Chapter 5 :Epistemology TYPES OF KNOWLEDGE

Although philosophers may differ on how many different types there are they agree that we claim to have knowledge of different things. What they may have in common that make them knowledge then becomes the issue. Here is one schema for different types of knowledge. LOGICAL SEMANTIC SYSTEMIC EMPIRICAL

What are these about ? Why make these distinctions? Consider that you probably would claim to know the following things. Examples: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. There are three sides to a triangle. The sum of their angles is 180 degrees. There is a computer in front of you right now. 23 + 11= 34 A bachelor is an unmarried male. If a is more than b, and b is more than c, then a is more than c.

These sentences all make claims that can be determined to be either true or false. They are sentences that express propositions. They are claims about which you can come to a judgment as to whether or not they are true. You probably know that they are true. Now how is it that you come to know these things? Obviously you come by this knowledge in different ways. This relates to the idea of the different types of knowledge. LOGICAL example 5

There is a knowledge that is the result of the understanding of the relationship of ideas to one another. There are the rules or laws of logic that permit claims to knowledge that are further statements of ideas consistent with the rules and the ideas already accepted. Here is another example where you do not need to know what I am talking about because you know the relationships involved. A. All gazintz are gazatz

B. C.

All gazatz are garingers Therfore, all gazintz are garingers.

You can claim to know that : If A and B are true, then C is true as well. This you know by LOGIC. SEMANTIC example 4

There is knowledge that is the result of learning the meaning of words. Knowledge of words is knowledge of definitions. Such definitions are set in dictionaries. So bachelors are unmarried males. You know this. People acknowledge this. You can look it up. (Are newborn baby boys Bachelors???????? Do people say to the new mother in the hospital nursery: "Oh what a beautiful bachelor you have there Ms Jones!" ?) SYSTEMIC examples 1 and 3

There is knowledge of Mathematics and Geometry, which is the result of learning a system of words, or symbols and how they relate to one another and the rules of operating in that system and then any claims made that are consistent with those definitions and rules is called knowledge. EMPIRICAL example 2 There is a knowledge that comes through our senses. This knowledge is empirical knowledge. Science is the best example of a method for ascertaining the accuracy of such knowledge. Scientific knowledge is a result of the practice of the method : Observation, abduction of a hypothesis, careful observation, refinement of hypothesis, deduction of test for hypothesis, testing and experimentation, confirmation or falsification of the hypothesis. What do these four types of knowledge have in common? One of the most popular theories of knowledge of the twentieth century holds that KNOWLEDGE does imply a Belief. Belief does not Imply Knowledge. Wherever people claim to know that something is true they believe that it is so. When people claim to believe that something is so they dont always claim to know that it is so. What kind of a belief is KNOWLEDGE.? To begin with it must be true. You can not know something that is false, that is not so. It must be true and you must claim to know it and it be true not by accident or coincidence but because there is evidence to support and enough to warrant or justify the claim to know. So, KNOWLEDGE = JUSTIFIED TRUE BELIEF WARRANTED TRUE BELIEF EVIDENCE is NEEDED for JUSTIFICATION CAUTION!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

WARRANTED TRUE BELIEF may not be knowledge if true by ACCIDENT. January 1, 2001 the claim is made: I know that the GIANTS are going to win the SUPERBOWL in 2001! It turns out that several weeks later they did win. Can I claim that I knew it on January 1st or was it just a lucky guess or a well informed guess? How does a person gain the warrant or the justification for the belief? Well, depending on the type of belief that it is there are different kinds of warrants. MODES of WARRANTY LOGICAL Warrants found in the rules of Logic. Follow them and the claim is warranted. SEMANTIC Warrants are found in the dictionaries. Use them, be consistent with them and the claim is warranted. SYSTEMIC Warrants are found within the system (Math or Geometry) follow the rules be consistent with the definitions and rules and the claim is warranted. EMPIRICAL Warrants are found with evidence. How is the evidence to be gathered, examined and evaluated? Ther will be more on this under the topic of TRUTH There are four types of beliefs when considering truth and warrants: 1. warranted true beliefs : This type is called KNOWLEDGE 2. warranted false beliefs: This type cannot exist at all. 3. unwarranted true beliefs These are lucky guesses or coincidences and not knowledge. 4.unwarranted false beliefs These are just wild unsupported claims or wishes that are not true . What is Knowledge: A Debate - Paul Rezendes and Mitch Hodge, Why Knowledge is Justified True Belief; JTB. Justification , Warranty comes in degrees! How much evidence is needed in order to determine whether or not someone knows something or not?

How much evidence is needed in order to determine whether or not someone has sufficient warrant to make a claim to know something or not? How much is needed depends on what is riding on the outcome of the claim. For simple matters of little consequence humans appear to accept fairly small amounts of evidence. For important matters much more evidence is needed. EXAMPLE: How old is someone? If someone claims to know how old John Smith or Mary Doe is we probably accept the claim on their word if it is just gossip. However, if there were a $10 bet on it we would ask for evidence. We might go to the person and ask them to confirm the claim. If it were $100 we might want a drivers license. If it were $1000 we might want a birth certificate. For $10, 000 we might want to go to the official registry and check the official documents ourselves. The highest consequences on claims to know: Human Life. At a criminal trial, a capital homicide case, what is the standard of proof? It is evidence that is convincing beyond a reasonable doubt. NOT beyond all doubts. But beyond reasonable doubts, meaning beyond all doubting or questioning of the evidence that we have reason to doubt or question. Scientists have their reputation riding on their claims to know things. The standard for the warrant in Science sis that heir claims be supported by evidence that other scientists can examine, experiments that others can repeat and get the same result and equations that others can examine to check against errors. So, claims to know may be accepted depending on amounts of support that may vary in the type and amount depending on the type of claim that it is. However, to know something that which you claim to know must be TRUE and truth does not have degrees: because a statement p is either true or it isn't TRUTH will be examined in the next section. Proceed to the next section by clicking here> next

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Copyright Philip A. Pecorino 2000. All Rights reserved. Web Surfer's Caveat: These are class notes, intended to comment on readings and amplify class discussion. They should be read as such. They are not intended for publication or general distribution.

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Table of Contents for the Online Textbook

Types of Knowledge
Philosophers typically divide knowledge into three categories: personal, procedural, and propositional. It is the last of these, propositional knowledge, that primarily concerns philosophers. However, understanding the connections between the three types of knowledge can be helpful in clearly understanding what is and what is not being analysed by the various theories of knowledge.

Personal Knowledge
The first kind of knowledge is personal knowledge, or knowledge by acquaintance. This is the kind of knowledge that we are claiming to have when we say things like I know Mozarts music.

Prodecural Knowledge
The second kind of knowledge is procedural knowledge, or knowledge how to do something. People who claim to know how to juggle, or how to drive, are not simply claiming that they understand the theory involved in those activities. Rather, they are claiming that actually possess the skills involved, that they are able to do these things.

Propositional Knowledge
The third kind of knowledge, the kind that philosophers care about most, ispropositional knowledge, or knowledge of facts. When we say things like I know that the internal angles of a triangle add up to 180 degress or I know that it was you that ate my sandwich, we are claiming to have propositional knowledge.
[Note: this paper is more than usually half-baked. Epistemology is not my field (although it increasingly interests me), and so it is rather simplistic. I beg forgiveness from people who know more about it than I do: it is written from a pragmatic professional position, rather than a properly rigorous academic one.] "OKso you've got a Ph.D. Now, don't touch anything!" (Source unknown) "It's all these NVQs (National Vocational Qualifications) nowadays20 years' experience doesn't count for anything!" (One of our campus gardeners, about to be made "redundant" and required to re-apply for his present job. August 2004; he was re-appointed.)

There are many ways of slicing the idea of knowledge: Technical Knowledge Knowing that Propositional knowledge (Conscious knowledge) Comprehension (knowledge about) vs. vs. vs. vs. vs. Practical Knowledge (Aristotle, Oakeshott ) Knowing how (Ryle) Procedural knowledge Tacit knowledge (Polanyi) Apprehension (knowledge by direct acquaintance) (Kolb)

There are problems with all these constructs, and most knowledge in the real world is a combination of many forms, but the distinctions are far from sterile. For present purposes the major problem is that our educational system values the left-hand column much more than the right, for many reasons, including: Such valuation being implicit in the establishment of dedicated educational institutions, and the transformation or reduction of knowledge into "that which can be taught". (Becker, 1963; Lave and Wenger, 1991) The technology of assessment, in the face of constraints such as validity, reliability and fairness, not coping well with the right-hand column. (Which is strange, given that practical etc. knowledge is more clearly demonstrable through a "product" or a

"performance" than is propositional knowledge where the assessment can never be more than a proxy. Pace the gardener above, the NVQ system in the UK does emphasise assessment by direct observation of performance.) Hence, in a world obsessed with accountability and qualifications, the left-hand column rules. (No, I am not going to make any dubious connections with the left and right hemispheres of the brain.) The real separation based on this opposition can be seen, for example, in the provisions of the 1944 Education Act (UK), under which those who succeeded in the 11+ examination went to the grammar schools, whilst the rest went to the secondary technical and modern schools for a more practical or vocational training. Hirst (1974) however, argued that all knowledge is of the knowing that variety, and that the distinction is therefore spurious. Knowing how knowledge consists of knowing that, together with a direct experience. Is that the case? If so: is direct experience is best thought of as knowledge or not?
When discussing the knowledge about versus knowledge by acquaintance distinction with a group of doctors, in the context of Kolbs learning cycle, they related readily to it in terms of their patients knowledge of the illness (by acquaintance) as opposed to their own (about).

Direct experience is cognition, but may not be knowledge, in the sense that one cannot do anything with it, until it is integrated into some kind of mental model. Tulving (1985) makes a useful distinction between episodic memory (the remembered narrative of our lives) and semantic memory (our acquired conceptual understanding) : direct experience may be known in the sense of having been laid down as part of episodic memory, but it cannot be said to have been learned from, until it has been integrated into semantic memory. One could argue that the process of learning is this very transformation and integration. Others have suggested the category of "procedural memory" for "knowhow" to bridge the two. But don't let's get carried away! It is all too easy to mistake command of theoretical knowledge for the whole thing. Lave and Wenger, and Becker, cited above, argue that is because this theoretical (left-hand side of the table) knowledge is what schools are good at teaching : Let me take a couple of examples from my own reflective journal:
Today I stood in for S. to do a teaching observation of M., since she had to get it in before the end of term. ... She works part-time at a College of Further Education, and she was teaching a group of nursery nurses ... Their syllabus required them to have studied team-working, particularly in multi-disciplinary teams. ... At a technical level, M. is a good teacher: she tried to draw information and ideas out of the students (all but about two of them about eighteen), but, since they had little experience to draw on, she could not get the right answers from them. Some of them were making potentially insightful anecdotal

points based on their work placements, but they were slightly off-track. At last, M. put up on the whiteboard the three essential components of good team-working ... I thought at first, that was interesting. Then I put myself in the position of the students, who were dutifully making notes, and thought, they have to remember these points for their exam: there is a lot more to studying in this area than I thought. Perhaps I ought to make a note of these points for my own future reference? Then I woke up. I started my working life in management and organisational development: I have been involved in team-working for the past twenty years, working in teams myself, and conducting training and consultancy on it. There was nothing wrong with the three points on the board, but I had never conceptualised the issue to myself in that way, and I saw no particular advantage in doing so. They did not even represent a particular school of theory, which could be contrasted with other perspectives. They seemed to represent the outcome of the text-book authors search for three simple headings under which to organise his required thousand words on team-working. But for these students, this was now the definitive knowledge on the subject, to which their experience had to be subordinated ... As M. said afterwards, it was what they were expected to know ...

And five years later, with a similar group of students...

I have just been to observe H. She was teaching a class on key skills on communication. The requirement to be addressed was conducting a discussion. After some discussion in the class [note that], and a word-shower exercise (apparently brainstorm is no longer PC) she embarked on a show and tell exercise. This was interesting in its own right, but it was meant (and, I suppose, did) to provide evidence that they could discuss. They then had to write this up in as part of a portfolio for assessment. There was no problem with H's competence at all, but she was lumbered with a stupid syllabus, and I asked myselfand herwhere the learning was in all this. The students had amply demonstrated their ability to discuss in the first part of the session, whether or not they had come up with the approved answers, but that somehow did not count. We have reached the situation where selfevident skills have been devalued to the point that they do not count until someone has assessed them.

In both casesand it is easy to multiply examplesthe left-hand column has been elevated to the only kind of knowledge which matters. No wonder the students play "surface learning" games. But this is not merely a tirade against conventional educational wisdom (see the "heterodoxy" section for that kind of thing). It is a real problem. Go back to Riesman for a moment. He predicted the growth of the service economy. The "products" of the service economy are not physical objects (such as cars or wheat)

but evanescent processes, such as "education", "health care", "financial services" and even "entertainment". How might the apprentice in such an economy produce a "master-piece" which would be available for the scrutiny of all to judge his or her achievement?
See "Heterodoxy: against formal education"

So:
If you are in a formal educational setting, and if you are subject to a rigorous and sceptical regime of inspection and quality assurance and hence "objectivity" Then how do you assess performance with no permanent product? Answer: you fall back on the readily-assessable. Knowledge (left-hand column knowledge).
One of the courses I teach on is at Master's level. All the modules within the course are assessed at that levelexcept one. A couple of years ago, a professional body conducted an evaluation of the course for its formal endorsement. Keen to raise the status of the profession, they wanted everything at "M" (Master's) level. They wanted to know why this module was at "Level 3" (the final undergraduate level, below Master's). My answer was that I did not know how to assess "Teaching in Practice" at that level. Master's level implies a degree of expertise, rather than mere competence or proficiency. But this was a course of teacher training: most of the participants were just starting out on teaching. Assessing them on the so-called "scholarship of teaching" was no problem. It was about what they knew about teaching. But if we were to assess them at the same level on their practice, there would be no chance until they had practised for at least five years (and exhibited a "flair"whatever that is for it). We could assess them unproblematically on writing about it, but actually doing it? The argument was grudgingly accepted. But a few years on, the university has surreptitiously sneaked a "practical", allegedly Master's level module into a new degree. Those responsible claim that nowadays all credit on Master's degree has to be at a postgraduate level. Credit, perhaps, but not the skill which is is supposed to evidence. Presumably one is being awarded credit for being able write very well and eruditely about why one's actual practice is rubbish.

(I am wilfully ignoring the "competence-based training" issue here, which maintains that it is possible to specify and list these "higher-level" competences at a purely practical level. My argument with that is that its reductionism has no way of allowing for context, and higher-level performance always has to take context into account. The use of terms such as "appropriate" does not get round the problem.)
See the paper on "expertise"

Where is this taking us?

It is going in the direction of making a practical distinction between academic (left side) and professional (right side) knowledge for educational purposes. I am forced to accept the discourse of "discourse" to carry the argument further. Sorry.

In short, there is a fit between the social technology of education and assessment and the discourse of "knowledge about". That discourse is, in the jargon, "privileged". There is no such fit with "know-how". "Competence" just about works, in a strangulated fashion, at the "lower" levels, but we have great difficulty beyond the craft skills. In some areas of education, such as art and design or performing arts, or even management, great convoluted and fudged effort is put into seeking general criteria even for assessment. We may recognise exceptional excellence (with a tolerable degree of consensus) when it confronts us, but we have little idea of how to operationalise that state-of-the-art good practice which is not mould-breaking. The classic cop-out, not invented but legitimised by Donald Schn, is "reflection". That is the cross-over category which is claimed to translate practice into assessable theory. It has been latched on for its utility, but it does not really work. It presupposes articulacy, or a dual competence in doing something and talking or writing about it: and the evidence of "expert systems" is that it does not work. However, it meets the needs of academe, so we insist on "reflective journals" which we (think we) can assess. It used to be thought that Howard Gardner's "multiple intelligences" might potentially break the mould of conventional assessment, but the notion has proved to be less useful or even accurate than previously thought. More immediately important than the intractable assessment question. however, is that of how we teach on the right-hand side of the table. Learners learn, clearly, but probably in spite of rather than because of their teaching. Craft teachers who respect their own skills and have peer recognition, if not that of the establishment, can help; but they are not equipped to act as advocates within the discourses of academe.
As far as teaching is concerned, read this piece from the New York Times (31 August 09) on experienced teachers' judgements on their training.And then this follow-up on a blog. But what strikes me about both pieces is the lack of actual content in practically all the courses referred to.

The solution? I haven't got one.

It gets worse!
Sorry! The distinction at the top of this page is over-simplified. Different disciplines have different criteria for what constitutes knowledge. The "left-hand""right-hand" distinction is far from pure. In pure and applied sciences (what are sciences? We'll leave that on one side for the moment) advanced knowledge presupposes a considerable underpinning of accepted and "given" knowledge. Notionally, "normal" science (Kuhn, 1970) builds on what has gone before, but while it might question its findings on occasion, it does not question its questions. I therefore expect a Master's or research student to exhibit a comprehensive command of previous work in her field, accompanied by a necessary skill in constructing and conducting experimental methods. I do not necessarily expect her to analyse the presuppositions of previous work.

The same goes for sophisticated disciplines investigating human artefacts, whether physical (archaeology) or social (law, politics). In these areas, on the whole, knowledge accumulates. History? Knowledge certainly accumulates. Some historical scholarship and research is about unearthing previously unknown or neglected sources, and assimilating them into our picture of the past. But some is about accommodating that picture to the evidence: Collingwood pointed out years ago (I'm sorry, it is so far in my past that I haven't got the reference) that historyor more accurately, historiographysays as much about the preoccupations and values of the present as about the past. How much critical analysis do we look for at a given academic level? Social "sciences"? Sociology and anthropology are so wracked by problems of the interactions between current and previous thought that they are almost paralysed in some sectors. It's not surprisingsociety is changing fast. Any empirical work over ten years old is suspect, but it is not just that. The assumptions and hence the questions underpinning that empirical work have become questionable in a "post-modern" age: uncritical citation is a sin beyond "A" level. Literature? Cultural studies? Substance seems to matter less than the critical stance (or "gaze" to follow Foucault: why did I put that bit in? Discuss.) And so to professional studies. It obviously depends on the discipline and its evidence base. However, the prescriptive element of professional studies (and it is the presence of the prescriptive element which makes them "professional") exists in an uneasy relationship with its descriptive (or "evidence") base. Even medicine has a problem with this, and those professional areas which have a less established base are in even more trouble. Social work (about which I know a little more than the others) is in thrall to political correctness. Management is pragmatic but prone to the vagaries of fashion, often preaching doctrines which have little (respectable) research base, but which "seem to work"; or did a couple of decades ago in a different economic climate... What counts as "advanced knowledge" in such a shifting "Red Queen" environment? I am not a polymath: I cannot pronounce with authority on most of the disciplines above. But I can testify to the problems of comparing the levels of study/ achievement/ scholarship. The Quality Assurance Agency has a well-meaning (the QAAwell-meaning?) project of "subject benchmarking" to establish what constitute expected levels of knowledge and competence at undergraduate level, but this is written from within the subject disciplines. Perhaps it is futile to attempt comparisons, but it is a real problem. I expect critical evaluation, and questioning of assumptions from my Master's students: I get dissertations from science-based candidates, who already hold a doctorate, which are scrupulous but positivistic in their approach, and I feel obliged to say that they are not good enough. By what right do I say that? Simply on the grounds that "education" is a shaky discipline blown hither and thither by the winds of fashion?

The new interest in skill acquisition

However, recently there has been more interest in the kinds of knowledge and skill identified on the right-hand side of the table, particularly in the form of craft and performance skills

Ericsson and others (2006) have emphasised the role of deliberate practice in skill acquisition, and were the first to come up with the now well-known figure of 10,000 hours of practice. (See here for a comment and the main reference). Richard Sennett has discussed the attributes and the acquisition of craft skillalbeit in rather rarefied contexts and a rambling manner. My take here. And Matthew Crawford (2010) The Case for Working with Your Hands; or why office work is bad for us and fixing things feels good London; Penguin/Viking, published in the USA last year as Shop Class as Soulcraft; an inquiry into the value of work does what it says on the tin. Everyone involved in vocational and professional education should read it. Read more on that here.

And go here for a more practical discussion on what is actually involved in writing at Master's level.

Read more: Forms of Knowledge http://www.doceo.co.uk/tools/forms.htm#ixzz2O7tN3RJF Under Creative Commons License: Attribution Non-Commercial No Derivatives