That Philosophy Website

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Key texts

• The Problems of Philosophy, Chapter 1 (Bertrand Russell): Appearance and reality
• Principles of Human Knowledge (George Berkeley): Introduction

Support materials

• Revision quiz
• AQA Philosophy specification (PDF file)

Related topics

• Epistemology: An introduction

Excerpt from teaching notes

Having considered some of the ways philosophers have made a difference to the world we live in, let’s now consider ways that they have challenged and changed our understanding of things

Many philosophers believe the relationship between epistemology and ontology is the fundamental issue in philosphical studies, and one can see this theme being discussed in many of their works.

In short, epistemology considers how we know what we know – or in other words - it is the study of our knowledge of things.

Ontology is the study of what things are, or what a thing is in itself (aka Being).

The reason why the relationship between epistemology and ontology is considered so important to many philosophers is because it concerns the very nature of what we claim know, what we can actually know, and how we might know any of these things at all.

Immanuel Kant’s phenomena and noumena distinction is probably the most well-known, influential, and modern analysis of the relationship between epistemology and ontology

Kant argued that our knowledge of things in the physical world is shaped and formed by certain cognitive categories in our mind. For instance, we are able to distinguish between different objects around us because our minds contain the category (or concept) of space, and as such this acts like a ‘lens’ through which we experience, understand and make sense of the world.

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