SCIENTIFIC AND EVERYDAY KNOWLEDGE∗

I. Introduction
According to the current opinion, the difference between scientific
knowledge and common knowledge consists in the fact that the former is
true and certain while the latter (also called general, practical, common-
sense knowledge) is either completely devoid of these values or possesses
them to a very low degree.
This view does not adequately reflect either what links these two kinds
of knowledge, nor what actually separates them. The task of this paper is
to outline a more adequate view on the similarities and differences
occurring between common knowledge and the scientific knowledge.

II. Truth and Certainty

Since the time of Plato and Aristotle, certainty and truthfulness have been
considered by philosophers to be two fundamental values of human
knowledge. For the philosophers mentioned above, they were the
fundamental characteristics of episteme, which differentiated it from the
common opinions (doxa).
However, we now know that in spite of persistent efforts of both
philosophers and scientists to make the kinds of knowledge – the
philosophical and the scientific knowledge – true and certain, the above
values do not constitute their adequate distinguishing factors, especially if
they are compared with common knowledge. This is obvious for
philosophical knowledge. As far as scientific knowledge is concerned, it is
enough to take any example. Such an example may be a comparison of any
law of science with its common-knowledge equivalent. Let us take, for
instance, Newton’s law of gravitation (a quantitative law) and its common
equivalent which had been known long before Newton and is now called
the “qualitative law of gravitation” according to which: “All the bodies
attract (each other).”

∗
Translation of “Wiedza naukowa a wiedza potoczna,” published in B. Kotowa, J.
Such (eds.) (1995), Kulturowe konteksty poznania [Cultural Contexts of Knowledge].
Poznań: Wydawnictwo Naukowe IF UAM, pp. 23-31.
74 Part Two: The Nature of Scientific Cognition

It is obvious that, in spite of the same level of generality, Newton’s

law, because of its greater exactness and, consequently, greater (both
logical and empirical) informational content, precludes more possible
states of things, and is more easily falsifiable than the qualitative law of
gravitation. No wonder then that it has been falsified (by counterexamples
showing that gravitational attraction of fast moving bodies with respect to
each other or having an enormous mass does not come under Newton’s
formula: Fgr = Gm 1m 2/r2, although it is compatible with the equations of
the general relativity theory) while the latter is still considered to be true
and given its long persistence will probably also defeat other quantitative
laws of gravitation, subsequently formulated in physics (e.g. by Einstein in
the general relativity theory).
Hence Ajdukiewicz’s conviction that scientific knowledge as a whole
is not distinguished by any high degree of truthfulness or certainty. If it
did, scientists would not have any right to find out new things and
formulate new hypotheses, since the latter ones are prevalently true to an
insignificant degree and initially are also of little reliability. According to
Ajdukiewicz, a principle of rational recognition of convictions holds in
science. The principle states that “the degree of conviction with which we
claim a given view should correspond to the degree of its justification.”
According to this principle, a scientist has the right to formulate and
proclaim views of any degree of certainty, provided only that s/he does not
present his/her new ideas and loose scientific hypotheses as mature and
well-confirmed theories (and vice versa). It can be seen that the principle
of rational recognition of convictions has two “edges”: one directed
against dogmatism, the other against undue scepticism.
It can be considered that from the point of view of the certainty of
knowledge both kinds of knowledge considered here are comparable with
each other. There are some fragments of scientific knowledge which are
more certain than various fragments of common knowledge but there are
some which are less certain. This shatters the myth of scientific knowledge
as that kind of knowledge which is completely true and completely certain.
From the point of view of certainty, scientific knowledge appears to be
totally inhomogeneous: both well-grounded facts and theories as well as
daring concepts that have only recently been proposed enter the treasury of
scientific knowledge. If it were otherwise, a scientist as a scientist would
not have any possibility at all of proposing new hypotheses, which initially
are not very reliable, and sometimes outright false in the light of previous
knowledge, as they are simply discordant with it.
Thus, if not truth and not certainty, what constitutes a real
discriminant of scientific knowledge, causing its cognitive status to be
considerably higher than the status of common knowledge?