Using history and at least one other area of knowledge, examine the claim

that it is possible to attain knowledge despite problems of bias and

selection

The topic in question wants me to find out that whether is it really possible or feasible to gain
knowledge even in face of common problems that hinder the gain of such knowledge – notably
being bias and selection. In order to explore the subject in a better way, let’s first understand
what bias and selection actually means in the dictionary.

Upon compilation of various definitions of the term “bias” from various dictionaries, the
common standard definition of bias emerges as: “a divergent, irrational preferential favour or
behaviour towards an opinion, belief, idea, and concept or towards a person or any other thing
that is not expected under normal circumstances. It is a deviant behaviour that blocks any
objective consideration of a thing, situation or an issue as the opinion is generally formed and a
conclusion is made beforehand without having a second thought on the issue or matter. The
other term selection means that a single choice has been made in selecting a particular thing,
idea or belief and that selection might not be totally justifiable at all as a rational approach might
have been left out in making the selection and it may have been subject to prejudice and bias.
At a first glance it might seem that an unbiased, unselected knowledge offers the purest and best
forms of knowledge, but being totally objective in outlook such a knowledge might be useless
due to it’s sheer volume. As there would be widespread uncertainties in determining which
knowledge fits to the closest definition of truth, it would be practically impossible to segregate
the unbiased knowledge from all the selection of knowledge tagged as uncertain.
On the other hand the relative ease of comparing and evaluating the knowledge which may be
tagged as subjective makes room for being the best form of knowledge in practical use, even
though it may have been derived by selection or bias. As it is better specified and can be better
compared and evaluated in comparison with other forms of knowledge that may not be biased or
selective, it has more weightage as it can justify what is closest to truth.

If I take an area of knowledge, say History, my knowledge claim tells me that knowledge
in this area of knowledge cannot be attained without involving selection or bias. The main
purpose of History is to either keep a record of the events that occurred in the past or to prove
some view on a topic or incident of past. In exemplifying the above, I would like to refer to a
history book on world history which is written by Lowe. This book of history contains a broad
perspective and overview of events that happened in the past and the book’s objective is to
provide the summary of major important events that happened in the world in the past. But in
compiling the data and providing the hierarchy of events in the book, it is the writer Lowe who
decides what should come first and what should follow it including the amount of exposure
provided to a topic that may be suited best in the interests of the writer himself. Lowe as an
individual writes what he deems to be the priority of topics and the amount of space it should
take in the book based on his thinking and reasoning and his personal view and opinion.

Similarly in writing the book, The Discovery of India, the Late Indian Prime Minister, Mr.
Jawaharlal Nehru made his point of view on the book which was pertaining to India’s history
and the hierarchy of the chapter and it’s content were set according to Nehru’s personal views
and beliefs.
Not only in reading books are we indirectly supporting bias and selection but the method of
imparting knowledge is so set that we receive knowledge that has been filtered by bias and
selection. For example in our history class, we learn to analyze and examine various sources
with a particular process called OPVL. By doing so, we are deliberately making knowledge
selective by filtering and selection that may be biased in origin.

Now we will consider the case of counter claim of the knowledge issue which implies that
knowledge can be gained even if the problems of selection and bias remain in obtaining it.
In making the above statement realistic, let’s consider a history book whose content is totally
unbiased. This seems to be highly unrealistic but let’s consider it for a while. Even if it is
unbiased, it will have a plethora of information and the knowledge would be very much useful
for us and by reading it in a narrative way, one can feel going back in past in a time machine,
experiencing the events live infront of the eyes and feeling the emotions as it happened in the
past. Although it may seem that both the knowledge claims appear to be valid, yet History as an
area of knowledge is such a subject that relies more on an individual’s own personal
interpretation of the past events in time and the way how he or she might want to put it before us
by it’s depiction or portrayal. Most of the work of historians is based on providing a summary or
conclusion to a historical episode and they write the history with such a preconceived mindset in
the very first place. In trying to portray their “customized” & “personalized” version of history,
historians often skip many points in history and compile the ones that they deem most fit to suit
their opinions and beliefs. So the end result in the form of conclusion is also different from the
real history that actually happened in past.
The other area of knowledge that I will take for presenting my views on the topic is Natural
sciences in which my knowledge claim tells me that the data in this AOK is seldom unbiased or
without selection. An example can be found in the scientific procedure like making observation,
proposing hypothesis, making predictions, doing the experiment, collecting the data and finally
arriving at the conclusion which is normal in an objective way of working with science. But an
important and equally interesting point to observe in natural sciences is that all scientific
assumptions are basically based on a hypothesis and the experiment is based on that hypothesis.
The hypothesis which is the point of creation of scientific experiment is seldom put to test and
this is where bias and selection in natural sciences creeps in as any experiment is biased right
from the beginning. To put a backup to this claim, the following sentence will suffice it: Since
facts and data are not discovered merely by chance but by proper scientific method, the
scientists are aware before hand where to begin and start and what exactly to find out. So in
doing so, the scientists have a pre constructed idea of what they are particularly looking for and
once they think that they had found it, they start looking for evidences which can be used for
backing their hypothesis. The term given to this kind of bias is “confirmation bias”.

So we can see that in natural sciences, seemingly genuine knowledge or facts are normally
biased and selective as the result may itself be derived on a false or wrong hypothesis at the first
place. In exemplifying the above statement we can put the example of the shape of our planet
which at first was thought to be flat, then round and now finally an ellipsoid shaped object. So it
is seen that bias and selection are also subject to change in due course of time due to gaining of
new knowledge and attaining latest technology. But humans will always have bias and selection
in them.
If we make a counter claim to this knowledge issue, we will find that in a scientific experiment,
some real knowledge is always gained even though the hypothesis or assumption may be
incorrect. An experiment may reveal large quantities of data but the data collected is also
knowledge – be it be small or big
If the problems of bias and selection were not there in the first place, then chances are that
natural sciences would had evolved at a much smaller pace.

So one may be tempted to ask that which knowledge is better? One that is objective or the one
that is subjective? This is because the former is useless and the latter may be false.
So conclude, it can be said that although unbiased and unselected information gain by objective
knowledge seem to be having better content, it is not easily summarised and comprehensible.
However biased knowledge in being selective offers more knowledge as it is not only subjective
but also easily comparable with other knowledge for reference, etc., The flipside to this kind of
knowledge is that it could be incorrect and wrong. But even though for me knowledge gained by
bias and selection is more convincing as it leads one towards the trail of actual knowledge and
truth. This is because there is a point where the knowledge claims could be justified which is
farm more better than having knowledge that doesn’t have any verifiable lead on correctness
and authencity. So I somehow disagree with the knowledge claim of the topic as knowledge that
has passed justification & reasoning is closer to truth than knowledge that is biased and
selective.

Word count = 1570

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Books:

Lowe, Norman. Mastering Modern World History, 4th Edition, Palgrave Macmillan , 2005, NY

Nehru, Jawaharlal. The discovery of India, Oxford University Press, 1985

Web:

http://able2know.org/topic/167188-1

http://www.dur.ac.uk/4schools/History/Biasintro.htm