“The knowledge that we value the most is the knowledge for which we can provide the strongest justification. ” To what extent would you agree with this claim? When asked what the knowledge you value the most is, some might say the knowledge learned has a strong justification, and/or proof. While others may state that, their own inner knowledge and personal beliefs, and what you believe to be ‘right’, is the knowledge that they find the most valuable. This might mean that people will not solely rely on knowledge provided in something like a textbook or by a person regarded an ‘intellectual’.
In most cases, people will probably use whatever knowledge that they have previously learned and use it as a base or support of a new way or theory that they may come up with. This essay will focus on two ways of knowing in particular that can influence the knowledge we have and believe to be most valuable; reason, thinking about things that make sense and are proven, and emotion, acting on things or believing in things that are mostly spur of the moment and based mostly on how you are feeling at the time.
In areas of knowing there is evidence of both of these ways influencing value, though this differs from subject to subject. The most valuable knowledge in Science, some might say is when we look for something more than what has already been found. Others may believe that the knowledge that has been taught to us via textbooks and teachers, and so is thought to be proven is the most valuable. When in science, experiments are conducted to either prove that someone else’s theory is correct, or to see whether or not your own theory, which fundamentally has been based on another person’s theory, is correct or makes sense.
Many of the great scientists, for example Einstein came up with the theory of relativity, the theory finally emerged by him coming up with a new way of thinking, while still having some previous knowledge of the subject. Einstein, like many scientists, looked at the world in a different way, and tried to find solutions to how things work in our world. And like many scientists, he too had a ‘eureka’ moment when he was thinking about a way to disprove Newtonian and Maxwellian theories as they contradict each other.
He had given up, when he suddenly realised that “time can beat at different rates throughout the universe, depending on how fast you moved. ” Although his theory was originally thought of due to Newton and Maxwell’s theories, his own theory came from his perception and reasoning. On the other hand, not everyone can come up with their own way on knowing, the majority of people decide to believe in what is shown in textbooks and what has been proven correct.
Unlike Einstein’s way of discovering solutions, by taking other peoples theories and building on them to develop his own idea, and so making that the most valuable knowledge. A way to show how knowledge that we find most valuable is that of knowledge that can be proven and that has been proven. In Environmental Systems we looked at population, for this subject we looked at the Lincoln index, a method for looking at the population of a single type of species, when doing this you’re looking at a small section of a bigger range.
This is done so that we can compare the result to information already available to us, proven by other people. In my case, I looked at the population of snails, by first looking at others results and then doing the experiment ourselves; we were able to see the population in a certain type of environment and so could see if the conditions stated in others information affected or not the population of the snails. In my case, when I approach a subject like science, I believe that the knowledge which I value the most is the knowledge given to me by either the textbook or the teacher, and things that I know work.
And if that is so and I understand how it works, then I don’t think it necessary to try and find your own way of knowing. However, this only relates to me, for instance if some of the great scientists of history did not come up with their own knowledge, the knowledge which they most value, then I doubt that I would have the knowledge which I value now. Value, therefore, comes when a scientific idea is meaningful to us, and that meaning comes from experiments. In Maths, like other subjects that are considered reason based areas of knowing, the knowledge which is most valued, for some is the knowledge that can be proven.
