What type of knowledge is contained in big questions?

Question

There are questions the answers to which can be easily found, the questions that most people know the answers to. Then there are questions which each person knows the answers of only individually, the answers that one might not be able to make others understand fully. But there are questions that no one knows the answers to and yet questions constantly stand. These are big questions, questions about life, the universe and God. In my view these questions stand and play a role in our live, in the way we know things. What is in them?

Answer 1

You have asked what is in them? I think another important question is what is NOT in them.

The "big questions" are filled with uncertainty. They lack stable ground or "proof" of something - a state which humans are uncomfortable with.

Big questions continue to challenge us, because in seeking the answer, we are finding out more about the world, our neighbors, ourselves. Often there are no set answers, either because no data yet exists, as in scientific questions, or because each person has a unique answer for themselves, as in questions of religion and ethics.

I think it is the big questions which will hold society together - they are a sort of "conscience" - a search for right/wrong, good/evil which keep us continually seeking the best, the most right.

When a society becomes complacent, and no longer asks the "big questions" it means they are no longer looking outward, but have become too self involved. It is at that point that society dissolves and it is "every person for themselves." I, for one, hope that day never arrives.

Answer 2

The knowledge of not knowing teases the human race as it thinks itself superior and knowledgeable this intrigues our minds which further leading us to raising more questions to answer the questions we began with! These questions do play a huge part in our lives your right but only if we choose to except them then do we start to live! In these questions there is mostly wonder and thirst to swallow the knowledge of the world. However we haven't the time or the strength to do just that knowing ever thing can not always be good so maybe the knowledge inside these big questions is there for us not to know but to QUESTION. If we knew the answers to them their wouldn't be anything left to question, nothing left to repel against. That's not a life we want to live there would be nothing for us to live for!! (this is really long and confusing you might have to read it again lol) hehehe ;-P

Answer 3

I'm not certain I understand your question. When an important question remains unanswered, it is generally because of a lack of information, and that is probably true in the cases you are thinking of.

But if you are asking 'what kind of knowledge would be needed to answer these questions ?' The answer would probably be 'God's kind of knowledge'. These questions are generally the ones that world religions claim to answer.

If religious answers do not satisfy you, you just have to try to find your own answer. There are plenty to choose from - that is what philosophy is about - you could spend your whole life on it.

Anther question that might be interesting is 'why is it impossible to find answers to these questions that satisfy everyone ?'....

Answer 4

Typically, if we ask questions that seem fundamentally important but to which there seem to be no certain answers, either we are not asking the questions correctly, or we cannot get at the answer by empiricism and rationalism alone.

Questions over reality, knowledge, morality, and the like are extremely important, yes.

Here's an example of just asking the wrong question. Many people who first learn some physics ask something along the lines of "insofar as particle physics reveals that there exists much more space between particles than there exists space taken up by those particles, and insofar as the particles are always in motion anyway, then is it not the case that solidity is a myth taught to us by our limited senses and in actuality no solid objects exist?" If a person tries to answer that yes there are solid objects, the asker refutes it by saying the physics case again. The asker will stand on firm ground and tell you that solid objects do not exist!!! I say "go stand in front of a moving vehicle and then tell me what you think as you lie in traction for a year."

My point is that the question was fouled up in the first place. How? Because it conflates together two different levels of discourse, making it appear that only one of the two assertions can be correct. That's all! At the level of discourse that corresponds to particle physics, yes solids turn out to look very fluid. That's one ontological level of reality, and a corresponding level of discourse to go with it. It has little or nothing to do with the everday world of the naked senses where objects are the same solid they've always been, inlcuding before particle physics investigated them at another ontological level. Particle physics does not refute solidity; it tells us that at one ontological level there are solids, and at another there is more space than matter. So what? Physics in engineering does not consider that there are no solids! We still teach solids in geometry. We do not say that houses do not exist just because if we tear them apart we see studs, nails, empty rooms, wires, pipes and so on.

Often we are confusing ourselves with our questions, although they attempt to get at very important issues. With such wquestions, we can go around and around, and end up thinking we know nothing, when sometimes the facts are so "in our faces" that we miss them entirely. That explains some of what you're inquiring about.

BUT, to answer your question literally, as asked, the knowledge contained in questions depends on its presuppositions. Typically, questions are requests for knowledge, not assertions of knowledge. Therefore, we would not say that knowledge is in the question. But questions often contain a lot of unspoken material, material that is assumed in the asking of the questions. If that material is knowledge, then we could say that those presuppositions are the knowledge inherent in the questions. THAT is the answer to your actual question, as it is stated.

Answer 5

The big questions are the type of question that everybody asks but nobody can answer, for example:

Why are we here?
Where is the Universe?
and so on.

I'm sure others can think of more really big questions.

Please don't start bringing God into it because that sets off another long string of unanswerable questions.

Answer 6

I believe that what those questions have, are many question rolled into one. Leaving the canvas open to several answers rather than just one. A subjective opportunity, rather than an objective opportunity. Allowing the reader to design an answer, rather than regurgitate a memorised response.

Answer 7

Knowledge of the Universe and the ability to tap into the collective consciousness of the cosmos.

Answer 8

WISDOM- this type of knowledge is obtained through experience, with the ability to find a rational connection through two completely unrelateed ideas.

Answer 9

They hold answers that may challenge everything we know, love and make us feel secure. We constantly ask these questions to challenge ourselves and our beliefs - but do we really want the answers?

Answer 10

A question implies a lack of knowledge and longing for an answer...

So your answer is... none.






g-day!