Surface Tensions
Emotion, Conflict and the Social Containment of Dangerous Knowledge
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 23431097 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Andrew Cooper (0000-0003-4972-8812, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2007 |
| Pages | 139-155 |
| Publication date | 2007-01-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | CHAPTER |
| Venue | Public Emotions (SOURCE_BOOK) |
| Publisher | Palgrave Macmillan UK (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.1057/9780230598225_7 |
| OpenAlex | W2488966997 |
| ISBN | 9780230598225 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 7 |
In public life, how do we know that we know what we think we know? Trust, whether personal or social, depends upon a framework of confidence in our epistemological relationship to the world around us, and to ourselves. For the conduct of everyday life we need to believe that we are in possession of reliable ways to distinguish fact from fantasy, truth from lies, fiction from documentary, evidence from interpretation, knowledge from belief, possibility from probability — in fact the daily shopping list of epistemological essentials is rather long when one reflects upon it. Knowing, or at least believing, that we know how to know is a precondition of a trusting rather than a suspicious relationship to reality. But from time to time our received social framework of confidence in these matters is profoundly shaken. Episodes or periods of radical doubt are both necessary for social change as well as reflecting such change, and this chapter attempts to illuminate some features of these processes.
Art · Epistemology · Everyday life · Fantasy · Interpretation (philosophy) · Literature · Possession (linguistics) · Precondition · Sociology · Anthropology: Ethics, History, Culture · Middle East and Rwanda Conflicts · Philosophy · Psychology · Social Psychology
| Citation velocity | historical |
|---|---|
| Highly cited | No |