Week 1 - Reflection

The course have been interesting so far, I'm getting a grip of it and what I can gain from it. When we were asked what we thought about this course I said 'better late than never' and it's so true. I think that this course may give me the framework for writing a good or great master thesis. I think it will help me open my mind even more and think outside the box as an engineer, interaction designer and in the extension as a human understanding the world better.  

I learned about impact factors, gained good sources for relevant scientific information and most of all that knowledge is a different thing entirely depending on who you ask. Impact factors is in it's simplest sense a measurement of how important an academic journal is within it's own field. I.F gives the mean of citations on articles from the journal. 

Knowledge is a different matter, I think that it's essentially easier to define what knowledge isn't than what it is. Then again knowledge in a discipline is much simpler to explain than knowledge overall - Take knowledge about math for example, in math two plus two equals four, this we have knowledge about and can prove. Which for me is what I for now define as true knowledge. In a way I am more likely drawn to the theories of pragmatism than other views because I think it is a way of proving something to be true and when it is true it is knowledge. 

Pragmatism is in it's core a philosophical view where theory and action is in focus. An action or theory is considered valid if it works. Experiments are essential to discern what is true and false knowledge in pragmatism. In it's most basic form pragmatism closes in on knowledge by looking at how an organism interacts with it's setting and how it, by using ideas, keep the ones that work as true and reject those that  don't. This organization of experience, derived from true ideas and theories which is gained through experiments, is what pragmatism identifies as knowledge. One important aspect of this confirmation of knowledge is that the method of deciding if it's true is open to the public to confirm. 

As one known pragmatic, John Dewey, states, you learn by doing. On that note I leave you to learn more about this by searching on.