Alan Tsai
Schroeder
English 1A Section 015
18 November 2009
The Problematic Theory of Knowledge
The second problem with language is the problem of accuracy of translation. The world is filled with different cultures, and within each culture is another language, and within each language, there are different dialects so it is difficult to translate the meaning of one sentence of one language to another language (60). For example, there is a fruit called longan fruit that is typically grown in southern China. However, in Mandarin, the Chinese call it “long yan” which literally means “dragon’s eye.” The Chinese would say “wo chi long yan” which means “I am eating longan fruit.” However, when literally translated to English, it reads “I am eating a dragon’s eye,” which is not accurate. When hearing a translation of that phrase, a person would be left confused. Although there are few faults to language, it is still crucial and essential for the growth of society because language allows for communication between different groups of people.
One of the biggest reasons why heavily relying on emotions as a source of knowledge is unfavorable is the idea egocentrism (Solomon and Higgins 194). When people are caught in an argument, there is a reason why they take the position they do. It is because they think they are right, and because of that, they argue in any way they can to prove that their stance on the argument is right, no matter how asinine their argument is. It is their emotions that do not allow them to subject themselves to the opposing arguments so they do what they can to say they are right. This can be related to the idea of bias.
The last way of obtaining knowledge is through logic and reason. Every day, people use logic to reason out various problems they encounter in areas such as mathematics or science (Lagemaat 112). Reasoning can be done through two types of reasoning: deductive reasoning and inductive reasoning. In deductive...