Knowledge

I just returned from a meeting about how to get research output recognized. A key criterion for a work to count as “proper” research is that it must demonstrably contribute to the advancement of knowledge. But what if knowledge can’t actually advance? What if real knowledge is independent of any change whatsoever?

Of course, by all apparent evidence, knowledge seems to change. It’s well documented that what we seem to know today differs from what we thought we know a century ago. Yet this raises a deeper question: what exactly is it that we really know? And a good follow-up question is: can we really say that we know anything truly if what we know keeps changing?

As a philosopher, I’m not interested in apparent knowledge. I’m interested in real knowledge.

Then comes the unsettling question: how do we know for sure that we are not confusing knowing with believing?

If we don’t even know what knowing truly means, the entire enterprise of human understanding risks operating upon a false premise – and all research may turn out to be nothing more than an elaborate daydream.