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Introduction

"What can be meant by the Panchantantra saying, "Knowledge is the true organ of sight, not the eyes?" Is it necessary to have clear ideas to see? The Panchantantra saying : "Knowledge is the true organ of sight, not the eyes," almost directly contradicts the popular idea held by many today in which "seeing is believing". However to truly understand the question asked, we must firstly define what is meant by knowledge, as the definition for this will surely affect the answer given to the question. Simply put knowledge can be defined as justified true belief. To elaborate, it isn't enough to simply believe something and accept it as fact, what you believe you know must be true, it should be an indisputable fact. For example I know my name is Samirah Musazi, as it is stated on my birth certificate, I am therefore justified in this belief, and can take this to be an aspect of my knowledge. This then leads to the question, what are the different ways of acquiring knowledge? And speaking specifically in terms of the question, are our eyes the most valuable tool in our acquisition of knowledge? To answer these questions I shall first examine the ways that our eyes (or sense perception) ...read more.

Middle

This can also be seen in people's exploitation of optical illusions whereby the brain sees something and simply makes up the rest. It builds a whole image as to what it believes should be true, even though it isn't. I have fallen victims to such tricks, a notable one is where you are presented with two rectangles which are of different shades of colour and are angled differently. One appears to be longer than the other, but they are actually both the same size. So in this instance we can say that I am in agreement with the Panchantantra saying, "Knowledge is the true organ of sight, not the eyes", as your eyes do have the power to deceive you. On the other hand, as I previously stated, for many the eyes are the true organ of sight. By sight I mean insight into the world and knowledge of our surroundings, this is demonstrated by the age old proverb: "seeing is believing." Although it can be acknowledged that at times our eyes do deceive us, for many they are the primary object used to discern what is around us. Through our eyes we gain what we perceive to be physical evidence, and for many this is enough. ...read more.

Conclusion

In other words, someone must have held the idea that the DNA had a purpose, which would have driven their desire to find out what the purpose was. So having clear ideas does indeed influence what we allow ourselves to see, or blind ourselves from. So what can be concluded from this? Through my analysis of the question we can see that there isn't a definite answer. In some instances our eyes alone are sufficient in causing us to have justified belief, but in other they can serve only to deceive us. Furthermore, having a certain belief can affect what we allow ourselves to see, or not to see in some cases. Perhaps it is better to use our eyes in conjunction with other senses in the hope that we will not be thoroughly deceived then. Or perhaps we can never fully rely on our senses. This is quite a cynical view, however I draw comfort in the fact that there 7billion human beings in this world, with 7 billion minds and beliefs. These beliefs often shape what we later discover, and there will always be someone willing to push the boundaries and see if something is true or not, leading to the general acquisition of knowledge. ?? ?? ?? ?? Samirah Musazi ...read more.

This student written piece of work is one of many that can be found in our International Baccalaureate Theory of Knowledge section.