As a philosophy major, it goes without saying that I enjoy the learning process and the search for knowledge, truth, and all other popular philosophical topics. One thing that I have never really given much thought to, however, is the way in which our minds learn. Hegel provides for the reader of The Phenomenology of Spirit an idea of how he believes the mind goes about the process of gaining knowledge and understanding. Hegel says that the mind is aware that upon immediate perception of an item, we cannot be expected to understand the true meaning or even to be able to give a chosen meaning to said item. While we can easily gain a basic knowledge of things due to our sensory perceptions, what they truly are or mean is information that will take the mind a while longer to figure out or decide.
The next stage of the learning process occurs after our initial sensory discovery of the object. When presented with a new object or concept the mind is struggling to gain understanding of this unfamiliar thing. In an effort to fix this problem, the mind begins the next part of process. The mind will try to think about the new thing and try and figure it out, so to speak. The mind will continue to attempt to successfully categorize or gain a more solid knowledge of the thing. This is as close as we can get to understanding according to Hegel. Understanding, says Hegel, or at least the settling of information about something is the highest form of consciousness.
I thought this was a fairly interesting way of thinking about the knowledge process. If you really give it some thought it seems like it should make pretty good sense. We may not find ourselves thinking about which stage of the consciousness process we currently happen to be experiencing, but it is fascinating to think that our mind goes through so much just to gain understanding of each and every little thing that we experience. It is kind of cool to think that our minds are so complex rather than just machines which immediately process all empirical data. Maybe next time I find myself getting frustrated with something I do not immediately understand I can remind myself that my mind is just getting used to the idea and will eventually come to a better understanding of it. I am interested to hear what everyone else thinks. Do you think this is an interesting way of analyzing the gaining of knowledge and understanding? Or do you think that how we come to gain knowledge and understanding is not as important as the final result? Overall I kind of like the idea, although we shall see if I still do once my mind has had some more time to think it over.
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What may be more interesting, while still along the same lines of your post, is that in order to understand something (or the truth of something), the process of that something has to be complete. In other words, while the components of the system are apart, there is no real relationship that can be gathered about the system istelf that would reveal its truth (or our understanding of this truth). For example, in my upcoming post, I try to explain Hegel's triangular system of understanding (how the lines that make up right-angled triangles, until in relation to one another) could be any number of countless lines that could possibly be drawn. The truth that is the triangle is then only seen after the completion of the project.
ReplyDeleteWhile I think you're right in that understanding is the final result of gaining knowledge, I think true understanding is achieved in the ability to successfully communicate that understanding to another person, especially if that person starts out without a solid basis for it. Einstein once said that you do not really understand something unless you can explain it to your grandmother. I think that that transference of understanding between individuals is the final step.
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