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Jill Dando Institute of Crime Science

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Systems of Knowledge

Thus far we have got a sense of some of the material that is extant. We have also looked critically at the frameworks we bring to this material in our attempt to make sense of it. `Belief' has been problematised as a term, and the discussion in the scholarship of ancient history (with several attempts to reinstate `belief' and `believe' as useful terms noted but discarded.) This session will build on these beginnings and grapple with the difficulties of representing a thought system (rather than simplified and simplistic objects). All knowledge is negotiated in its application, and complex systems display a range of strategies: it is my contention that ancient dream analysis formed a complex sub-system of their broader thinking. It was not autonomous but rather the logical conclusion of several principles that remained largely implicit. In their application,these strategies lead to apparent contradictions (especially if we become fixated on individual items such as `dreams were prophetic': we shall explore a number of themes. Firstly, the conclusion of `inconsistency' will be problematised: any system of thought, when applied to a particular scenario, will evoke `contradictory' answers: at its simplest, this could be described as `necessary trial and error' in thinking within a thought system. We do not make pejorative judgements about modern systems of thought when such scenarios arise. If time allows, we shall examine the work of the anthropologist Robin Horton who has compared religious thinking to modern science in its structure (leading to serious critical problems with defining science against religion). This also leads to difficulties (worth exploring) about how we describe what happened: can we talk about their `knowledge (once we have discarded `belief' as overly problematic)'? What terms can we use, and what is evoked when we say `knowledge'? This brings us to our second major theme: knowledge systems can be seen as a dynamic matrix of strategies, what affects the choice of strategy? Or, to put it another way, are the deductions made by a practitioner of a thought system purely empirical? Or are they the culmination of a mass of factors, such as preferred solutions to problems, idiosyncratic interpretations, social pressures, haste, tiredness, perversity or extraneous agendas (cf a fictional modern scenario where the virulence of a new disease is downplayed because a panic would cause more problems than the disease itself.) Thirdly, we shall consider whether we can usefully locate dream interpretation within the broader culture of prediction. In discussing the ancient tendency to see significance in interpretation, we tend to focus on individual items ('the ancients thought that dreams were or could be prophetic') which form an uneven collection of artificially discrete `beliefs' with much similarity but little co-operation. The explicit writings of those who address this are heavily debated, and we infer to a large extent a reasonably unproblematic relationship with the broader culture in which those writings were intending to find purchase and gain acceptance. I propose to invoke a much messier model, by drawing on modern comparisons (with all their difficulties), not so much to make a set of specific points but rather to orientate participants differently - to make ancient thinking seem less alien in its internal logic. The interplay between the explicit and tacit knowledge within a culture and the ways that decisions are reached are far more complex than the simple arrival at a formula by the use of rigid rules and implicit and often inchoate principles alter through their very formulation. Themes I hope to touch on are the status of bodies of knowledge and to what extent they can be seen as systems - thus invoking the modern idea of a discipline. Possibly the closest parallel in the ancient world was `techne', often translated as `skill' or `craft' (eg the techne of medicine). I do not propose an exact translation - the differences are as interesting as the similarities.

Speaker

After various placements centred in UCL, I moved to the Centre for Advancement of Learning and Teaching where I teach on Adult Education, and research Interdisciplinarity and Ancient History.