Should a knower’s personal point of view be considered an asset in the pursuit of knowledge, or an obstacle to be overcome?
...anged many times, some of these theories include “Thomson’s Plum Pudding model”, which suggests that atoms were a large mass of “positive glue” with small, negative electrons in them. The current theory differs quite a lot from either of these, suggesting atoms consist of mainly nothing, with small electrons orbiting a nucleus which contains protons and neutrons. Theories like this have many times proven to be wrong, yet have helped to develop a new theory or expand upon a previously thought of theory, which will first of all increase the knowledge of the person developing/improving the theory, and then perhaps of other people as well, if it proves to be successful. This is an example where a personal point of view is first an obstacle, which then leads to acquiring further knowledge, therefore becoming an asset. When attempting to prove a theory, the person or group of people doing this will most probably obtain quite a lot of knowledge concerning the theory being studied during the process of attempting to prove it, whether it is proven right or not. These theories have all originated from a personal opinion, and become a good asset in the pursuit of knowledge. A personal point of view given to a knower, can be questioned and can then lead to the acquisition of knowledge. If someone says “I don’t like this weather”, a knower may question this and may attempt to find out why the person dislikes that kind of weather. He may succeed at finding out if he finds out whether this person said it because he has been ‘taught’ that that kind of weather is ‘bad’, or because the weather reminds him/her of something that happened in the past that he/she disliked, or because they have given it conscious thought and have reasons for them to think it to be like that. In doing this, the person questioning the statement can acquire knowledge about the person or even achieve a more general knowledge of people in general, or equally if the person having said this becomes the questioner of his own statement, he can acquire more knowledge about himself and realize that he does not truly think this or has no reasons to think so. This is another example in which a personal point of view is an asset in the pursuit of knowledge. Personal points of view are also sometimes an obstacle in the pursuit of knowledge, as information becomes biased, and may prevent the person from acquiring further knowledge. A religious person, who believes in a god as a creator of the universe, has this as a personal point of view (it is not always a strictly ‘personal’ point of view; it may equally be a point of view of a group of people). This point of view may prevent this person or group of people from even wanting to know about theories of creation of the universe, and therefore can limit their knowledge in a wider usage of its definition. As is well known, many authors, if not all, employ personal points of view in the writing of their literature, if this is what they write (I am excluding news articles or ...