Just a few reminders when writing your essays!

AoK’s:

Mathematics
Ethics
Natural Sciences
Human Sciences
The Arts
History

WoK’s:

Sense Perception
Emotion
Reasoning
Language

Question Uno: “We see and understand things not as they are, but as we are”. Discuss this claim in relation to two ways of knowing.

Personally, I agree very much with this statement in its entirety. There are 4 ways of knowing that us humans use in our everyday lives, they are: (i) Sense Perception, (ii) Emotion, (iii) Language/Symbols and (iv) Reasoning. Let us take a simple example such as a friend lying to you about anything. Firstly, depending on how the nature of the person who is lied to is,(s)he may see the issue differently. If the person is always generally happy and has never lied to anyone about anything, they would find this instance very hurtful and may hold a grudge against that person. However on the other hand if that person often lies about things to other people, (s)he may not be as affected by that one lie as they may understand the motives behind the person. This is the effect of sense perception. Emotion, on the other hand is a totally different issue. If someone has a very emotional connection to the issue that was lied about, (s)he would most certainly be unhappy and would take the news in a very negative way, whereas, if the people involved do not have a rather big emotional relationship it may not have the same magnitude. A simple example of an emotional connection would be if a girlfriend and boyfriend were to lie to each other about something. If they are very close and one ‘partner’ lies to the other about anything, no matter how big or small that issue may actually be, the other person would be greatly affected.

Question Dos: How can the different ways of knowing help us to distinguish between something that is true and something that is believed to be true?

First we must define what we mean by truth, and what we mean by belief. The “truth” is something that can be explicitly explained by any of the ways of knowing, but is also usually connected to facts that have been proven. A “belief” is something is something that one wishes to be true, but that is not proven to be true or that cannot be supported concretely by any of the ways of knowing. The ways of knowing are four-fold, (i) Sense Perception, (ii) Emotion, (iii) Language/Symbols and (iv) Reasoning. A main issue that is brought up by this question is the way in which things that we know to be true, are proven as true. In real life there are absolute truths, which we know to be true universally independent of location and time. These facts are undisputable; however, there are also personal truths, which are only true until disproven by any of the ways of knowing. The question then arises that: how can we ever know anything to be true - unless it is an indisputable fact - if truths can be changed through new information? Furthermore, there are scientific truths, which are truths that come by proofs done by ‘the scientific method’. The ways of knowing help us to distinguish between truths and something that is believed to be true as they form a basic outline of how and why things should be true. For example, if we look at the mathematical ‘Area of Knowledge’ we know that truth is that 1+1 = 2. This statement of sorts can most certainly be proven true by the ways of knowing, especially language and reasoning.  

Question Tres: “People need to believe that order can be glimpsed in the chaos of events" (adapted from John Gray, Heresies, 2004). In what ways and to what extent would you say this claim is relevant in at least two areas of knowledge?

This statement above by John Gray clearly indicates that people need order...people need order so that they do not get lost in the chaos of events, or rather, the uncertainties of the world. People need to know that they are following a certain path, since everything is up to chance and probability, we may lose track of what we want and what were meant to be doing, and therefore that path is essential to help keep them on the right road, and out of harm’s way. One such path that people follow is religion; however, in many cases around the world, this ‘path to order’ has become a ‘path to chaos’ with people fighting over which religion is greater than the other. Another issue is that if this whole path business were that simple as to believing in a particular religion, then why do we face issues such as poverty, where people are destined to live in the streets, or how does one explain problems where people are born with deadly diseases, without having the chance to try and make life better for themselves.

On the other hand, there may be positives to some such events, where if a very close friend is depressed or they have gone ‘off the path’, then, as a friend, it becomes your ‘duty’ to help bring them back and make them realize that order can be found in the chaos of events.

These are my views on these topics only, please feel free to comment on them if you feel I have not tackled the issues in the right way.

I believe that mathematics is a language. If we look at a few definitions about language, such as grammar, syntax and axioms, some definitions from mathematics such as arithmetic and geometry and a general definition of symbols, one may find a deeper understanding as to how math is a language. In language, grammar is a system of rules by which words are put together to make sentences; however, mathematics also has a set of rules. For example, in language it would be grammatically wrong to say: “I is a Boy”. Likewise, in mathematics it would be wrong to say: 5 + 10 = 14.  Another example of this would be with syntax. Syntax is the ordering of words or relationships between words in sentences and phrases. For example, “She has done many bad things” can be written as “She is a bad person” but they still mean the same thing. Likewise, in mathematics, there is more than one way to find a solution: 5 +10 = 15, but 10 + 5 = 15 as well. Another valid comparison is between symbols. Language and Mathematics both have their own definition for a symbol, but in the end a symbol is something that represents something else. In language and literature, a symbol could be something as simple as a house, whereas in mathematics a symbol could be something like a triangle.

Therefore, Mathematics is a language.

Language as defined by Encarta dictionary is the communication of human beings through words. Over the past few generations, people have started to understand that humans think in terms of language. Being an Indian, I have been brought up with two languages, Hindi and English, and also having lived outside of India my whole life and studying in an international school, I never lost touch of English, but also having kept in touch with Hindi at home.

In one of my earlier posts I had discussed the issue of “What I Know”, and had addressed the issue that I know that I am living in the universe. In the English language we can easily say this as “I know that I am living in the universe”, whereas in other languages the same thing can be said in that respective language. An example of this would be in Hindi, the same thing can be said as “Mujhe maalum hai ke mein iis Bhraman mein rehta hoon”, which literally translated means that I know that I am living in the universe. As can be seen from before, this is something that we know, and if it can be stated in the same way in more than one language, then the answer to our question is no, if people speak more than one language, what they know is not different in the different language.

I believe in Hinduism, my religion. I believe in this particular religion because I have grown up with this religion all my life, and I believe in the certain practices that we have. For example, every year we have many festivals to celebrate important events, maybe historical events such as Diwali (the return of Lord Ram from his 14 year exile in the jungle) or for simple mythological beliefs such as the festival of Holi (celebration of the washing away of evil spirits). But when we come to think of these beliefs as knowledge, we don’t really know if all of it is true. Taking into consideration the historical event of the Ramayan (the story of Lord Ram), seeing as to I was never there, and nor were my parents, grandparents or even great grandparents, we simply do not know for sure if these stories are true, yet I believe in them.

I know that I am living in the universe. I know this because the universe is everything that we know about; the universe contains every little thing, or in most cases every BIG thing that we are accustomed to in our everyday lives. I know that I am living in the universe, because the universe contains many galaxies, which contain planets, and specifically speaking, we are all living on the planet Earth. To be able to know that I am living in the universe is the fact that I am alive, and I know this because I am here writing this post right now.