Theory of Knowledge: Understanding The Production of Personal Knowledge

When we speak about the “production of knowledge” it refers to a complex and time- consuming process of something, that means as a “acquiring or gaining” knowledge which is a reliable information, an entity or thing that relates to our experience, conceptual, representational thinking which everybody agrees on and the “correspondence theory of truth” of what we call our “shared knowledge” in our TOK language. To “produce” something means to bring it forth out of hiding whether that something is the product of Nature or the latest tech gadget from which is the “produce” of human beings. “Production” is a “bringing forth” for example, some of mathematics structure are intrinsic to nature and derived from the nature by our ancestors.

Sometimes, people rely on these hypothetical, to develop some initial epistemological ideas regarding what data is and the wayit's created. for instance, in trial cases, If the witness is relying solely only on experience, then the witness should add howthat have leads to the conclusion reached, why that experience could be a sufficient basis for the opinion, and the way that have is reliably applied to the proof, because experiences also are evidences. “Conclusions” relate to our judgements or theories which are accepted by a huge people, of what something is. Our judgements are the definitions that we give to things thus providing the limits to the things so that we may classify them as such and place them in our Areas of Knowledge. For example, while we accept the appearance of atoms, we have no applicable models to the “evidence” that we have regarding their nature and behaviour. Atoms are symbolic entities represented by an algebraic formula, and their physical “existence” is “skipped over” in order that we may “produce” knowledge based on the conclusions that we have already arrived at regarding the atom’s nature and what it is. In this skipping over, we “go beyond” the issue of our lack of knowledge of what the thing such as atoms being is.

Constructivism is basically theories based on how people construct their own intuition, ideas, experiences or knowledge to understand new things. For instance, Two women created new history by entering the Hindu temple of Sabarimala in kerala, offering prayers to the god and smashing the long standing practice of verdict of women from entering the temple.But their feat triggered protests in different parts of the southern state of Kerala, where the temple is located, by people who maintained that the act went against the temple's tradition. This builds a new knowledge of how socio- political, economic and anthropocentric people plays a important role in breaking tradition as their is a leap of faith, and intuition that women are lesser than men and not allowed in temple and believe that women are already divine and give lives so they don't need to converse with god and that is their accepted knowledge and not there is no facts of history or evidences to prove that women are above men or more divine but this is the “indigenous knowledge” system that is what they believe in they accept in the TOK language.

Interestingly, accepting women as the prior to men or divine, they are the one with more suffrage, and no freedom to right to vote. The phrase “Beyond the evidence” in accepting conclusions is a questions which means do we have to go further to accept conclusions that we think is probably is not real, in order to get to knowledge. For example, in Tok questions we are asked to assume a live situation and think beyond what is actual evidence or solution because we imagine for all the possible solutions for the problem. For example, the great Lawyers, have to leverage through intuition and reflect beyond the proves that support the fact to defend guilty. Countering my statement, the accuracy and reliability is not relevant as religious is faith which is a personal knowledge , Buchak characterizes faith as a commitment to acting as if some claim is true without first needing to examine additional evidence that could potentially bear on the claim. This shows the distinction between the faith and intuition. By claiming that, the production of personal knowledge also requires accepting conclusions going beyond the evidence. Accepting evidence requires how we see the evidences and we interpret the evidence and apply to the universe, as evidences influence us to see the universe from a different perspective. For example, The Malagasy people accept a conclusion that seems to go beyond the evidence for it: that dancing with the exhumed bodies of their dead ancestors sustains the communal connection between the living and the spirits of the deceased which linger on earth until their buried bodies are fully decomposed dut to the faith and religious beliefs. This is a personal knowledge which became shared knowledge when people started believing them.

When knowledge can be produced without going beyond the evidences? When we believe or assume as a conclusion or true. For example, any hypothesis or mathematical equation which goes beyond the evidences when they become theory after there is enough evidences to support it. Countering my statement, Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, means when people often involve claims such as' I saw a bright light!' or ' My life flashed before me ' or ' I now know that there is a better place after death,' suggesting that the claimants suddenly recognized more than human beings at work worldwide.Such conclusions seem to go beyond the evidence available to support them. Knowledge is not always stable, infallible or incorruptible, it sometimes keeps changing as we get closer to new ideas or evidences. For example, Albert Einstein’s theory of relativity, there weren't enough evidences to support the hypothesis to become theory or fact. Scientists assume that by working at such anomalies, they'll either disentangle them to see how they fit with the current theory or contribute to a new theory.

Because of atoms or of anything works in producing the outcomes that we tend to desire, we don't care what the character of the atom really is as long as we are able to produce reliable results or conclusions and might create use of these results or conclusions. By claiming that, within the Arts one will discuss our general lack of knowledge relating to the mysteries of imagination, knowledge, and Art itself. To bring forth the work of art whether as a “production” or an object of art doesn't require that we know or are certain of what “art” is, or what the “knowledge” is. Artists try and categorical the reality through their intuitive understanding, but we may discuss whether something is or isn't art or whether a production is “good” or “bad” however these ar secondary to the work itself. The purpose isn't merely that to make a work but more than that, but that the artist is not in control of his or her own creativity. Art isn't based on evidence, this is how it differs from science. Art is a form of impersonal force that uses the artist imagination, visualization and in a way that artist accepts his “conclusions” (the work) over that they have no limited “evidence”.

The aesthetic view of art today is of modernity or call humanism, and as what is ‘objectively representable’. The way I feel in the presence of something, determines my view of everything I encounter. Art is thus “subjective” as it’s a personal knowledge. Hence art has become a device for the provision of ‘experience and part of our “personal knowledge” which can be shared knowledge. This view could be abetted the view that a piece of art is a thing, a crafted thing, with aesthetic value superimposed on it by us. Despite the Greek use of techne for both ‘craft’ and ‘art’ this “production” is present both in human beings and in Nature. The “ends”, the conclusions, are accepted even though we have no “knowledge” of the whats, the hows and the whys of the things. Constructing new theories from the existing information or an unaccepted theories, For example, Copernicus, discovered that by studying the revolutions of the heavens, ended up understanding that it is us rather than the sky that turns, exploring the nature of time leads us to discover something about ourselves.

But most people explore these contents based on past predictions and empirical evidence. For example, a similar argument of “ the shortage of Empirical Evidence” figures terribly powerfully in Atheists versus Believers discussion that there has not been any reliable, testable proof to support the hypothesis that God or immortal souls exists and it's, therefore, not rational to believe that there's a God. Until now science couldn’t prove the existence of the god and the scripts, but we still believe in them despite the absence of evidence. Theory in human sciences need to be valid and credible and has to be fit with other scientific theories to build new knowledge. Similarly, mathematics rely on definitions and axioms to deduce conclusions that are globally agreed on.But to what extent maths and science can be dependent on evidences? In some cases, production knowledge does not require jumping out to further conclusions, it can be solved by the given evidence. In fact, distinction of evidences is important as it might be misleading in terms values. Evidences have their own limitations but in the end they determine the value of the knowledge.

The difference I tried to explain is that, though we need considerably a lot of evidence to justify a 'right' mathematical formula, all or at least a large group of people to accept it.This is completely different once it involves an ethical claim, because little or many justifications can never lead everybody to just accept that ethical claim to be either right or wrong. Michael Woolman identified four ways of justification that are: justifying through logic, justifying using empiricism, justifying using memory and justifying with a reference of authority.

A basic standard for accepting or rejecting 'conclusions' or 'knowledge claims' is that there is sufficient evidence to support the claims made. In a court of law, the evidence must point to the culpability of an defendant 'out of reasonable doubt’’. In the human sciences, this is shown by its reliance upon “statistics” as “evidence” of the “correctness” of its use of the principle of reason: nihil est sine ratione or “nothing is without reason” or “nothing is without a cause”.

However, keeping in mind the ethical relativism, conclusions in ethics can be only accepted by a certain group of individuals, which makes them less well-supported than mathematics, which in contrast to ethics is universally accepted.

Besides this, sometimes demanding people makes people accept in belief without the evidences this is called Bandwagon effect which is psychological phenomenon people do something primarily because other people are doing it, regardless of their own beliefs. For example, believe in religion and practises.

In my personal opinion, I believe that knowledge is gained from everywhere whether considered as evidences, our own experiences or our religious belief that becomes our new knowledge. Consciously or subcounsciuly we gain most of our knowledge from our life experiences which goes beyond any evidences as it shapes how we want to visualize the universe.