Negative Epistemology

Is epistemology about building up our knowledge? I would like to put forward an alternative: the goal of understanding is to reduce our knowledge; or rather, to reduce our habitual sedimentations and programmed responses to the world. It is not something we hold on to, but a clearing away and a freeing up.

For example, I can come to the world conditioned by a good number of anti-Islamic attitudes, conditioned by society. I can then approach scholarly research which points out a number of ways in which I am just wrong about the Islamicate world. What have I learned? Well, there have been facts involved, and it can be helpful to keep them on hand as tools for various purposes, not least of which is helping other people come to the same point. But what I have really gained is a removal of old habits and a new openness to people and society. Even if I forget everything I read, I keep this new freedom unless old habits find ways of re-asserting themselves.

So when I approach philosophy from an historical angle, I should sometimes remember the arguments; they are essential for publishing and teaching, and therefore securing a job. But the mere memory of ideas is not necessarily what I am after. Of what use is mere accumulation of knowledge, other than as a mere pastime? I want to free my thinking, to see how I have become blind to my own presuppositions, and to how I already hedge in the possibilities of the world.

Now, one might say that there certainly seem to be times at which we want to have knowledge, and we mean by that that we are actually building up facts about the world. Granted. To this end, I distinguish two types of knowledge. One the knowledge of means to a given end, and in this case we want positive knowledge of how to go about achieving our end. But how do we pick an end in the first place? How do we come at the world in general, aside for using it for our own purposes? It is in situations like these where I would suggest that a negative epistemology might be in order, at least as an interesting thought experiment.