How do we know what we know?

Genealogy is not an exact science. What we know about the historicalpast and particularly our family is based on our experience. Some of theinformation is likely very accurate, while it is entirely possible thatsome of the things we know, or think we know, about our family areentirely false. Whether our beliefs about our family are based in factor not, depends to a great extent on our system of justified beliefs,that is, those things we "know" to be true from our experience eventhough we have no objective evidence or proof that they are true. Inmany cases, we may or may not be able to differentiate between fact andfiction, since it is experience which creates our system of justifiedbeliefs and our experience may be limited or faulty.

Evidence of the past is based on our perceptions, coupled with memoriesand introspection (i.e. thinking about our memories). In addition, wemay have as yet unsubstantiated beliefs we can call intuition. All ofthese combine to form what we think we know about our ancestry.

That area of philosophy that deals with the study of knowledge and justified belief is called epistemology.It is not my intention to delve into the realm of philosophy, but it isimportant for those practicing in a fact-based discipline likegenealogy, to take the time to analyze the basis for our beliefs aboutour family to the end of rejecting those portions of our justifiedbeliefs that do not comport with reality. "Justification is the reasonwhy someone properly holds a belief, the explanation as to why the belief is a true one, or an account of how one knows what one knows." Wikipedia.The real question is how do we determine a historical reality in lightof our human tendency to justify our beliefs and can we overcome thattendency?

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