“What is Knowledge that I Should Acquire It”: Towards an I-Thou

Abstract

This paper dwells on the concept of Buber's 'Ich and Du', popularly known as 'I and Thou', as it concerns knowledge production and acquisition. From Buberian parlance, 'I and Thou' can be seen in twofold, 'I-It' and 'I-Thou'. While the former emphasizes separation, the latter accentuates relation. In its original position, this paper raises questions as, what knowledge is, what lie is, what constitutes truth, how knowledge becomes different from belief, who is/are to be educated, amongst others. The paper further clarifies terms as, 'to know' and 'to learn', and critically examines the philosophical anthropology of man, essence of man and relevance of knowledge acquisition. With the realization of human advancement, this paper submits that an individual to/with individual must strive to realize one another’s potentialities and intend each another as a particular person specifically reaching out in a bipolar situation not seeing one another as mere objects but rather same as oneself.

Demoethical Model of Sustainable Development of Society: A Roadmap towards Digital Transformation

“…Dialectics is the doctrine of the most general regular connections, the formation and development of being and cognition, and the method of creatively cognizing thinking based on this doctrine. Dialectical knowledge considers all objects and phenomena in terms of general connection and development [83][84][85]. Socrates was the first to use the term "dialectics" to refer to the art of conducting an effective dispute, a dialogue aimed at a mutually interesting discussion of a problem to achieve the truth by confronting opinions [86].…”

Nature of Knowledge in Philosophy

“…The traditional account of knowledge as justified true belief (JTB) has been challenged by the American philosopher Edmund Gettier in his 1963 three-page paper. He gave two counterexamples to illustrate that there are instances where a person may have a justified true belief about a knowledge claim and still fail to 'know it' because although justified, the reason(s) for the belief turned out to be false [31].…”

“…The epistemologically understood world is not only a representation but a semantic horizon. Knowledge has also been subjected to further criticisms; however, epistemology or theory of knowledge provides the basis for conceptual analysis; a coherent path for our thinking that opens us to a whole new world of 'knowing', unraveling what knowledge is and what it is not [31].…”