Abstract

The article is concerned mainly with the following issues. Firstly, I expound that the distinction between knowledge and understanding consists in that in addition to grasping the prescriptive nature of things, understanding needs to penetrate into the “evidence or reason” of things, even including grasping their meaning and value, etc. Understanding is an activity of reinterpretation of the subject investigated. Secondly, I argue that the foundation of understanding is not based on facts, but based on reasons. Reasons are related to facts.However, they are not the same. It is generally accepted that facts are objective, whereas reasons can be not only objective but also subjective. Taking a fact as a reason results from subjective choice, interpretation and judgment.Natural facts are repeatable, but it is not necessarily the case for reasons. Maybe there are universal reasons, but no universal facts. Finally, I discuss the relationship between understanding and explanation. Understanding is obtained by means of explanation which always seeks to find the best reason among diverse reasons, therefore its methodology is the “inference to the best explanation”.

Key Words

Understanding; Knowledge; Reasons; Explanation; Epistemology

Citation: Chen, J. 'Understanding, Reason and Explanation' [J]. Journal of Dialectics of Nature, 2019, 41(5): 10-17.

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