Responses 009 (2009-2010)

It was quite by random that my earlier post on examinations included "Discuss the claim that some areas of knowledge are discovered and others are invented," which was the 9th question in this set.

My gut instinct was to say immediately that there are NO areas of knowledge that are discovered. Period. The question, at first sight, stinks.

Why?

It's simple. Areas of knowledge can never define themselves. Any way we have of saying that something is an area of knowledge requires us to define it. And the act of defining an area of knowledge automatically means we have invented it.

We don't even have to walk anywhere near the murky area of whether knowledge itself is discovered or invented. There is a case to be made either way, for different kinds of knowledge. That's a traditional philosopher's problem. But when we come to areas of knowledge, haha.

Try this experiment. Think of an area of knowledge that defines itself, independent of humanity. I am certain that you will fail. At which point, you must confess that all areas of knowledge depend on human invention of definition.

However, there is one way out. If you can successfully assert that humans are machines that actually don't know anything (but are complex enough to have the sensation that they do), then there is no such thing as knowledge. This is actually a trivial case, since all this argument is moot if that is the case, and we can't live our lives as if it is true (even if we are living our lives that way but don't know it).