Knowledgeisbelief – and shaped by culture

Abstract

Phillips and colleagues claim that the representation of knowledge is more basic than the representation of belief, presupposing them to be categorically distinct mental states with distinct evolutionary purposes. We argue that the relationship between the two is much more complex, is further shaped by culture and language, and leaves its mark on manifestations of theory of mind and teaching.

The dual role of culture for reconstructing early sapiens cognition.

“…Unlike most nonhuman species, humans can gather information in two distinct ways: directly as individuals through their own experiences or indirectly from members of their group such as parents, teachers, or peers. In fact, most of what people come to accept as true in the course of their lives is socially learned, often incompletely and imperfectly, rather than arrived at through experience or empirical testing (Bender & Gatewood, 2021;Bender & Oterhals, in press;D'Andrade, 1995;Gatewood, 2011Gatewood, , 2012. Furthermore, we tend to take for granted what we learn from others (Legare & Nielsen, 2015;Sloman & Fernbach, 2017); even the mere belief that someone else understands a phenomenon increases our own sense of understanding (Sloman & Rabb, 2016), and oftentimes we could not be more wrong (e.g., Lawson, 2006;McCloskey et al, 1983;Rozenblit & Keil, 2002).…”

“…Such observations, however, do not remain in isolation; they give rise to more abstract concepts, are integrated into mental models on the topic, and tend to be organized by overarching theories of how things are related. To a substantial degree, this body of culturally accumulating knowledge is predicated on believing and on subjective interpretations rather than on personally verified understandings (Bender & Gatewood, 2021), such as which mushrooms are edible (Bender & Oterhals, in press), and is organized by explanatory frameworks that themselves represent culture-specific perspectives on the world (ojalehto et al, 2015, 2017a, 2017b). While this cognitive content is tested against and adjusted to reality over generations, and hence constrained in the extent of diversity, it continues to be permeated by culture-specific values, attitudes, and beliefs.…”