Essay: To what extent do faith and emotion influence an expert’s interpretation of a fact?

Every area of knowledge we study today is a collection of facts and theories. Some of us have studied certain AOKs in more depth and are therefore considered experts in those disciplines. However, even within a discipline, despite studying the same facts and theories, experts disagree. In order to investigate why this is the case, we must answer the following questions. Firstly, what is a fact? A fact can be defined as a piece of information that has been proven to be correct. However, it is crucial that we can ask ourselves, are what we consider “the same facts” actually identical?
All theories are based on facts. Theories are the arguments on which our areas of knowledge are built upon. They are the key to knowledge production. However, the way in which we interpret the theories determines our extent of knowledge in that particular area. Our interpretation of knowledge can be influenced by various factors such as the representation and context of the information given to us, the emotional impact of the knowledge, our personal experiences and who is producing the knowledge. The latter is extremely important to consider because it could consist of either personal knowledge or shared knowledge or even both.
An expert is considered to be someone who has the greatest knowledge in an area of knowledge. They are thorough with the facts and have developed their own theories based on the facts. We all interpret information given to us in various different ways. Anybody can develop a theory based on a fact. So why can’t everyone be an expert and what classifies one as being an expert? Different experts have different interpretation to the same facts based on their own ways of knowing. Every expert has a different background, different personal experience, varying degrees to access to certain facts, dissimilar emotional and ethical standards.
These are a few of the factors, which must be taken into account when analyzing why there are disagreements in the same discipline.  In this essay, I consider the uncertainty of the definition of a fact and an expert and base my arguments about why experts in the areas of knowledge of History and the Natural Sciences have disagreements through the knowledge question: To what extent do faith and emotion influence an expert’s interpretation of a fact.
History is an AOK which we often see disagreements between experts.
The production of knowledge in History is mainly through evidence including art, literature or antiques from a certain time period. In history faith is important to an expert’s interpretation of a fact because depending on their experiences and values, they formulate theories, which then tell us about a time period. E.H Carr once said “The belief in a hard core of historical facts existing objectively and independently of the historian is a preposterous fallacy, but one which it is very hard to eradicate.” This means that no historical fact is ever objective and always has the expert’s influence. In 1917, the Bolshevik Party stormed the Winter Palace to overthrow the Provisional Government of Russia.  The fact is that the Bolshevik soldiers had free entry into the palace, as the opposition did not resist the revolution. However, paintings of the revolution depict a great struggle and a real battle between the soldiers and the government. Historians debate this because clearly, the Bolshevik party wanted to play up the portrayal of their feat. Ethics can be used to determine whether the paintings portray an accurate image because modern historians’ values influence how they interpret the paintings. An expert who believes that storming the palace was ethically correct would agree that the painting is accurate.
A counterclaim to this is that through emotion, despite being given the same facts, experts still draw the same conclusion. Recently, I read a book called “Look who’s back” by Timur Vermes. It was a story about Adolf Hitler being back in the 21st century and trying to start his Nazi campaign again. The book was inspired by the events of World War 2 and Hitler’s death. The author envisioned what Hitler would be like if he were to come back and see Germany today. I enjoyed the book a lot and through imagination and language the writer was able to produce a great literary work using history as a basis. However, despite the same facts used the write the book, there many that do not believe in the how they are presented.
From this analysis we can deduce that an expert is in fact someone who has a theory but a common consensus does not make everyone an expert
As in history, the natural sciences are another area of knowledge where there are often disagreements between experts. Experts in this field require a great deal of emotion and faith in order to make sense of the facts. Doctors use the scientific method along with their personal experiences and judgments to form arguments based on the facts given to them.
I have a personal example of how two experts in the field of medicine had disagreements. I was born with a birthmark in my eye. As I grew older, the birthmark became larger. The first doctor I consulted claimed that the birthmark was actually a tumor. This got my parents extremely worried and we consulted a second doctor. He claimed that it was a simple mole and could be surgically removed. From this example, we can see how two doctors – both experts in the field – came up with extremely different diagnoses. Both doctors knew that the fact was that there was an unidentifiable spot in my eye. Yet, both doctors disagreed as to what it actually was. Why is this so? The way of knowing intuition can be linked to this example. Even though both doctors are experts, they have studied the same material in their field in very different ways.
In contrast, one may argue that through emotion, experts have been seen to draw the same theories based on the same facts.
The telephone is arguably one of the most important inventions. There is a well-known controversy based on who gets credit for inventing the telephone. Samuel Morse had come up with the telegraph in 1837 where he used electrified signals to transfer messages. In 1840 we saw Page using electromagnetism to produce sound signals. Decades later, Alexander Graham Bell developed electromagnetic devices that could transmit harmonics in an attempt to help those who were deaf. However, around the same time, scientist Elisha Gray was independently working on the first telephone as well. She had developed a harmonic device using vibrating reeds that could transmit musical tones. Both Gray and Bell had filed their patent for this device with very similar drawings on the same day: February 14. From this we can see that in the same AOK, scientists agreed with the same facts and in fact used the theories that others were developing to further enhance their technology. So, based on the same facts, the ended up drawing similar conclusions to finally develop the same theory.
In conclusion, we can see that there are a lot of links between various areas of knowledge. Knowledge from all AOKs is based on a common groundwork of knowledge made up of facts and theories that have been accumulated over time. They help us understand how and why things work the way they do. It is also important to realize that if two areas of knowledge are not directly linked in terms of their knowledge coming together to form a fact or theory, then the use of one AOK is important to process and assimilate knowledge in the other AOK. Disagreement between experts encourages progress in that particular discipline. This is because, the fact that any idea can be challenged means that various different perspectives can be brought into the discipline by various different experts.