5.WaysofKnowingareaCheckofOurInstinctualJudgments.

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AlexNguyen
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Feb.3,2015
TheoryofKnowledge
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Two seconds. That is all it takes for students to make instinctive

judgments about the effectiveness of a teacher (Ambady). Instinctive
judgments are a knowers immediate responses to knowledge claims, most
hard-wired in our neural structures. Instinctive judgments play an enormous
role in our daily lives, probably because of their sensational success in
keeping us alive as a species for thousands of years. The prescribed title is
asking whether instinctual judgments, usually based on incomplete data, are
avoided by utilizing ways of knowing. I disagree with reservations because
ways of knowing are often complements instead of checks to our instinctive
judgments. In a range of areas of knowledge, three ways of knowing
including sensory perception, language, and memory have a heavily
biological and neurological basis. That is, they do not escape the influence of
instinctive judgments.
Humans often believe their senses to be methodical sensors and
cameras, duly noting bundles of data for us to interpret. However, sensory
perceptions, which are processed and created in the brain, are greatly
influenced by instinctive judgments. Our adaptive unconscious, responsible
for snap judgments, decide which information to prioritize attention to
because our conscious working memory are only able to simultaneously hold
a finite amount of information (Wilson). This means that our instinctive
judgments, shaped by neural structures that are built according to
environmental and genetic factors, continuously shape our selective sensory
perception processes, in turn shape future instinctive judgments, creating a

feedback loop. Therefore, sensory perception is not a completely reliable

check against instinctive judgments because it is heavily dependent on
them. For example, an invaluable ancient Greek sculpture was sold at the
Getty Museum in the 1980s (Hoving). Before making such a risky deal, the
museum sent experts to check legal documents and radiologists to verify the
material of the sculpture. Unfortunately for the museum, the sculpture was
later identified to be a forgery. In hindsight, there were signs that the legal
documents had been fudged and chemical tricks played to fool the X-ray
sensors. Yet these experts ignored all of these clues, protecting the notorious
duplicity. The Getty Museum was a brand new venture then, and it believed
that an ancient Greek sculpture would be a valuable asset. This belief, fueled
by an irrational but instinctual desire for fame and prestige, overshadowed
the experts sensory perception, leading them to perceive or misperceive
signs. Therefore, our tendency to perceive only what supports our instinct
prevents sensory precludes us from trusting it too much. This shows that
sensory perception is not necessarily a check to instinctive judgments,
because our instincts tell us what to selectively perceive.
On the other hand, in the natural and social sciences where sensory
perception and observation are ways of knowing, there is greater room for
sensory perception to check instinctive judgments. This is especially true in
the natural sciences, where expectations have less bearing on the results
because there are fewer variables to control for. For example, in my physics
class I often had to contradict my intuition by solving problems about

relativity, which postulates that things shorten as they move faster.

However, even in the social sciences instinctual beliefs on the outcomes
mean that the scientist will control for only variables they believe are
relevant and therefore produce a result consistent with their expectations.
83% of psychology articles in the journal Science report affirmative results to
their hypothesis. This shows that if we can nearly always find what we are
looking for in our instinctual judgments.
Memory is not at all like a library indexing system where one can easily
locate the source of knowledge from a catalogue, pull it out, recover it, and
then put it back safely where it belonged. Today courts still use witness
testimonies as credible evidence in order to convict someone of serious
crime. Remembering and recalling a memory are much more like uploading
and downloading a YouTube video. As we continuously upload and download
videos, some data is lost each time and eventually the video is vastly altered
and somewhat unwatchable. Although memory does not become
unwatchable, it subtly changes whenever it is recalled (CBC). As we recall a
memory more and more times, it becomes increasingly difficult to rid it of
instinctive judgments, and thus, they are not completely reliable checks on
our instinctive judgments. For example, my friend Olivia is a huge fan of
bread and she loves it on every occasion. She will eat bread without any
condiments if she can. After we had our little party at a Capilano math
competition I asked her what she had. She replied bread and I stared at her
dumb-foundedly. I told her that there was no bread, only spaghetti, soups,

and salads at the party. Her own instinctive feelings about bread trumped the
memory that she formed at the party, replacing it with a version more
favorable to her instincts. The fact that our memory is consistently shaped
by our own brains as they change in response to more recent events shows
that memory is not a completely reliable way of knowing. Many witnesses
have insisted that some person is the culprit only for DNA evidence to
exonerate them decades later.
However, memory can still play a role in helping us avoid instinctive
judgments. As we grow older and develop a greater ability to self-control
under the guidance with the experience of our memory, it is our instinctive
judgments and behaviors that we learn to suppress. For example, I simply
love the taste of Chipotle and spicy Mexican food. However, from experience
and my own unpleasant memories I know that the next day I will have very
irritable bowels. I have decided that this discomfort is not worth the extra
happiness I get from eating Mexican. This shows that memory can help play
a role in suppressing our instinct when our instinct is a source of harm or
discomfort because our memories and inductive reasoning can be used by
our higher-order brain as a rational counterbalance to the urges of our
instinctive brain. We should not discard memory as a way of knowing
completely, but rely on it cautiously as it is can be influenced by our
instinctive judgments.
We often think of language as learned. We go to school to learn more
about our language and take foreign language courses to acquaint ourselves

with another. However, certain linguists, such as Chomsky and Pinker,

believe that language itself is an instinct, hardwired into our genetic code.
They point to the fact that our ability to rapidly acquire our first language
declines very quickly in the first years of our lives. That means that if
someone has not learned to speak their first language by the age of nine or
ten they are unlikely to be able to speak properly at all (Bongaerts, Planken,
Schils). Language also has a profound relationship with instinctive judgment
in that both affect each other continuously. Our instinctive behavior and
judgments, as summarized succinctly by the word personality, affect the
type of language we use, and on the other hand, the language we use affects
our instinctive judgments. For example, assertive people who instinctively
know how to project confidence uses self-confident language, as opposed to
an insecure person. Our immediate responses to the situation are measured
by what type of language is used. People against abortion rights call
themselves pro-life, while people for reproductive rights call themselves prochoice. People for a universal health care system are called socialists
whereas people for a laissez-faire economy are called corporate shills.
These labels and differences in language have significant impact on the
world we have today, as instinctive judgments give rise to a difference in the
language used between both sides, signifying a breakdown in
intercommunication. The unfortunate fact that our capacity for language can
be influenced by our instinctive judgment shows that language is itself not a
completely reliable check against our snap decisions.

However, language can still be used to check ones instinctive

judgments. Because language shapes thought and consequently, higher
order thinking it can be used in humans faculties of logic. Logic is often cited
as the antithesis to instinctive judgment, and rightly so, as its validity does
not depend on the subjective whims of each individual. Furthermore, the
nature of our own language obliges us to habitually think about certain ideas
which can override our instinctual responses. For example, I speak
Vietnamese, a Southeast Asian language heavily influenced by Confucian
values. Therefore, Vietnamese has an extremely complicated system of
honorifics based on the family. I call everyone else a brother, a sister, an
uncle younger than father, an uncle older than father, a grandfather,
depending on their age relative to me. This somewhat limits my arguments
with older Vietnamese people against my instinctive judgment at times
because in my culture, I am instilled respect for authority. This shows that
language can be built to as a check of our instinctive judgments.
Instinctive judgments play a bigger role than most of us realize in how
we evaluate and accept knowledge claims. Most ways of knowing, including
sensory perception, memory, and language have biological and neurological
bases along with our adaptive unconscious, the part of the brain that makes
instinctive decisions. This means that while it is possible to keep our snap
judgments in check with ways of knowing, we need to understand that this
does not always work and therefore, to always be careful and wary of our

instincts. Ways of knowing have been developed to keep us alive, not to

make us good philosophers.
Works Cited
Ambady, Nalini, and Robert Rosenthal. "Half a Minute: Predicting Teacher
Evaluations from Thin Slices of Nonverbal Behavior and Physical
Attractiveness." Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 64.3
(1993): 431-41. Web. 3 Feb. 2015.
Hoving, Thomas. "False Impressions: The Hunt for Big-Time Art Fakes
Paperback May 8, 1997." False Impressions: The Hunt for Big-Time
Art Fakes: Thomas Hoving: 9780684831480: Amazon.com: Books.
N.p., n.d. Web. 03 Feb. 2015.
"Scientists Explore the Illusion of Memory." CBCnews. CBC/Radio Canada, 04
Jan. 2013. Web. 03 Feb. 2015.
Singleton, D. M., and Zsolt Lengyel. The Age Factor in Second Language
Acquisition: A Critical Look at the Critical Period Hypothesis.
Clevedon: Philadelphia, 1995. 30-50. Print.
Wilson, Timothy D. Strangers to Ourselves: Discovering the Adaptive
Unconscious. Cambridge, MA: Belknap of Harvard UP, 2002. Print.