What is Yoruba Epistemology? (African Philosophy)
Summary
TLDRThis video from the 'Car Daddy' series delves into Yoruba epistemology, a West African philosophical approach that challenges Western notions of knowledge as justified true belief. It contrasts 'emo' or first-hand knowledge with 'Gbagbo', knowledge based on testimony or justification. Yoruba epistemology prioritizes sensory experience as the most reliable form of knowledge, differing from Western foundationalism that often relies on logical justification. The video invites viewers to consider the strengths and weaknesses of these epistemological perspectives and encourages skepticism about the foundational claims of both traditions.
Takeaways
- 🌍 The video is part of a series analyzing African philosophy, focusing on Yoruba epistemology.
- 📚 Yoruba epistemology challenges the Western notion of knowledge as justified true belief.
- 👀 'Mo' refers to knowledge gained through first-hand sensory experience and is considered undeniable and strongly connected to truth.
- 🗣️ 'Egbagbo' refers to information not directly experienced but believed based on testimony, divided into verifiable ('osi') and only justifiable ('alaye') categories.
- 🔍 Verifiable 'egbagbo' can potentially be confirmed through personal experience, whereas justifiable 'egbagbo' relies solely on explanation and argument.
- 🤔 The distinction in Yoruba epistemology highlights that direct sensory experience is seen as more reliable than second-hand testimony or logical justification.
- 🔄 The video contrasts this with Western epistemology, which often places higher value on logical truths and justification over sensory experience.
- 😴 The video addresses potential criticisms such as optical illusions and dreams, which can challenge the reliability of sensory experience.
- 🧠 The concept of Yoruba epistemology suggests that different cultural perspectives can challenge and enrich traditional Western philosophical views.
- 💬 The series will continue with explorations of Akan philosophical psychology, Ethiopian philosophy, and Pan-Africanism.
Q & A
What is the main focus of the video on Yoruba epistemology?
-The main focus of the video is to explore Yoruba epistemology, which is a part of sub-Saharan African philosophy, and to examine its challenge to the Western concept of knowledge as justified true belief, particularly the notion of justification.
What is the significance of the Yoruba people's geographical distribution in the context of this video?
-The Yoruba people are primarily based in Nigeria but are also found in Benin, Ghana, Togo, and Sierra Leone. This distribution is significant as it highlights the regional scope of the philosophical ideas being discussed, which are not limited to a single country but are part of a broader West African cultural context.
How does Yoruba epistemology categorize knowledge?
-Yoruba epistemology categorizes knowledge into several types, primarily distinguishing between 'emo' (knowledge) and 'mo' (to know), with 'mo' being based on first-hand experience and not requiring justification, unlike the Western concept of knowledge.
What is the role of 'mo' in Yoruba epistemology?
-'Mo' in Yoruba epistemology represents the strongest kind of knowledge, which is derived from direct sensory experience and is inherently connected to truth, not requiring justification.
What are the different levels of knowledge in Yoruba epistemology besides 'mo'?
-Besides 'mo', Yoruba epistemology recognizes other levels of knowledge such as 'gbagbo', which is information that can be verified or justified but does not have the same strong connection to truth as 'mo'.
How does the concept of 'gbagbo' differ from 'mo' in Yoruba epistemology?
-'Gbagbo' represents knowledge that is not based on direct experience and may require justification or verification, making it a weaker form of knowledge compared to 'mo', which is directly connected to truth through sensory experience.
What is the significance of the challenge Yoruba epistemology poses to the Western concept of knowledge?
-The challenge Yoruba epistemology poses is significant because it offers an alternative perspective on what constitutes knowledge, emphasizing the importance of direct sensory experience over justification, which is a central tenet in Western epistemology.
How does the video address the potential for misunderstanding or doubting sensory experiences?
-The video discusses the possibility of misunderstanding or doubting sensory experiences through examples like optical illusions and dreams, which can challenge the Yoruba epistemology's strong connection between 'mo' and truth.
What is the role of skepticism in the discussion of Yoruba epistemology presented in the video?
-Skepticism plays a role in questioning the absolute certainty of both Yoruba epistemology's reliance on sensory experience and Western epistemology's reliance on justification, suggesting that neither may provide an undoubtable foundation for knowledge.
How does the video compare Yoruba epistemology with Western foundationalism?
-The video compares Yoruba epistemology, which prioritizes sensory experience as the foundation for knowledge, with Western foundationalism, which often relies on logical or necessary truths known through justification, highlighting the cultural differences in philosophical approaches to knowledge.
What is the conclusion or the main takeaway from the video on Yoruba epistemology?
-The main takeaway is that Yoruba epistemology provides a unique perspective on knowledge that challenges Western philosophical concepts, and that both systems have their strengths and weaknesses, suggesting a need for a more nuanced understanding of what constitutes knowledge.
Outlines
📚 Introduction to Yoruba Epistemology
This paragraph introduces the topic of Yoruba epistemology, a subset of African philosophy, specifically from the Yoruba people of West Africa. It contrasts this with Western epistemology, challenging the traditional definition of knowledge as justified true belief. The Yoruba perspective is presented as a multi-tiered system of knowledge, with 'emo' (knowledge) divided into categories based on the strength of justification, starting with 'mo' (to know), which requires direct experience and doesn't need justification.
🔍 Yoruba Knowledge Typology and Justification
The second paragraph delves deeper into the Yoruba typology of knowledge, distinguishing between 'mo' and 'gbagbo' (information not based on direct experience). It explains 'occe' as verifiable information and 'alayich' as information that can only be justified through argument. The Yoruba view justification as a weaker form of knowledge compared to direct experience, which is seen as inherently connected to truth. This challenges the Western emphasis on justification in defining knowledge.
🌐 Yoruba Epistemology vs. Western Foundationalism
This paragraph contrasts Yoruba epistemology with Western foundationalism, which relies on logical or necessary truths as the basis for knowledge. Yoruba epistemology, on the other hand, is grounded in first-person experience, viewing sense experience as more reliable than justification. The paragraph discusses philosophical debates between dogmatists and skeptics regarding the reliability of sense experience versus logical truths, and how Yoruba epistemology could challenge Western assumptions.
🤔 Philosophical Skepticism and Yoruba Epistemology
The final paragraph raises skeptical concerns about the claims of Yoruba epistemology, questioning whether sense experience or logical justification can provide a solid foundation for knowledge. It discusses the potential for misunderstanding or denying what one senses, using optical illusions and dreams as examples. The paragraph concludes by suggesting that the existence of differing views on knowledge, such as those found in Yoruba epistemology, undermines the idea that certain truths are self-evident or beyond doubt.
Mindmap
Keywords
💡Yoruba Epistemology
💡Justification
💡Ethno Philosophy
💡Mo
💡Gbagbo
💡Occ
💡Aleyich
💡Dogmatism
💡Skepticism
💡Optical Illusions
💡Dreams
Highlights
The video continues the series on African philosophy, focusing on Yoruba epistemology.
Yoruba people's philosophy is primarily oral and has been documented through ethno-philosophy.
Yoruba epistemology challenges the Western concept of knowledge as justified true belief.
In Yoruba thought, 'emo' represents knowledge with different categories based on justification strength.
The concept of 'mo' refers to first-hand experience and is considered the strongest kind of knowledge.
Sense experience in Yoruba epistemology is inherently connected to truth.
The video discusses 'Gbagbo', knowledge that requires justification and is weaker than 'mo'.
Verifiable information ('OCC') is stronger than information that can only be justified ('alayich').
Yoruba epistemology values direct experience over justification or argument.
The video explores the distinction between 'mo' and 'bugbo' in terms of truth connection.
Yoruba epistemology contrasts with Western foundationalism, which relies on justification.
Optical illusions and dreams are presented as challenges to the reliability of sense experience.
The video debates the sufficiency of 'mo' and 'bugbo' as foundations for knowledge.
Skeptics argue that neither sense experience nor logical truths are undoubtable or self-justified.
Cultural differences in epistemology suggest that what is considered self-justified may be influenced by culture or philosophy.
The video concludes by questioning the traditional Western claim that logical truths are beyond doubt.
Upcoming videos will explore con philosophical psychology, Ethiopian philosophy, and Pan-Africanism.
Transcripts
welcome back to car daddy so today we're
going to be continuing with our series
dumbfounding definitions dizzying
distinctions and diabolical doctrines a
series sorting through some of the
jargon of philosophy in this video we're
going to be continuing our mini-series
analyzing African philosophy looking at
some of the theories and positions that
exist in African particularly
sub-saharan African philosophy in this
video we're looking at what is Yoruba
epistemology so we now move from
southern Africa to West Africa the
Yoruba people live primarily in Nigeria
but are also found in Benin Ghana and
other West African countries such as
Togo and Sierra Leone well we lack
written philosophy from the Yoruba
authors Halon and so Deepu have worked
with the traditional keepers of ideas
passed down through oral traditions to
document philosophical ideas within the
tradition of ethno philosophy if you are
curious about what ethno philosophy is
and how its philosophically justified
check out my previous video on what is f
no philosophy the focus of this video is
on Yoruba epistemology which challenges
one of the central conceits of Western
epistemology going back to Plato that
knowledge is defined as justified true
belief specifically it's going to take
issue with the idea of justification
being important for knowledge and the
Yoruba justification is actually going
to be a far weaker source of knowledge
than other kinds as we'll see this claim
which has only really been challenged by
Gettier since Plato is deeply entrenched
in Western philosophy as much of
epistemology is built on top of it
therefore it's just the kind of claim
that a non Western philosophy is well
positioned to challenge as the non
Western philosophy doesn't have that
same history going back to a particular
idea they're able to look at it from a
different perspective and not be kind of
bogged down by all the baggage so
instead of lumping knowledge into a
single category your room epistemology
can be described as splitting it into
several categories with straw
and weaker justification the first
category is known as emo the verb form
of which is mo so first off apologies if
I mispronounce anything don't worry I
mispronounce European things far more
often so it's it's no slight on anyone
so you would compare mo to to know
something so you could mo something and
emo to knowledge so you would have emo
if you mo something so in order to have
mo you must have first-hand experience
so that's generally some sense
experience of something so seeing
something feeling something smelling
something touching something those kinds
of things give you mo mo is the
strongest kind of knowledge is a
separate category from the next level of
knowledge that we're going to look at in
a second there is an assumption that
sense experience is inherently connected
to truth what is true and that this kind
of knowledge has a much closer
connection to truth than other types of
knowledge or other separate categories
of things that we're going to talk about
in a sec so something like seeing a dog
smelling a flower or feeling sandpaper
would classify as evil you do not need
to justify them and here's the key kind
of difference between this and Western
philosophy for Western philosophers
knowledge must be true it must be
believed it must be justified for your
robe of histology something that is mo
doesn't need justification you see it
you feel it you experience it and
there's some way in which you can't deny
it you can't say that this is something
that is false
or you can't misunderstand it you can't
not see what's there
so you don't need to justify things that
you mow or things that you experience at
least for yourself internally to other
people you may need to justify it
because for them it would be a Gbagbo
which we'll look at right now so the
next step of the typology of knowledge
is known as a bug book information that
you do not have direct experience there
are two levels of it bug both
information that can be verified and
information that can only be justified
the first being OCC and the second being
alayich if you speak Yoruba please
correct me in the comments on my
pronunciation of things verifiable
information is information that you
could mow but do not
well justification is an argument or
explanation given for something that you
cannot know so someone comes to you and
they tell you that something is true
that they know something that they saw
or experienced that thing now if you
could go and test it so for you if you
understand them and believe them that
would be egg Gbagbo something that you
also know but in a very importantly
different sense now within your egg
Gbagbo if you could go and check on that
thing yourself at least in principle it
could in principle be made mo for you
you could mow it then it would be well
si say wow if it could only be explained
or justified and you couldn't check it
for yourself it would be Aleya
and for the Yoruba that ability to be
verified or justified with your own
experience is a stronger type of
knowledge it's a stronger type of thick
bug Bo then something that can only be
justified or explained through an
argument so for example if you see an
eagle yourself that would be mo you
would mold it hearing from someone else
that Eagle lives in a
three would be Oh ceasing assuming you
could check on whether or not an eagle
did live there and mow it yourself but
being told that an eagle flew past an
hour ago would be Olay the weakest type
of knowledge as you would not be able to
mow it since you could not go and gain
sense experience of it yourself you
would have to be given an argument for
it you would have to be given the claim
that well look here's some Eagle
droppings here and look at this feather
that I found and these kinds of things
you would have to be provided some
justification for it whereas the other
two
you don't need justification you don't
need justification for it your eyes can
see and if you can go and check on
something yourself why would you justify
it when you can go and have that first
person sends experience which is itself
in some way undoubtable so within your
rubric epistemology you cannot deny or
misunderstand something that you know
that's what makes it importantly
different from it Gbagbo there's not a
separate step of understanding or assent
to a proposition about something that
you can see or experience you can't deny
the things that are in front of your own
face
you can't deny your senses but you may
deny or mistake something that someone
tells you you can either understand what
they say and deny that it's true or
misunderstand what they say and so
either deny or accept that it's true but
be understanding something incorrectly
and therefore not really having
knowledge at that point it doesn't rise
the level of Bud bull no no unlike
knowledge while Moke may have a strong
connection to truth he bug beau does not
because you may understand and believe
someone telling you something but it
could be not true and a bug beau has
this sense of the ability to not be
perfectly connected with truth in the
same way it more
is and Wow sometimes a big Gbagbo can be
go out and be justified through the use
of mold that doesn't mean they are
inherently or must be true in the same
way that a Western conception of
knowledge must be true to be known an
argument for the station between molt
and bug will might go something as
follows from its one people are
incapable of doubting or
misunderstanding something that they
experience themselves and those things
are importantly connected to truth if
not always true people are capable of
doubting or misunderstanding something
that they are told via testimony or that
is explained to them or that is
justified to them through an argument
and those things may not be connected to
that basic truth in the same way
therefore there's an important
difference between beliefs and knowledge
formed on the basis of experience and on
the basis of testimony or argument
former category being both the second
category being a bug Bo now unlike many
Western epistemologies which take
mathematical or logical truths as the
undoubtable truths to build a foundation
out of or some deep necessary truth that
they try to construct alla Descartes
Yoruba epistemology builds out of
first-person experience as the basic
undeniable truth this is why
justification is central to the Western
definition because your basic deep
truths your necessary AA priori truths
are only known through justification not
through sense experience but it only
arrives at the weakest level if your
rube epistemology because the undeniable
things of things that you see with your
eyes or experience through your senses
well justification is the kind of thing
that can be twisted around and
misunderstood or denied
while the Western dogmatist might take a
logical truth justified by
argument as undoubtable but sense
experience as suspect a Yoruba dogmatist
would claim exactly the opposite as
philosophical skeptic I'm all for
doubting the basic definition of
knowledge and I would argue that the
existence of kind of Yoruba epistemology
in this very different conception of
what the basic kind of kind of knowledge
or kind of information that is justified
is is a good case for doubting or being
skeptical of the traditional Western
dogmatist claim that it's impossible to
doubt the truths of logic but easy to
doubt the truths of experience but my
concern is that there are ways that we
could misunderstand what we see or deny
our senses optical illusions are an
example of a situation where you might
misunderstand what you see and if you're
aware that something is an optical
illusion you may not believe what you
see or what you experience
now the Yoruba dogmatist might come back
and say that these are strange cases and
are very uncommon in the real world the
skeptic might say either well you
wouldn't know if they were uncommon if
they were everywhere and you just
haven't ever realized that they're all
there or go a step farther and talk
about things like dreams so dreams may
make us concerned that our senses are
betraying us you don't know that you're
not dreaming right now
necessarily and in your dream you're
sensing things and experiencing things
and so you may be mistaken about what
you are sensing or experiencing and in
that way there's a disconnect between
what you seem to mo and what is true and
there's a way in which those kinds of
things are in some way disconnected from
reality despite being sensed and
experienced if you think you might be
dreaming right now then you might fail
to assent to what you are experiencing
at the top and so it kind of break
support this necessary connection
between things that you experience
through your senses and things that you
believe or assent to both of these
examples pose a problem for the status
of molt as more solid than a bog ball
because they show that you both can not
necessarily understand what you're
sensing or experiencing and that you may
deny or not assent to we're not agree
with the things that you're sensing or
experiencing this doesn't mean that the
distinction cannot be made simply that
the existing ranking of it in comparison
to a bug bow may be problematic and that
some of the ideas of the way of that
distinction is parsed may not perfectly
map on to our reality from the other
direction the of the dogmatist we might
think that logical truths which folks
believe solely due to justification and
explanation have never acts but have
never actually experienced or in some
way more justified because they're
logically necessary or can be known
without experience the dogmatist would
argue or might argue something along the
lines of wow it might be false that I
think I see a pencil in front of me
because it's actually an optical
illusion or a projection of a pencil or
I'm really sleeping two plus two equals
four no matter if I see it or not no
matter if I'm dreaming or not and no
matter whether my senses have been
tricked the skeptic of course would come
back that even your reason can be
tricked which is arguably an argument
from the side of your rube epistemology
that would say that your senses are more
trust about than things like
justification or explanation these
dogmatist might agree to the distinction
between kind of testimony or explanation
and first-person experience but would
classify things justified by logic is
more reliable than first-person
experience however for the skeptic
neither first-person experience nor
logical truth stand up to the sufficient
foundations for knowledge skipped
doubts the claims of Yoruba epistemology
faith because they find testimony
justification and first-person
experience all insufficient to provide
knowledge so neither moth nor egg Gbagbo
is sufficient to give you knowledge
they're not perfectly connected to truth
in the way that the Yoruba
epistemologists would make us think that
mo is necessarily connected to the
reality of the world arguing about what
represents a stronger or weaker claim to
knowledge is not important if none of
them have been shown to be knowledge in
the first place so while this might pose
some interesting objections to the
dogmatist that relies too much on
justification instead of sense
experience the skeptic is unconvinced in
fact the very existence of these
differing perspectives on what is a
stronger type of knowledge is evidence
that neither mo or necessary truths are
undoubtable or self justified as the
foundationalist might have us believe in
the Western tradition that these kind of
necessary truths are things that are
true through logical justification
must be true and can't be doubted the
aruba might say those are exactly the
kinds of things you can doubt where is
your sense experience is something that
you can't whereas the Western
epistemology through foundationalism
might say no those are the kinds of
things that you should doubt the fact
that they disagree on that at least
gives us evidence that these things
aren't just self justified on their face
that it's in fact perhaps your culture
or your previous philosophical notions
and understandings that makes you think
that they're self justified or that
they're undoubtable as there's evidence
that other cultures do in fact doubt
them so that was Ruby epistemology leave
your comments down below do you think
that you rube epistemology or kind of
the traditional Western foundationalism
is more convincing for what's a stronger
version of knowledge either Sense
experience or things that are justified
or are you skeptic like me and think
that neither are next up we'll be taking
a look at a con philosophical psychology
then Bob - philosophy ethiopian
philosophy pan-africanism
and that'll finish up the series watch
this video and more here at Carnegie
stuff org and stays skeptical everybody
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