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CRITERIOLOGYLesson 2: Sources ofKnowledge
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Reality manifests itself to the mind in different ways.
Not all men have the same keenness of vision or
hearing or intellectual aptitudes.
The fact that we do not know everything, and that allour knowledge is inadequate, does not invalidate theknowledge which we possess anymore than the
horizon which bounds our view prevents us fromperceiving more or less distinctly the various objectswithin its limits.
This is essentially the condition of scientific progress:to find connections between various objects toproceed from the known to the unknown, from theimperfect to the perfect, from the contingent to thenecessary, from the dependent to the self-existentand from the finite to the Infinite.
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Sources of Knowledge:Where do you get what you think you know?
Perception
Introspection
Memory
Reason
Faith
Intuition
Testimony
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1. PERCEPTION
Sense knowledge
Sources of error: illusion (seeing something as something else)
hallucination (seeing something when theres nothing at all)
Error is not caused by the reality, neither by thesenses; it is caused by the judgment that we make.
You saw Fr. Bobby holding the hand of a beautiful lady, and
you say, Ah, girlfriend ni Father yan!
You saw a Dominican brother talking to another brother in adark room, and you conclude, Oh, hes gay!
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2. INTROSPECTION inner feelings
persons internal way of ascertaining what mentalstate one is currently in
statement of how we feel or what we are thinking orwondering about: I feel cold, depressed, alone, left out.
I feel awful. I feel excited.
Im nervous
errors in reporting inner feelings (mis-description ofinner feelings We may say we feel angry when we only feel annoyed. One may say hes in love when it was just an admiration.
I dont like her anymore. What he wanted to say is,Iddie if she leaves me.
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3. REASON Inferential argument, truth of reason, law of
thought
If you are older than I am, then I am youngerthan you.
All priests are ordained; Fr. Bobby is a priest. Ergo,Fr. Bobby is ordained.
I
t collects facts, generalizes, reasons outfrom cause to effect, from effect to cause,from premises to conclusion, frompropositions to proofs. It concludes, decidesand comes to final judgment.
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4. MEMORY
R
ecall
Problems of Memory:
Loss of memory: amnesia
Dj vu
We remember what we think happened,not what happened. We remember onlywhat we want to remember.
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5. FAITH Assent of the intellect to a truth which is beyond
comprehension but which it accepts under the influence of the
will moved by grace.
It is a belief which goes beyond the available evidence
It is something that has no basis (reason) for making thestatement, and you could hardly claim to know it.
I have faith in him. (It might not be based on faith at all as theremight be some good reasons in the past to support your trust inhim.
The certitude faith commands is not based on intrinsic truth
(i.e. the intellect does not attain truth in itself; it does not seeit.) but based on an intrinsic motive, i. e., the intellect is movedby the will which regards the assent to the proposed truth invirtue of the intrinsic evidence of an object
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6. INTUITION direct insight into, or apprehension of, truth; a kind
of knowing that is immediate and direct.
process of knowing not through seeing, hearing oranything of the visual sensory channels but througha sudden conviction that turns to be right.
It is a personal spiritual experience. Spiritual flashesand glimpses of truth, inspiration, revelation andspiritual insight come through intuition.
The mind has to be pure to know that it is intuition
shot in the dark; there is no reasoning process at all.
ESP, palm reading
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7. TESTIMONY Taking the word of another: either oral or written
Problem with acquiring knowledge through testimony: it does notseem to live up to the standards of knowledge. Crudely put, thequestion is: 'How can testimony give us knowledge when we haveno reasons of our own?'
People are often ready to believe the personal reports of what others
say that they have seen and experienced. Thus, it is important toconsider just how reliable peoples memory and their testimony can be.Perhaps the most important thing to note is that, even though there isa popular perception of eyewitness testimony being among the mostreliable forms of evidence available, the criminal justice system treatssuch testimony as being among the most fragile and even unreliableavailable. Consider the following quote from Levin and CramersProblems and Materials on Trial Advocacy:
Eyewitness testimony is, at best, evidence of what the witness believes tohave occurred. It may or may not tell what actually happened. The familiarproblems of perception, of gauging time, speed, height, weight, of accurateidentification of persons accused of crime all contribute to making honesttestimony something less than completely credible.
Willingness to be challenged
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To simply be a competent witness(competent, which is not the same ascredible), a person must
have adequate powers of perception
must be able to remember and report well
and, must be able and willing to tell thetruth.
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MentalGymnastics: Ate Rosiel is here.
perception
If I let go of this piece of chalk, it will fall. reason
The Lady of La Naval has not been stolen yet. memory
You have two hands. perception
You are not a woman.
perception Jose Rizal once lived.
Memory/testimony I am in the Philippines.
perception A man will never give birth to a baby.
reason
The past will never be future. reason
You are younger than your parents. reason
I feel dumb and stupid. introspection
We will end the class before 6pm Mass.