St. Thomas and the Problem of Knowledge

ST. THOMAS AND THE PROBLElVl OF KNOWLEDGE I ,rHEaverage man is rarely concerned about the problem of knowledge because knowledge as a common and ordinary human experience does not present itself as a problem. Knowing things imperfectly, he meets problems in his knowledge; he solves problems through his knowledge or fails to solve them because of his lack of knowledge, but the knowledge itself he generally takes for granted. Although he makes the ordinary efforts to distinguish between what is true and what is false, it very seldom occurs to him to investigate the validity of knowledge itself or to inquire into the basis certitude. him knowledge is really no problem at alL He lives and works, eats and sleeps, and has no difficulty his knowledge as such, though he is well aware of frequent mistakes. He knows his wife and family; he knows his friends and associates; he knows his business or profession. Knowledge for him is not a problem to be solved but a fact to be faced. As far as the ordinary person is concerned, Scepticism or Idealism -if he knew or thought about them-would be simply silly. He is a realist because he has to be. The philosopher, however, is not satisfied this naive acceptance of knowledge and what it seems to reveal to us. The philosopher, the man of reflective thought, wants to get to the bottom of things, and therefore knowledge itself, on reflection, begins to pose problems that lead him to investigate the validity of knowledge and the basis of certitude. He is faced with many facts that need explaining, for example, that we all make mistakes, that many of us hold contradictory opinions about the same things, that we are constantly changing , revising and correcting ideas, judgments and conclusions 510 ST. THOMAS AND THE PROBLEM OF KNOWLEDGE 511 that we once considered adequate and certain. These facts evoke questions that, properly understood, make up the various facets of the problem of knowledge. Is any of our knowledge true? Can we be certain we have the truth about anything? Does my knowledge represent a world of reality, a real world, or are my ideas which seem to represent reality merely private experiences elaborated entirely within my own mind? These and related questions have always troubled philosophers, though with varying intensity at different times; and the crucial nature of the problems involved, concerned as they are with the very foundations of all certitude, has impelled reflective minds to seek a complete and satisfying solution. For almost three hundred years philosophers have been especially tormented by the problem of knowledge. It has been taken for granted that before anyone can enter into the temple of wisdom he must begin with a critique of knowledge to determine whether or not our ideas correspond with reality. That method was inaugurated by Descartes and Kant, and perfected their So deeply were all convinced of its necessity that they tended to make the problem of the critique of knowledge not merely the preliminary question but the entire content of philosophic investigation. As a result, modern thought has been for the most part lost in the maze of epistemology and has begun only lately to escape from it. Philosophers since the time of Descartes and Kant have been swinging on a pendulum of their own making that has touched periodically the two extremes of Idealistic Monism Materialistic Monism. The history of modern philosophy is largely the account of the series of epistemological reactions that followed the acceptance of Descartes' extreme dualism. Ignorance of man's composite nature leads naturally to oversimplification in explaining his knowledge, and the various theories offered are significant only in pointing up the utterly contradictory positions to which thinkers can be led when they approach the problem of knowledge. Something must be seriously wrong when sincere and capable investigators must do an about-face each generation in their attempts to find the 512 GEORGE C. REILLY solution to so fundamental a question as the problem of knowledge . From the viewpoint of Thomistic philosophy, it is probably true to say that of all the divisions or classifications of philosophical science the newest, the most unsatisfactory and...