Theories of Knowledge

Von Glasersfeld’s "An Introduction to Radical Constructivism” is well seasoned with wit and "isms". I appreciated the basic nature, simplicity, and logic of many of his ideas. I effortlessly agreed with those that I have long held, intuitively and innately, though not cognitively – previously never having thought about them in that manner.

Dominant beliefs in my personal philosophy of life that I have often pondered are:

“The only aspect of that "real" world that actually enters into the realm of experience, are its constraints.”

“Any cognitive structure that serves its purpose in our time, proves no more and no less than just that it has done what was expected of it. Logically, that gives us no clue as to how the "objective" world might be; it merely means that we know one viable way to a goal that we have chosen under specific circumstances in our experiential world.”

“It tells us nothing -- and cannot tell us anything -- about how many other ways there might be, or how that experience which we consider the goal might be connected to a world beyond our experience.”

“The proponents of an idea, as a rule, explain its non-acceptance differently than do the critics and opponents.”
Simple, Logical and True.

“Our knowledge is useful, relevant, and viable - if it stands up to our experience and enables us to make predictions, to bring about, or, avoid certain phenomena.” Simple, Logical and True.

“Because our ways of experiencing are what they are, we cannot possibly conceive of an unexperienced world.”

I have never been able to conceive what is inconceivable to me, without first being exposed to the possibility of its potential existence. It is my experience that communication of an idea by another - through the exchange of thoughts, use of senses, or exposure to stimuli always occurs prior to contemplation of what had previously been unimaginable.

“The epistemological problem - how we acquire knowledge of reality, and how reliable and "true" that knowledge might be” certainly troubles me. We use thoughts (some resulting from experiential exposure) to construct ideas, and ideas to construct knowledge, and knowledge to construct reality. Since reality is fabricated out of (sometimes competing) individual or group constructs, how do we determine whose reality is the true reality? And what if the true reality is as yet inconceivable?”

Presently, we know with certainty, of the existence of “the unknowable.” Knowledge is a prerequisite for defining reality. Therefore, it is presently impossible to suppose any definition of reality to be true.

I agree with von Glasersfeld, “Our knowledge can never be interpreted as a picture or representation of that real world, but only as a key that unlocks possible paths for us. A key fits if it opens the lock. The fit describes a capacity of the key, not of the lock.”

“If we take seriously the evolutionary way of thinking, it could never be organisms or ideas that adapt to reality, but it is always reality which…inexorably annihilates what is not fit to live. In nature, a lack of fitness is invariably fatal; philosophers, however, rarely die of their inadequate ideas.”

Could this be why there are so many Philosophical Schools of Thought and so many philosophers?

After reading this article, I know for certain, that I am not a metaphysical realist. I can embrace some of the components of radical constructivism’s theory of knowledge. However, at present, I lack sufficient data to consider limiting myself to any one "ism" or category philosophical.