Epistemological Confusion

                When people debate nearly any philosophical, religious, or political subject, a point often raised is an epistemological one.  The line of reasoning is generally stated as follows: 1. We can never truly know anything with 100% percent certainty.  2. Therefore, nobody can ever say something is true or not. 

                This line of argumentation is generally brought up by somebody who is losing an argument, so they throw out this epistemological “catch-all” to change the direction of the argument.

                The problem with this line of reasoning is it is based on the false notion that if we don’t know something with 100% certainty, we don’t know any truth at all.  This criterion for truth is far too demanding.  Truth is always a probability game. 

    Some things are far more likely than others, and we are always analyzing the truth of something based on the facts we are given.  For example, in all likelihood my parents are my biological parents, but there is always the possibility they are not, even if I was to take a DNA test.   The logical mistake people often make from here is that since something is not certain, it is now equally likely that my parents are (or are not) my biological parents.  This makes no sense; we must always analyze things in terms of relative likelihood.

    This epistemological confusion is constantly used in religious contexts.  People often say things such as “you don’t know for sure Jesus isn’t the son of God” or “you don’t for sure Xenu the Robot isn’t real.”  From this they conclude that all religious beliefs are equally valid.

    It is certainly true that you can never know something with 100% certainty, but religious questions, like all questions, need to be weighed against empirical and rational realities.  I can never be completely positive that Greek mythology isn’t the correct understanding of divinity, but there is virtually no basis for such viewpoints.  Therefore, in all likelihood it is not true.  Similar (and more thorough) analysis can be applied to most religious viewpoints.

                In similar fashion, many have argued that humans cannot grasp truth about objects because the linguistic symbols and conventions humans utilize are not based on adequate awareness of objects.  They claim we merely have awareness of the mental or representative states of objects and not adequate awareness of objects themselves (because of sensory and intellectual limitations).  The path between an individual and an object, which moves from object to perception to concept to linguistic symbol, dilutes our awareness of the object in and of itself and undercuts our ability to find actual truth.

    I grant that humans cannot directly access all possible perceptions and interpretations of an object, but it is not clear why this is a problem or why as a result humans cannot be adequately aware of objects or discover any truth about objects.  This criterion for truth is far too extreme – it claims we either have complete truth and awareness of an object or none at all.  Representative states are imperfect, but they also give humans a way of knowing and understanding all sorts of things about an object.  And although sensory data and representative states can be deceiving at times, and there is a sequential path between objects, perceptions, concepts, and words, this path still gives humans a form of awareness that has proven itself extremely valuable for learning highly probable truth about the world over time.