Theme 1: Theory of science - Reflection

My experience with philosophy is rather limited. I haven’t taken any courses in it at university nor at high school. So this assignment was something new for me. Usually at KTH we learn to solve problems by finding the correct answer or solution. What we learn about for example maths and physics require us to accept a scientific stance on what’s true and what’s not. Thing that have been “proven” by science is regarded as facts which we seldom dispute.

In Russell’s text he challenges accepted theories and that we can’t be sure what’s real. I think this text brought some insight on how we usually take all knowledge as facts and never questions it. It was also interesting to read about how our view on different objects is only a view of our own perception and will differ some person to person. Knowing about this is a good quality to have as a researcher or scientist. I guess we can widen our own mind if we think like this and not only get in line and conform to what some textbook or professor tells us to be true.

The text felt a bit repetitive at times but interesting. That’s usually a great way to learn, but some parts became confusing to me so I had to reread a lot of paragraphs. I’m comfortable reading in English but I’m not very experienced in reading this kind of texts so that might have added to me getting confused. However, after reading the blogs this week and the comments I got, some of the things that weren’t clear to me became clearer. I also got the feeling that I wasn’t the only one who thought the text was a bit confusing sometimes.

It was unfortunate the seminar was cancelled because it might have enlightened me further on Russell’s views.