UNIVERSITY OF JOS

FACULTY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES

DEPARTMENT OF PSYCHOLOGY

UJ/2016/SS/0006

EZIE AMOBI LEWIS

COURSE TITLE:
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COURSE CODE:
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QUESTION
GIVE A COMAPRISON BETWEEN THE SCIENTIFIC SOURCE OF
KNOWLEDGE AND OTHER SOURCES OF KNOWLEDGE
Sources of Knowledge

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 Knowledge according to webster’s dictionary, is the fact or condition of knowing something with
familiarity gained through experience or association.
There are many ways to gain knowledge, and some are better than others. As scientists, psychologists must
be aware of each of these methods. Let’s look at several ways of acquiring knowledge, comparing them, beginning
with sources that may not be as reliable or accurate as scientists might desire. We will then consider sources that
offer greater reliability and ultimately discuss using science as a means of gaining knowledge.
About a century ago, an American philosopher Pierce (1877) compared the scientific way of acquiring
knowledge with three other methods. He labeled these the authority, tenacity and a priori methods.

1. Intuition: sometimes referred to as the “I just know it” knowledge. When we gain knowledge via
intuition it
means that we have knowledge of something without being consciously aware of where the knowledge
came from.
2. Authority: According to Peirce, accepting someone’s word on faith is the simplest way of fixing
belief. A trusted authority tells you what is true and what is false. Most Christians believe that
God exists because the Bible says so. Religious beliefs are formed by the method of authority.
You may believe your professors because they are authorities in the discipline.

3. Tenacity: Another method of fixing belief is one in which a person consistently refuses to
change an acquired knowledge, despite evidence to the contrary. This method of tenacity as it
was termed by Peirce is commonly seen in racial bigots and realists that rigidly cling to a
stereotype even in the presence of good counter example. Although this method of maintaining
belief may not be completely rational it does have some value in the sense that it helps those
who adopt it to form a uniform and constant outlook on things and therefore may relieve them
from some amount of stress and psychological discomfort. For people who have a difficulty in
handling stress the method of tenacity may be a reasonable way to fix belief.

4. A Priori: In this context the term a priori refers to something that believed without previous
study or examination. Propositions that seem reasonable are believed. This in a sense is an
extension of the method of authority. In the a priori method, however, there is no one particular
authority that is being followed blindly. In most instances, the general cultural outlook is what
seems to fix belief a priori. At one time people believe that the world was flat and it seemed
reasonable to suppose that world revolved around the earth, as does the moon.

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5. Rationalism: gaining knowledge via rationalism involves logical reasoning. With this approach, ideas
are precisely stated and logical rules are applied to arrive at a logically sound conclusion. Rational ideas are
often presented in the form of a syllogism. For example:
All humans are mortal;
I am a human;
Therefore, I am mortal.

6. Scientific Method: Science is concerned with interrelated principles, laws and theories. This
method fixes belief on the basis of experience. If we define scientific psychology (as well as
science generally) as a repeatable self-correcting undertaking that seeks to understand
phenomena on the basis of empirical observation, then we can see several advantage to science
over the other methods that we have outlined. What do we mean when we say that science is
empirical and self-correcting?
An examination of these concepts will enable us to see the advantage of science over
the other methods. First, none of the methods that we have specified relies on data
(observations of the world) obtained by systematic observation. In other words, these other
methods have no empirical basis for fixing beliefs. The word empirical is derived from an old
Greek word meaning experience. Thus, having an empirical basis for beliefs means that
experience rather than faith constitutes the basis for knowledge.
The second advantage of science is that it offers procedures for establishing the
superiority of one belief over another. In general, it would be difficult for people holding
different beliefs to reconcile their various opinions and positions. Science deals with this
problem because in principle, anyone can make an empirical observation, which means that
scientific data can be public and obtained repeatedly. Through public observations, new beliefs
are compared with old and existing beliefs. Such old beliefs may be discarded if they do not fit
the empirical facts. Indeed, changing scientific beliefs is usually a slow process, but eventually
incorrect ideas are dropped. Empirical, public observations are the bases of scientific method,
because they make science a self-correcting enterprise.
The third advantage of scientific knowledge is that unlike knowledge gained from
authority which might only be accepted by only people who you work with and might not be
generally or nationally accepted scientific knowledge is generally accepted nationally.

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 The fourth advantage is that scientific method can be relied upon to solve problems
consistently knowledge need to be shared and the scientific method is easy to explain to others
unlike intuition which its knowledge cannot or hardly be explained to others.
Conclusion

Although there are other types of knowledge the scientific source of knowledge is the most
widely accepted source of knowledge because it can easily be communicated to others.

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 References
A.k.J IBANGA, A. M. (2004). POLITICS AND ETHICS OF SOCIAL SCIENCE RESEARCH. In A. M. A.k.J IBANGA,
INTRODUCTION TO BASIC AND APPLIED PSYCHOLOGY (pp. 34-35). JOS: WAPTECH LIMITED.

Habermas, J. (1971). Knowledge and Human interest Boston: Beacon.