Thinking about thinking warrants thinking about language

The discovery that is not

By a rather amusing coincidence, only one day before I posted my discussion about the relationship between science and epistemology, Holly Dunsworth (a paleoanthropologist at the University of Rhode Island) posted some of her own epistemological reflections on another science blog that I enjoy ("The Mermaid's Tale: A Conversation about the Genetic Causation in Evolution, Development and Ecology").  In her foray into scientific epistemology, Dunsworth contends that she has discovered that "belief and knowledge aren't so distinct (or maybe aren't distinct period)," followed up by the conjecture that this idea is unlikely to be well-received by many of her colleagues in science.  Initially, I wondered why she was so doubtful, as I was initially quite sympathetic to her "discovery."

However, as I continued to ponder over Dunsworth's "discovery," I found my sympathy ebbing by degrees.  My first reservation arose after thinking more carefully about my own epistemological scheme and specifically about the genus-species relationship that it posits between belief and knowledge.  In logic, a genus-species relationship is one in which all members of a given 'species' constitute a subset of a larger set, the 'genus,' yet not all members of the genus are necessarily members of that one species, presumably because they belong instead to other species falling under the same genus.  Hence the well-known saying in geometry that "all squares are rectangles, but not all rectangles are squares."  Similarly, in the epistemological scheme I described in my previous post, all knowledge is belief, but not all belief is knowledge.  Well, as it turns out, my initial sense of concord with Dunsworth's claim was founded on my preoccupation with only the first part of this contrast ("all knowledge is belief") and on the resemblance between this part and her claim.  It took me a bit to shift my attention to the rejoinder that "not all belief is knowledge," and that's when I realized that our epistemologies are not so concordant as I had initially thought.

My sense of agreement diminished further in evaluating the conditions of Dunsworth's "discovery" more closely.  After all, it is one thing to assert that knowledge and belief really aren't so different.  It is another thing entirely to assert it as a 'discovery.'  I found myself wondering, "what set of circumstances could possibly lead to the discovery that knowledge and belief aren't very different?"  One possibility is that the two terms can be defined in advance with meanings that are nearly or entirely identical to each other, then "discovering" that all of the referents of one of the terms turn out to be referents of the other as well, as in "I can't believe it, but every single one of the bachelors that I interviewed was also an unmarried male!"  Obviously, this would be a particularly disingenuous sort of discovery, or else one requiring an incredible feat of self-deception.  I need to stress that I do not think that Dunsworth is guilty of any such deception.

Instead, Dunsworth's discovery is predicated on a confusion, in this case an unself-conscious movement between two incompatible epistemological schemes or systems of meaning that just so happen to share some items of vocabulary.  What sets her discovery up to be seemingly so surprising is her initial endorsement of an epistemology in which "some things can be distinguished as belief vs. knowledge," followed immediately by her endorsement of a second, incommensurate epistemology, in which items of belief that are taken on faith (and have a good chance of being incorrect) are subsumed under the same heading ('believing/knowing') as are those that are well-supported, because both can be equally real for the person who accepts them as true.  I suspect that this second epistemological scheme, in which level of emotional investment is the pivotal criterion separating belief/knowledge from its opposite (ignorance, suspended belief), has wide enough currency among people at large that I will call it a "folk epistemology," which might be depicted as:

In fact, this scheme is not so different from the one I presented in my previous post: while the two axes of the figure (level of support and level of emotional investment) have been turned on their sides and while the labels for different categories of statement have been reshuffled a bit, the same distinctions are made between those beliefs having strong support and those lacking it, and between those invested with considerable emotion and those lacking it.  So, Dunsworth's error is not that she has endorsed a deficient epistemology (at least, not one more deficient than the one that I endorse) but rather that she equivocates between two different senses of 'knowledge,' favored by two different epistemologies.  What is so remarkable about this equivocation, however, is that it has not led Dunsworth to commit the fallacy of equivocation (see also here) but instead to her surprising discovery that two words that are sometimes regarded as mutually exclusive may also paradoxically be used interchangeably.  In my opinion, the real discovery is not the recognition of this paradox but instead the recognition that it only exists because there are (at least) two separate epistemologies in play and that we are at risk of equivocating between their respective terms.

I see you got rid of the bathwater ... but where's the baby?

While I am comfortable with the coexistence of the folk epistemology and my own favored scheme, my personal preference is still to keep the term 'knowledge' separate from '(beliefs taken on) faith,' because our license to dismiss bad knowledge claims is dependent on this distinction.  For example, if someone were to suggest to me that they knew that malaria is caused by bad air, I would not hesitate to counter, "how could you possibly know that?" (admittedly a dismissive rhetorical question)  "Malaria is caused by a mosquito- and blood-borne parasitic infection, not bad air!"

On the other hand, I am inclined to agree with Dunsworth's contention that

"[W]hen you think about all the 'knowledge' that's passe and that's been overturned during the history of science, and when you do some serious reading about history and cross-cultural beliefs and knowledge, it's easier and easier to accept that these distinctions we make as scientists are cultural just like any other tribe's when they're describing their own system versus another."

The cultural and historical relativity of belief systems is a standard tenet of anthropology and the history of science, and it is well supported by anthropological and historical research.  But does the historical and cultural finitude of belief beg a collapsing of 'knowledge' and 'belief' into a single epistemological category, if not the rejection of the category of 'knowledge' entirely?  Dunsworth endorses the former, but I do not agree with either suggestion.  And then there are the people who favor the "let's dismiss knowledge" option, who argue (1) that any idea incapable of withstanding either the test of time or of cultural distance is unworthy of the label 'knowledge' and (2) that far too few ideas that have ever been entertained enjoy such transcendence, and therefore there isn't much left worthy of the label 'knowledge,' hence little need to keep the label itself around.  But valid as this argument may be, is it also sound?  That is, are its premises (and therefore its conclusion) true?

The problem is, the truth of both premises is dependent on the definition of 'knowledge' that we accept, and as it turns out, this definition is a hotly disputed matter in epistemology, presently lacking enough consensus to speak of a single, conventional definition.  Once upon a time, the Platonic definition of 'knowledge' as "justified, true belief" (JTB) prevailed in epistemology, but this definition is nowhere near as widely accepted in contemporary epistemology as it once was.  In its stead, a plurality of alternative definitions are currently available.  Yet, plural though these definitions may be, I would hazard a guess that most of them are more inclusive than the Platonic one.

As a result of this plurality, our judgment on the soundness of the above argument hinges on what position we take on the definition of knowledge.  In the JTB outlook, it is certainly fair to see cultural relativity and historical finitude as an indictment of a belief's knowledge status (though some accommodation can be made for politically motivated or other interventions).  Thus, given that so many ideas have exhibited cultural and temporal limitation, it can be concluded that humankind has never truly been in the possession of anything worthy of the label 'knowledge.'  Conversely, the increased inclusiveness of many current definitions of knowledge does allow us to distinguish between knowledge and other kinds of belief, even among the culturally relative and historically finite ones.  Thus, to return to my malaria example, I would be considerably more amenable to conceding the possibility of knowing that bad air causes malaria prior to the discovery of the relationship between the protozoan genus Plasmodium and the disease malaria, because the "bad air" explanation did have some empirical justification prior to this discovery.

While the JTB criterion is too strict to permit any belief to be labeled 'knowledge,' it is also possible to err in the opposite direction, refusing to discriminate between knowledge and other belief.  This is Dunsworth's position, but I fail to see a clear argument in its favor.  To observe that all ideas are historically and culturally finite, potentially highly regarded ("can be real") inside of this finitude but obsolete outside of it, and even observing that the justification for such ideas is similarly finite, does not undo the fact that different ideas enjoy different levels of support at different junctures in time and space.  It is this difference in levels of support, provisional though it may be, that continues to make the 'knowledge' vs. 'other belief' category useful.

A good epistemologist is a good linguist

Returning to the main point of my previous post, science advocacy unavoidably thrusts us into the arena of epistemology, and if we are to successfully sell science, we are therefore going to have to come to be good epistemologists.  I am now increasingly coming to realize that being good a epistemologist in turn necessitates being a good linguist.  In my previous post, I dabbled a bit in linguistics, specifically in etymology (the study of word history) and lexical semantics (the study of the meaning of words as they are actually used by language users), but I glossed too quickly over one of the troublesome realities encountered by lexical semanticists: in studying what words mean to their users, consensus meanings are not the rule but on the contrary can be downright elusive.  Single language users regularly employ single words with many different meanings depending on the context (hence the multiple entries in dictionaries), and worse still, communities are regularly torn over contested meanings.  The contested meanings of 'knowledge' and 'belief' are excellent examples: in the epistemological scheme I presented in my last post, 'belief' applies generically to any statement accepted as true, while 'knowledge' applies more specifically to those statements that are accepted as true and furthermore enjoy a noteworthy degree of support.  These meanings contrast with those intended by "science-minded folks" Dunsworth critiques, who "think that 'to believe' is different than 'to know' because 'knowledge' to many is based on facts and 'belief' is not."  [9/23/13 insertion: here is an excellent example of a science-minded folk who uses 'science' and 'fact' in contrast to 'belief' and 'ideology.']  In turn, both of these contrast with the folk epistemology favored by Dunsworth, in which the boundary between 'knowledge' and 'belief' is illusory. So, being a good epistemologist in this case means being able to articulate the constellation of meanings that constitute one's own epistemology, but also acting in lexicographic good faith by acknowledging other constellations of epistemological terminology.  (For a deeper glimpse into the contested meaning of several terms of scientific importance, check out this Scientific American article.  I will revisit 'theory' at some point in the future).

Conversely, there are plenty of moments when consensus does exist, and being a good linguist in such contexts means understanding what these conventions are.  On this point, Dunsworth's earlier foray into epistemology in her contribution to NPR's "This I Believe" also runs afoul.  In this essay, Dunsworth asserts that a fundamental difference in meaning stands between the verbs 'to believe' and 'to believe in.'  Specifically, 'to believe in' is defined as an act involving "faith, trust, effort, [and/or] strength" and implying "hope of happiness, reward, foregiveness, [and/or] eternal life."  In contrast, 'to believe' is an act that requires no feat of will, no leap of faith, and entails no particular hope in any particular reward, either self-serving or for the greater good.  Given this distinction, Dunsworth then concludes that she must 'believe' evolution, not 'believe in' it.

Here, Dunsworth's lexical semantics are not in-line with common usage, and this has fed into the frustration she later expresses in her "Mermaid's Tale" contribution.  So let us analyze the verb 'to believe' as a linguist would, by analyzing the three common, syntactically distinct constructions that involve this verb:

1. "to believe (that) ___"
2. "to believe in ___"
3. "to believe ___"

Our choice of which construction to use is dictated in large part by the meaning we intend to convey, with each construction entailing a different sense by convention.  In turn, these conventions dictate what class of objects can viably complete each construction (i.e., can be inserted into the blanks).  In the case of the first construction, any complete sentence can be inserted into the blank as a subordinate clause, so long as it is a declarative sentence.  This sentence is synonymous with the statement "I accept the truth of statement x."

Two separate classes of noun will satisfy the second construction, with very different semantic outcome: on the one hand we can substitute the names of institutions, perspectives, lifestyles, abstract virtues, or personae into the blank, for example 'love,' 'freedom (of choice, speech, etc.),' 'science,' 'Jesus Christ,' etc.  In this case, the construction serves as a shorthand for expressions following the first construction and usually entails some moral valuation and/or some hope of reward (thus coming close to Dunsworth's definition): "I believe that love is achievable, rewarding, and worthy of pursuit;" "I believe that the the freedom of choice/speech/etc. is unalienable and/or is an avenue to personal interest and/or is worth fighting for;" "I believe that science has great potential to lead us to better and more organized belief systems;" "I believe that Jesus Christ died for my sins ...;" and so on.  On the other hand, we can also substitute nouns whose reality we accept into this construction, often with neutrality, for example 'the germ theory of disease;' 'planets outside of our solar system;' 'evolution through mutation, genetic drift, gene flow, and/or natural selection;' etc.  As before, this construction serves as a shorthand for expressions following the first construction: "I believe that some diseases are caused by germs like viruses, bacteria, parasites, and prions;" "I believe that planets exist in other solar systems (and sometimes outside of any solar system);" "I believe that biological evolution happens and that it may be driven by any of the four recognized forces of evolution;" and so on.

The important point, which is not appreciated in Dunsworth's NPR essay, is that, while this second construction is frequently used to express one's commitment to a particular institution, value, or pursuit worthy of such commitment, and while these commitments often (but not always) entail some hope, it can also be used simply to express one's acceptance of the truth of something.  The former use by no means obviates the latter.

The third construction is considerably more restrictive in the nouns that can validly complete it.  Simply put, the only legitimate candidates are those nouns that literally or figuratively possess personhood, and even more specifically that can and do possess certain ideas about the world that can be shared.  This includes personal names and pronouns, as well as clocks, calendars, and GPS devices.  It can also include less obvious personae, for example good and bad omens.  This construction is then used to express agreement between individuals, in other words shared beliefs.  "I believe Galileo" = "Galileo and I believe in the heliocentric model" = "Galileo and I believe that the Earth and the other planets orbit the Sun, not that the other planets and the Sun orbit the Earth."

Inserting impersonal nouns into the third construction has the effect of causing psychological distress, which can only be resolved either by judging it to be intentionally absurd for humorous effect or else misused.  In the former instance, "I believe this teapot" brings Angela Landsbury immediately to mind, whereas in the latter instance, "I believe jumping" makes my head hurt.  I experience the same distress in reading the expression "I believe evolution": do I share any beliefs with evolution?  Probably not; it is a process like jumping, so it is impersonal.  But perhaps metaphorically it might offer an idea that I can agree with?  Possibly; there are certainly expressions out there like "if it's one thing that evolution teaches us, it's ...," and Dunsworth certainly exercises poetic license at the conclusion of her NPR essay when she says "I listen to evolution."  But would I personally ever use the expression "I believe evolution" when what I mean is "I believe in evolution?"  Not unless they repeal the current conventions of standard English syntax on this point.  I accept the truth of evolution; I do not share any beliefs with it that I am aware of.