Which sources of knowledge- books, web sites, the media, personal experience, authorities or some other- do you consider most trustworthy, and why?

Eva Schreuder IB2 29-11-‘02

In this essay I will be looking at the statement above in relation to the problems of knowledge, using where appropriate my experiences as a knower. To ascertain which source of knowledge one can claim to be the most trustworthy one would have to define them all first. The proposed sources are: books, websites, media, personal experience and authorities. After I have defined each source of knowledge, I will be looking at the reliability of each source, helping justifying my findings with the help of the problems of knowledge we have identified in class. Truth plays a large role in considering which source of knowledge is the most trustworthy. With truth there are many problems involved, for something to be true it has to be believe to be true and there have to bee good grounds for it to be believed to be true. This links to perception, truth I think largely depends on the way one perceives it to be reliable. .

When talking about books one can already distinguish between the fiction and non fiction books. Fiction is usually defined as fantasy and non real yet sometimes the author of the book makes it seem like non-fiction. This makes it sometimes hard for the reader to say if it is fiction or not. Due to the fact that fiction is fantasy it can be said that it is not considered to be true. Therefore fiction is not trustworthy as a source of knowledge. The other type of book is non-fiction. In the Oxford School Dictionary it is defined as “writings that are not fiction; books about real people and things and true events.” With this one can already identify a problem of knowledge: how can one say that something is true or not? Yet it has become a type of axiom in society that non fiction books are seen as reliable sources of knowledge. With these non-fiction books one must always be aware of possible biased authors. Things such as cultural background, epoch and religious beliefs will influence the perception of the truth. Books can be reliable as sources of knowledge, but I do think that one will have to consult more sources than only books to get a larger overview and more reliable view on an area of knowledge.

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One other source of knowledge one could consult could be websites. Websites are pages in the Internet that contain information about anything. It is a widely growing source, and it is used more frequently every day. It is a public service that is available to anyone with an Internet connection. It is also possible for everyone to open a website since it is a public service. This already makes it less reliable and very hard to state which site is reliable and which one is not. The thing that makes it uncertain are the authors or creators of these sites. Are the people making these sites qualified to offer such information, or do they want to open these sites to make other aware of their opinion? This doesn’t mean that every site is unreliable. The more commercial sites like the online encyclopedia: have strict guide lines they have to stick to. They cannot simply publish anything on their site, they have to go through a long process of checking and double checking their information before they place in on their site. This all to make sure it is correct. Of course one cannot ever be completely sure about this but it is a process that makes it more reliable. For the less commercial sites one can look if the name of the author is published. This already shows that the author is willing to blemish his or her name if the information is incorrect. One could also research into the author and see what kind of name they have. Then according to these findings one can conclude if the information is reliable or not. With websites one can never know who is sitting behind the screen making the site. Can one be sure of anything? This is the next question to ask. This brings on a problem of weight of evidence, how much evidence is needed to prove or verify that a certain website is reliable? Websites are said to be some what reliable because it is a public service, and does have to meet some sort of criteria. Sites that are seen to be incorrect or unreliable in anyway have the chance of being kicked off the web by the server.

The next proposed source of the knowledge is the media. With this one can already immediately identify a problem with language. The media is a source that frequently uses emotional language to portray events. Making the public of the media persuaded to believe their point of view. However the media is a tool that is open to bribes and is very sensitive to biased opinions. The media bases their reports on interviews and perceptions of their reporters. Since every individual perceives things different it is hard to say which one is to be regarded as being true. The media is also a tool that is easily controlled by the government, they in their turn can use the media to portray propaganda for themselves and to brainwash the public. Now a days this doesn’t happen any more in most countries because a law was established: the freedom of the press. Yet not every country believes in this. An example of this is Carlos Cardoso. A journalist from Mozambique who was about to reveal scandals made by the government but was murdered before his story even got to the presses. This is only one example of journalists being silenced. The media is, as said earlier, based on perceptions. The way the journalist perceives an event differs due to different factors, these can be things like age, gender, culture, religion, education and epoch. The media therefore is not the most reliable source of the tools mentioned in the question because it is tremendously vulnerable to biased opinions. It is also extremely difficult to make a report of the event that is objective because it is based on perception.

The way one perceives things is dependent on personal experience. Opinions are, to my opinion, based on personal experience. One can use previous experience to judge similar situations one can find oneself on. One cannot however use personal experience to recite factual information. The uses I can think of for personal experience as a tool of knowledge to interpret information and conclude information. With this one must be aware that personal experience can not be said to be a fact. This because of the fact that everyone interprets different affairs differently. Factors that can make personal experience unreliable are the potential of being mistaken, as one has been mistaken in the past. There is no guarantee that one isn’t mistaken this time, but also things like biased created by different perceptions and the factors contributing to this, but also because as individuals we may have a hidden agenda linked to our personal experience, if we want to gain personally from a situation we use our personal experience to do so. It has been said that it is the human nature to seek for personal benefit in any situation and that this can be a determining factor in using personal experience or not. A point that was raised in class earlier was the knowledge claim: “I may be mistaken about any knowledge claims because I have been mistaken in the past about previous knowledge claims.” This adds another level of uncertainty in the reliability of my own information. For this all I think that personal experience is the least reliable of them all as a source of knowledge. It can be used to judge and interpret ideas but not as fact.

In conclusion I think that there is not one source of knowledge that is the most reliable, to get a good overview one would have to consult more than one source or all sources to be more reliable. If one fails to do so then that person should write an note or let the reader know in one way or another that it is not the whole story, or that they where not completely informed before writing the piece. But this then brings the problem of weight of evidence: when do you know that you have consulted all the information possible. This is impossible to do; therefore to ascertain as to whether there is one source that is the most trust worthy, one can conclude by looking at all the arguments that there is not one source that is reliable. This piece as well is only a personal interpretation and should not be taken as fact in any way.