"Other ways of knowing," aka Different Cognitive Styles [View all]

[okasha]

It's long been recognized that not everyone aquires information/knowledge in the same way. Anyone who is even remotely associated with eduction, from first-grade teacher aides to University professors, knows that some students learn visually, some learn aurally/orally, some kinaesthetically. There are even a few who take in the world around them most readily from their sense of smell. There's really no argument about this.

In his Drawing from Observation, Brian Curtis defines two different cognitive styles, which correlate roughly to left-and right-brain activity (pp. 32-33). He presents them as follows:

RATIONAL COGNITIVE STYLES: INTUITIVE COGNITIVE STYLES:
Logical Emotional
Scientific skill Artisitic sensitivity
Intellectual Sensuous
Deductive Imaginitive
Rational Metaphoric
Discrete Continuous
Pragmatic Impulsive
Directed Free
Objective Subjective
Sequential Gestalt
Clear and direct Complicated pattern
Constructive/step-oriented Global/simultaneous
Temporal Non-temporal
Verbal reasoning Non-verbal understanding
Symbolic/abstract Concrete
Analytic (linear) Synthetic (holistic)
Successive Simulataneious
Trial and error Educated guess
Rule of laws Open to ambiguity, complexity and paradox
Explicit Tacit
Narrow focus Encompassing

He argues that the art student must rely on intuitive rather than rational information processing in order to draw accurately from observation.

It strikes me that the difference in these cognitive styles is also the difference between "ways of knowing," though I think it would be more accurate to call them differences in ways of perceiving or experiencing the world. Most of us are able to shift back and forth between these two styles at need: rational to balance the budget, intuitive to paint. Rational to pursue science, intuitive to experience relgion. There's a spectrum, of course, with extremes at either end. At the "rational" extreme is the devotee of scientism who insists that no knowledge exists except through application of the scientific method; at the "intuitive" extreme, the spaced-out druggie humming with the universe right through the red light and into the telephone pole.

I think Curtis' definitions also support a point made in another thread: the greater the number of people who share an experience, the greater the likelihood that the experience is valid. This applies to religious as well as to scientific areas.