separate from time, or else all knowledge is based in experience, and a priori is a worthless synthetic nonexistent concept. The examples listed so far include: issues of mathematical knowledge, and that of interrelating definitions and concepts in language. In the case of mathematical knowledge, I will show this is truly a posteriori knowledge, and in the case of linguistic knowledge, I will show it is not in fact actually a means of knowledge acquisition, but simply a restatement of the already known.
The best argument I can use against a priori is what I call, “The Helen Keller Thesis.” The HKT in short is an argument for the validity of sensory experiential knowledge as the only basis we gain knowledge in our lives, and a direct condemnation of the skepticism originated by Rene Descartes. For those not familiar with the historical person of Helen Keller, she was a woman born in 1880 who became both blind and deaf at the early age of 19 months. Having lost the absolutely most crucial human senses for the acquisition of knowledge, she was forced to learn everything through her sense of touch. Her teacher would trace individual letters of words into her hand, along with the corresponding thing represented by the word; early examples include a toy doll and running water. The force of the HKT is that without the window of touch sensation, Helen Keller would not have gained much if any knowledge; proving the absolute monopoly of knowledge acquisition through sense experience or the a posteriori.
The HKT shows that knowledge is attained through sense experience alone. Since this is the only way knowledge can be attained, how could we know something without experience? Again, proponents of the a priori will bring up the examples of mathematical knowledge and linguistic knowledge as a priori, such as, “a bachelor is an unmarried male; 2 + 3 = 5” (Russell).
On the topic of mathematical knowledge, they will say that they can know 2 + 3 = 5 a priori, or that a triangle has no parallel lines and has a sum of 180* all a priori. But how can they know this without experience. They must have had an experience where someone showed them these concepts in concrete terms before they were able to internalize them and manipulate these calculations at will in their mind. Someone must have shown them a set of objects and demonstrated the concept of addition; two apples plus an additional three apples equals a new sum of five apples. They must have experienced this demonstration where they gained the knowledge of addition, numerical symbols, sums, etc as concepts. The same goes for the triangle. They must have had an experience where someone drew a triangle on a chalk board, dry erase board, or sheet of paper with ink or pencil. They were shown through experience what a parallel line was so they could identify the presence or the absence of it. They were also shown how to use a protractor to measure the angles of the triangle. All of this together has formed the definition and conception of a triangle in their mind so that no matter where they see it again they can recognize it. In both of these cases, what was claimed to be a priori is actually a posteriori.
Now on the remaining topic of linguistic knowledge such as, “a bachelor is an unmarried male” (Russell). This type of knowledge is simply a linguistic shuffle or rearrangement of already existing knowledge, which like all knowledge, was gained a posteriori. The full account of the bachelor example is such: If all bachelors are unmarried men, then any unmarried man is a bachelor, along with, if a man is married he is not a bachelor. Assuming we already knew the definition of a bachelor, have we learned anything new? In truth, no new knowledge has been gained. An existing piece of knowledge has simply been linguistically manipulated and restated in different ways. The same could be said of any other such examples of purported a priori knowledge. What we have here is not knowledge of bachelors or unmarried men, but of the logical or structural features of language. In this case we have shown that such supposed a priori examples do not defend the notion that a priori is a method of knowledge acquisition, leaving us inevitably with a posteriori as the only means of knowledge acquisition.
Section II
As stated in the introduction, this section will serve to examine the views of rationalists and empiricists in light of the argument presented in the first section. After a careful analysis of each of these, a new conception of knowledge will be offered in an attempt to end the constant battle between the two existing views.
Peter Markie in his article, “Rationalism vs. Empiricism”, offers a quick definition of each of these existing views, “Rationalists claim that there are significant ways in which our concepts and knowledge are gained independently of sense experience. Empiricists claim that sense experience is the ultimate source of all our concepts and knowledge.” (Markie). Focusing on rationalism we find that, “The Intuition/Deduction thesis, the Innate Knowledge thesis, and the Innate Concept thesis are essential to rationalism: to be a rationalist is to adopt at least one of them.” (Markie). It will be shown that accepting any of these theses is impracticable and therefore the acceptance of rationalism is not viable.
“The Intuition/Deduction Thesis: Some propositions in a particular subject area, S, are knowable by us by intuition alone; still others are knowable by being deduced from intuited propositions.” (Markie). Markie continues, “We intuit, for example, that the number three is prime and that it is greater than two.” (Markie). With this example we can easily draw upon the discussion of a priori knowledge in the first section. There is no such thing as intuiting such information. The concept of numbers, prime numbers, and sequence of numbers are all known a posteriori through experience. Such things are not intuited they are calculated. The number three is known to be a prime number, because the definition of a prime number is known, and therefore you can test three for primness. Also, the fact that three is greater than two is known from past experience of learning the sequence of numbers, to understand that two comes before three in magnitude, and by extension three comes after two in magnitude. It may seem as though such things are intuited, but they are simply calculated extremely quickly based on comparing an existing circumstance to past memories of such concepts and ideas in order to reach a conclusion.
The remaining two theses cannot be analyzed in the normal sense because their claims are extremely mystical in nature compared to accepted science and psychology. “The Innate Knowledge Thesis: We have knowledge of some truths in a particular subject area, S, as part of our rational nature.” (Markie). “The Innate Concept Thesis: We have some of the concepts we employ in a particular subject area, S, as part of our rational nature.” (Markie). The HKT can be invoked here to help us dismiss these remaining theses. All of our knowledge that we can claim to have has been stored in our mind in the format of language. Without language as a system of logical order our memories are without meaning. The HKT shows that without the accusation of language, which can only be attained a posteriori, there is no means for us to store our knowledge. Even if such innate knowledge or concepts existed before our acquisition of language, there is still the potential that such wouldn’t be comprehendible once a system of knowledge based on this acquired language took precedence over all cognitive thought. At best, we could say that there is no way to confirm or deny such innate knowledge or concepts, but such would only be a passing ghost in the machine of thought easily ignored by our conscious understanding of the world gained a posteriori.
According to Markie, “Empiricists endorse the following claim for some subject area. The Empiricism Thesis: We have no source of knowledge in S or for the concepts we use in S other than sense experience.” (Markie). This thesis is the only foundation for empiricists and is completely in line with the argument presented in section one. However, I do not feel that empiricism is the absolute best possible account of knowledge acquisition. Empiricism’s obsession with experience as the only source of knowledge misses some of the argument presented by the rationalists. While the rationalists are blatantly wrong in their claim of reason being the sole source of knowledge, they are correct regarding the value of reason. Here is where I shall now introduce a new conception of knowledge called Meditivism.
Meditivism is an expansion of empiricism that includes the limited truth contained in rationalism. A Meditivist subscribes to the theory that knowledge is acquired through a synthesis of data collection, stored as memory through experiential sensory perception, which is intuitively analyzed and reflected upon, through mentally focused meditative thought, which is then processed and synthesized as an array of data into specialty memories called knowledge. Put simply, a Meditivist believes knowledge is gained through meditative reflection upon experience gained through sensory perception. Everything we do and know is based on our experiences. The human brain and by extension human knowledge is a slave to our biochemistry and psychology. We gain knowledge through our experiences and our ability to compare those experiences through our capacity for memory. Any confused idea of the existence of a priori knowledge is ignoring the absolute blatant fact, that we would be empty of knowledge, if it wasn’t for the experiences we have or the experience we have through others, by reading their works, listening to them lecture or by any other means we have to communicate our knowledge to others. The very conception of a priori and a posteriori as opposites truly baffles me and should utterly frustrate any other reasonable person.
No man can reasonably call himself a rationalist, as a priori knowledge simply doesn’t exist, and is simply an artificially contrived concept. Man also does not acquire knowledge exclusively as an empiricist. What is missing from empiricism is reason. Without reason, there is no way to make any sense out of the extraordinary amount of sensory data that comes at us every day. The scientist can easily be understood to fit my conception of a meditivist. A scientist gathers experiential data through experiments, but until he meditatively reflects upon all of the data and then synthesizes this data into a unified conception or understanding, no true knowledge has been gained.
The best example I can give of this is that of Francis Crick. After studying x-ray diffraction in an attempt to find data representing the structure of DNA, he was able to envision and subsequently sketch out a drawing of it. The experimental results were not enough to form knowledge of the structure of DNA, thus showing the inadequacy of empiricism outright. The experimental results and data shown in the x-ray diffraction was the hard experiential data he had to work with. He was able to internalize this experiential data and manipulate it at will using his mind’s capacity for imagination and meditative contemplation. He was able to synthesis this data along with all other information he had gained up to this point, resulting in his vision of the double helix structure of DNA. After having this meditatively created concept of such a structure, he was then able to compare it back against his hard empirical experiential data and confirm his discovery as justified new scientific knowledge. This example truly exemplifies the superiority of Meditivism over rationalism and empiricism, and hopefully has illustrated the absolute necessity for its election as the only true method of knowledge acquisition.
Conclusion
Through these two sections we have seen the fulfillment of the stated thesis, arguing against the existence of a priori knowledge and rationalism as a theory of knowledge, while developing empiricism into a more complete and full account of knowledge acquisition, resulting in a new conception of knowledge called Meditivism. It is my hope that this paper serves to end the constant ongoing battles regarding the concepts of a priori, a posteriori, rationalism, and empiricism, freeing epistemologists to contemplate other areas. It is also my hope that Meditivism gains further support, defense, and respect as the only true means of knowledge acquisition serving as a unified foundation for epistemology.
Works Cited:
Casullo, Albert; “Revisability, Reliability, and the A Priori”.
Markie, Peter; “Rationalism vs. Empiricism”.
Russell, Bruce; “A Priori Justification and Knowledge”.
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