How Can I Know Anything at All?

If you are to correctly claim to have knowledge about something, that knowledge must:

a) Be correct

b) Have been reached using a correct method (it can’t be a coincidence that you’re right).

The first obstacle to achieving knowledge is therefore that any information we receive though our imperfect senses could give an imperfect portrayal of the external world (see a). Secondly, our imperfect brains could process information incorrectly (see b). Therefore, a sufferer of schizophrenia might believe the ‘imaginary’ people he sees are real, or have a memory of something that never happened, and we too may have false perceptions of the external world, and even our own personal pasts. However, even the schizophrenic knows how things look and feel and sound and smell and taste to him. Like everyone, he has knowledge of his present sensations, his memories and his ideas. We are undoubtedly correct to say that we have knowledge of these things, because their reality doesn’t require existence of anything outside of the mind.

So, even though I can’t be sure that my perceptions give me a true picture of the external world, I do know what ‘the world to me’ is like. After that point, I don’t think it’s knowledge that is important, but reason. Reason allows us to take those bare bones of true knowledge and decide what they suggest about the world and how we should live in it.

Philosophy means ‘love of wisdom’. In Plato’s Republic, this is often referred to as ‘love of knowledge’, but I think this is incorrect. While knowledge has its own small (but crucial) role in achieving wisdom and understanding, it is really reason that does the hard work to determine how we live our lives.

I look forward to your comments