Sources of Knowledge - Essay Example

When a child is born, he learns what to do from parents, siblings and other people close to him. The people from whom we learn something are normally designated as authority. Apart from family, other common authority figures are celebrities.  There is a lot of information that you can learn from authorities. However, this does not mean that they are always right.

Deduction and Rationality

You can use rationalization to come up with many amazing facts. This is to say that when you are presented with a fact, you can deduce something else from it. For example, if all cats have hair and Baggs is a cat. Then Baggs has got hair. When using deductions to learn something new, the original two statements have to be true.

However, deduction and rationality have their own downsides which can be referred to as logical fallacies. An example of a fallacy is as follows: All cats have got hair. Baggs has got hair. Therefore, Baggs is a cat. The third statement is a fallacy in itself and it can apply in any complex situation. That is why there is a need to be extra careful when deducing facts. If you do not have information at hand about something, it is better not to deduce anything as doing so might lead to problems and misinformation.

Intuition and Insight

Intuition is one of the natural reactions that are very hard to understand, but it is one of the most accurate sources of information. Insight is the knowledge you have about something and it can be learned from books, scientific observation, or experience. In most cases, intuition and insight go hand in hand. Intuition and instinct are somehow interlinked. Intuition is like a small voice that tells you what to do and instinct is the action that results from the intuitive feeling.

If you have some insight into something, then you will intuitively react to it the right way. For instance, you will know to slap at a mosquito when it bites you. This intuitive action is a result of the insight you have about mosquitoes. Relying on intuition alone to come up with solutions to tough situations is not always a good thing.

According to Lehrer, there is not one source of knowledge that can be said to be better than another. They are all important in their own way. You cannot rely on the knowledge you get from other people without verifying whether it is true or not. The kind of knowledge that you get from whichever source should help you progress and develop yourself, and make your life and the life of the people around you better.