Knowledge is Useless

[SolitaryWalker]

I prefer to analyse things with as many preconceived notions are possible, because it makes my ideas so much more difficult to stand by...

It is more difficult to stand by your ideas when you have no ideas in mind than when you have many ideas?

Just like it is more difficult to stand by your apples when you have no apples, rather than when you have many? For instance, we get attached to our material possessions and do not want to give them away, same goes for our preconceived notions. If we did not value our material possessions we would not mind giving them away. Obviously when we have no material possessions, we have nothing to value, thus there is simply nothing for us to cling to.

For this reason a most open-minded examination is most easily conducted when we have as few ideas as possible that we would be reluctant to renounce.

Anyway, someone can analyse ideas even though they do not think that any idea is true; postmodernists do it frequently..

How would that work?

For example, if I were to make an argument as follows. If A then B. A. Therefore B.

If the premises are true, the conclusion must also be. This is a requirement of any valid argument, I am certainly curious about how it is possible to analyze something without being led to believe that this or that thing is true in the end. Reasonableness requires you to believe an argument which you cannot declare invalid or in which you could point out the falsity of the premises. Of course though, you can declare yourself unreasonable and believe in anything you want! Your remark regarding that postmodernists do so is quite pertinent on that note!

I think you missed the point..

I am not sure what the point was, was the point that objective knowledge is not as easily acquired as I seem to think? If so, how so? If not, what was the point?

 

[miss fortune]

Knowlege is useful if you're selected as a contestant on Jeopardy!

 

[Didums]

Oh so the knowledge of how to perform a quadruple bypass surgery is useless and unnecessary? The truths of x, y, and z in regards to what would be needed to fix the heart are worthless? Maybe, in a 1 out of 1 million chance, a random person miraculously performs the quadruple bypass surgery without knowledge of the truths, but the chance that he could perform it again on another patient are still staggeringly low without the preferred knowledge.

 

[reason]

Oh so the knowledge of how to perform a quadruple bypass surgery is useless and unnecessary?

Precisely. What matters is that a surgeon can perform quadruple bypass surgery successfully. Knowing how perform quadruple bypass surgery doesn't do anything extra. It's superfluous.

 

[Anja]

I think knowing one's self well may be the most practical study anyone could do.

Lotsa good stuff you can't learn in a book, for sure.

 

[Didums]

Precisely. What matters is that a surgeon can perform quadruple bypass surgery successfully. Knowing how perform quadruple bypass surgery doesn't do anything extra. It's superfluous.

Yes, in the event that a random person performs a quadruple bypass surgery, it is demonstrated that the knowledge of how to do so is unnecessary. Problem is: We'll have a lot less surgeons if the knowledge was not out there. The probability of such an event is too unlikely to rely upon. The knowledge of how to so the surgery increases to probability of success, which is technically unnecessary, but always preferable.

 

[SillySapienne]

Precisely. What matters is that a surgeon can perform quadruple bypass surgery successfully. Knowing how perform quadruple bypass surgery doesn't do anything extra. It's superfluous.

lolwut?



Knowing the procedural steps in performing quadruple bypass surgery is the furthest thing from being superfluous, rather knowledge of these steps prove to be the principle means that separate (and qualify) a heart surgeon from a layman like me.

I haven't read this thread so I am unsure if you defined what uselessness means/entails, but if you are trying to say that "cognitive" knowledge has no pragmatic physical use, then you are just, well, being ignorant, sorry.

 

[The Ü™]

Knowledge is power; the more I know about you, the more power I have over you.

 

[disregard]

^ You give me the creeps.

 

[Atomic Fiend]

He may be creepy but he's right.

 

[Anja]

Knowledge is power; the more I know about you, the more power I have over you.

Creeps into the "warning zone" so very INFP-like.


So I've told a lot about myself here. Please explain what power you have over me, Uber?

Or are you blustering?

 

[Venom]

...everything thread I start is somehow related to how i sound like a nihilist...

look we get it... you're a nihilist... thats nice. Get over it. ...And because *this* [existence, reality, arguments, truth, probability, knowledge, everything else you don't believe in] can't be true, you wont mind me being a total asshole about it, because really, we can't prove that I'm really an asshole...can we Reason?

 

[nightning]

Knowledge for the sake of knowledge is useless. Knowledge properly applied is. As Bluewing mentioned already, sure you can guess the answer randomly. Probability is against you though if you're merely guessing at solution. The more complex the problem, the worse your chances of guessing correctly.

I do not understand your reference to a cardiac surgeon. Being able to do the surgery = having the knowledge of how it's done + skills to do it. As I said already, knowledge by itself is useless, proper application of knowledge is. However you cannot apply something if you don't know how it work. QED

 

[The Ü™]

^ You give me the creeps.

It's Halloween, for Christ's sake.

He may be creepy but he's right.

I agree with Silently Honest.

 

[reason]

Me, a nihilist? Not in the slightest. If you have garnered such from anything I have written, then you have been reading it wrong.

 

[Anja]

It's Halloween, for Christ's sake.



I agree with Silently Honest.

Well, you may be honest, Uber, but I don't think you are correct about knowledge of others giving you power over them.

Unless you are talking about where they keep the key to the safe or their Social Security number.

If you are talking about knowledge of people's pain and a way to harm them with it, then perhaps you could have some power over someone who may allow you to do so. Chances are you wouldn't enjoy the company they make though. Could get lonesome.

But knowledge of others' needs and wants and theirs of yours, is actually a way to connect your personal power with theirs and can be a very positive thing.

Power over others isn't nearly as satisfying as power over one's own needs and wants. Get that one figured out and then you have some of your own personal power. And no one can take it from you without your permission.

I think that's pretty kewl.

 

[Mole]

Knowledge is power; the more I know about you, the more power I have over you.

Creep me out, Uber!

 

[Eldanen]

Knowledge is power; the more I know about you, the more power I have over you.

Unless I decide that you know too much and kick you in the stomach.

 

[placebo]

I agree that the JTB theory is not infallible, but not all knowledge is defined by the JTB theory for this reason. Unless you are taking the position of the philosophical skeptic and saying that knowledge is unobtainable, I don't understand what you mean by 'knowledge is useless'. "Know-how" or procedural knowledge is having the abilities to do something. In the example of the surgeon, surely, being able to successfully perform a surgery is that type of knowledge. Being able to ride a bike as well involves cognitive abilities that I don't see how that requires justified true belief or true belief. You do not need knowledge of the laws of physics that allows you to ride a bike, but your body has to be capable of doing so.