What is the difference between Fake News, and Sound Knowledge?
How do you tell?
If you want someone else to tell you—a government, an expert, or a newspaper—what happens if they are wrong? Are you willing to take that risk, or is there some other way to discern knowledge from speculative opinion that you can use for yourself?
This question, how do we tell the difference between knowledge and opinion, has been a question asked since ancient times. The classical challenge of epistemology, or the theory of knowledge, is how do we distinguish genuine knowledge from rumour or invalid speculation. This is a crucial skill, as each of us faces ideas—good or bad—from possibly thousands of sources each time we go to the internet.
“The classical challenge of ‘epistemology’, or the theory of knowledge, is how do we distinguish genuine knowledge from rumour or invalid speculation”
The problem with using accepted ‘mainstream’ sources of information is that they, too, can be wrong, dishonest, or misinformed. Your decisions are your responsibility. If you base those decisions on invalid knowledge, then you will make errors that can cost you in lost time, money, or even threaten your own and your family’s welfare or survival.
Would it be valuable to have a set of mental ‘tools’ to call upon that helped you discern knowledge more easily? Our success in life demands we have a means of validating knowledge that we can use for ourselves.
The new book, Validating Ideas, is written for exactly this purpose.
In order to produce Artificial Intelligence technology, author and scientist Kevin Alexanderman spent more than 10 years developing a new theory of knowledge, including a new science of validation, also called a scientific method.
It is different than Galileo’s scientific method because it works for all ideas, in the general case, including concepts of the humanities. If you want to learn more about this crucial intellectual skill, and how you can improve your chances of success in everything you do, click below and receive a free booklet, The 4 Pillars of Intelligence.