Reason as a Way of Knowing

that we could use reason to find certain truth if we used it correctly, while

Cahn, Steven M., Patricia Kutcher, George Sher, and Peter J. Markie, eds. Reason at Work: Introductory Readings in Philosophy. 3rd Ed. Florence, KY: Thomson Learning, Inc., 1996.

What reason engages in is always its own manifestation, be that language with its power of signification or be that harmonious numbers. In and through the sciences, reason searches for itself. Reason's true object is reason itself. Reason never simply deals with physical or historical objects as such.it manifests itself in culture and nature.

In the Theory of Knowledge (ToK) class of the International Baccalaureate Year One Class, we viewed a TEDtalk video called The Long Reach of Reason by psychologist Steven Pinker and philosopher Rebecca Newberger Goldstein, having a Socratic dialogue. During this video, the talk explored if reason or emotions like empathy and kindness are mainly responsible for pushing our society forward: past, present and future. Additionally, the video mentioned whether if good character or reason should be placed in more emphasis. The psychologist, Steven Pinker and philosopher, Rebecca Newberger Goldstein debated human progress and the concepts, with empathy being used as driving force of human progress while reason is argued to support that empathy, both

Thirteen colonies, united strong and firm to bring down the King of Great Britain, who had been controlling them for a period of time. In these colonies, various people gathered together and formed a document known as The Declaration of Independence, that broke them free from the king and made them a nation, America. But before becoming America, they were held captive by the King of Great Britain, who did no good for the people and brought them nothing but misery. America slowly, but eventually evolved itself since the mid 1700’s and has become one of the strongest nations even till this day. With all these changes and history this nation has become of, so has it’s actions changed and outgrown throughout these years. The nation created in 1776 can be represented in various characteristics, as when the Age of Reason occurred. The Age of Reason focused on reason, individualism, and skepticism, impacting the society in a variety of ways, creating the colonies to react and show several emotions. During this period of time, people were convinced the reason held by humans could make the discovery of natural laws of the universe and natural rights of mankind. And this conflicted with the religious beliefs because people based on their life from the word of God and didn’t believe a discovery like this would prove God wrong. Above all, the two most important characteristics that best represent America during the Age of Reason are inquisitive

that we could use reason to find certain truth if we used it correctly, while

The core idea of Albert Camus’ philosophy of absurdity centralizes upon the idea that humans exist in a meaningless universe, and follows that humans must simply accept this fact to live life to the fullest. In addition to this absurdist notion, Albert Camus also uses The Stranger to show how humans still strive to create superficial meaning to fulfill their own personal needs. Through the experiences and interactions in Meursault’s life, Camus illustrates that in spite of how events in life follow no rational order, society attempts to futilely create meaning to explain human existence.

In accordance with natural human behavior, we feel as though for every action there is a reaction, as well as a reason. We vie to inject logic inside our world because to accept the idea that there is not rationale for anything, including our own existence, is unthinkable. This idea that we unawarely manufacture reason to the world because in actuality, there is none, jeopardizes the very balance in our society. Our quest is not noble, rather fueled by our fear of uncertainty. Since the logic of our world is derived solely from the knowledge of

In the Bacchae, Euripides questions the authority of god versus man and man's allegiance to the gods. Pentheus is caught in a unique struggle of maintaining authority in his own kingdom and keeping allegiance to his favored god Apollo. The appearance of Dionysus in Thebes raises a conflict for Pentheus in that he can not accept the authority of a god other than the one he has chosen to revere within his kingdom. Pentheus resists Dionysus supreme authority as a show of solidarity with Apollo and the laws of reason versus Dionysus and the disruption of civil order.

He explains that both have different roles in human life as, “Science tells us what is. Religion tells us what ought to be.” Reason gives humans an understanding of how the world works currently, but it does not evaluate morality and encourage improvement. Reason focuses on the literal instead of the metaphysical. Since they have different roles, science and religion do not need to

Logic is a thought process formed by systems of reasoning and deductions, explained in the film The Joy of Logic with Professor Dave Cliff. The film discusses the complex definition of logic which includes formal reasons, “clear thought, good reasoning, reliable argument”, which originated in the times of Socrates and Aristotle. Furthermore, logic drives the fundamental process of reason through a set of various rules. This mathematical and social revolution impacts the way people live by affecting the way we speak to one another. Though often people do not consciously pay close attention to how logic affects our speaking patterns, they do indefinitely.

Faith and reason were two modes of belief that dominated the history of Western Civilization. Both faith and reason were popularized as tools to understand the universe in Greco-Roman and Judeo-Christian eras. By conflicting with each other, these two modes of belief sparked a lot of controversy. Reason or rationality is belief based on concrete evidence and logic. The development of one’s reason relies heavily on observation and questioning. Greco-Roman philosophers believed in the power of the human mind to understand the world. So in order to find ultimate truth, Greco-Roman philosophers dedicated their lives to perfecting their reasoning skills and encouraged those around them to do the same. Contradictory to reason, faith is the

The production of knowledge is a process that occurs through a sequence of related actions, these series of actions allows for the Ways of Knowing to interact in a way that works to develop the knowledge that is being produced. From the prescribed title we can claim that while the Ways of Knowing may appear to be acting in isolation when forming knowledge, they are actually working in a variety of different ways in the construction and formation. In some cases, the Ways of Knowing are interacting so closely together that it is often hard to differentiate between them, for example emotion and reason, or imagination and memory. Given the right circumstances faith can be isolated to a point where it can be acting by itself to produce knowledge. However, this knowledge is often deemed as unreliable, due to faith being seen as one of the more “subjective” ways of knowing. This inability to differentiate the ways of knowing from each other during the production of knowledge, raises the questions “Can any knowledge in any Area of Knowledge be produced by a single Way of Knowing?” and “Is it possible to distinguish between Ways of Knowing if they are working together?”. While reason is used in almost all production of knowledge, it is the other Ways of Knowing used that can determine whether the knowledge is reliable or not, as some Ways of Knowing are more subjective than others. This essay will attempt to

Knowledge can be defined as information gained through sense perception, emotion, language and reason, while it is defined by Plato as “justified true belief.” The claim that knowledge takes the form of a combination of stories and facts is however not accurate in history and biology. First, it brings up the questions of what are stories and what are facts. Stories are accounts of past events from somebody’s perspective, while a fact is the truth. When looking at the two areas of knowledge, they each favour one side of the combination over the other. For example, knowledge from history mostly takes the form of stories, while knowledge from biology mostly takes the form of facts. This distinction between the different types of knowledge leads to the knowledge questions of “How do we obtain knowledge in the different areas of knowing?” and “To what extend is knowledge in certain areas of knowledge subjective or objective?”

Disagreement may aid the pursuit of knowledge in the natural and human sciences because disagreement leads to new discoveries. Disagreement is about gathering reliable knowledge as well as using this newfound knowledge, and occurs when a group fails to reach a consensus over the logic of an argument. Knowledge is composed of facts, information, and skills acquired by a person through experience or education. Two areas of knowledge that are impacted by disagreement are human science and natural science. Human science is the study of human behavior and how humans gather information. Natural science is a branch of science that deals with the physical world. In order for a disagreement to occur, one must be familiar with the subject and have his or her own prediction that is different from the norm. Therefore, to advance knowledge in the areas of human and natural science, people must disagree. The roles of logic, reason, and emotion will be investigated to see how they are used to help gain new knowledge in both human and natural science.