Inside Knowledge

The parade of conscious experience waltzes by with sights, sounds, smells, feelings, thoughts, volition and other direct experiences.

All further conscious knowledge -- the noticing of patterns in this parade, forming ideas and beliefs -- is partial, fallible, approximate and ever-evolving.

Is conscious knowledge the only type?

How does an infant know how to suck on a bottle? It's instinct, the same instinct widely apparent in the animal world. This is knowledge, but it is not taught or learned; it is inherent, possibly coded in genes. It is "inside" knowledge.

Instinct forms a greater portion of our knowledge than we perhaps would like to admit. The mere fact that we survive requires the activation of numerous instincts, from the basic drive to survive, to the necessity of bodily functions, to complicated social interactions.

Researchers in the rapidly growing field of evolutionary psychology have come to see a basis in instinct in a wide range of human behaviors, all driven by the evolution-powered need for successful reproduction.

This broad motivator of our behavior is only in small part affected by our conscious perceptions; for the most part the behavior arises "from within," by instinct.

Repetition can internalize knowledge to the point that conscious thought is no longer necessary.

An example is the way someone plays the piano, or types on a keyboard. At first, the conscious mind is needed to learn the keys, but after much repetition, the behavior becomes "automatic." The conscious mind does not bother to think of the next key to be pressed, and in fact, if it tries, the whole process gets slowed down and mucked up. The conscious mind merely thinks of the end result, and the fingers do their thing on their own.

Clearly, knowing how to play the piano or how to type is knowledge, but just as clearly, this knowledge is not generally brought into consciousness. Knowledge can exist without the conscious mind needing to know every little detail.

Another type of knowledge that seems to come from "inside" is intuition, hunches and what is called the "subconscious." This type of knowledge springs up spontaneously, as if from some inside well.

As we probe into the nature of knowledge, we must realize that the probing is done consciously, but there is knowledge which the conscious mind does not reach. Is there a way to learn more?

Next: Unlearning