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Introduction: Geographers at the Beach
1.1 Before we get there: Introducing philosophy and theory
Nikki’s simple statement is a claim to knowledge, a claim to know something about the leaves on the trees. It is the kind of knowledge claim that we all make in our everyday lives, but it provides a good starting point for thinking about the more specialised knowledge that we develop within geography. At the broadest level of generalisation, geographers seek to know the world around us. If we want to have confidence in our knowledge – of glaciers, transport systems, flooding, poverty, biodiversity, pollution, inequality, landscapes and all the other things that geographers are interested in – then it is important to interrogate how we develop such knowledge. In effect, the question at the heart of this book is ‘How do we know?’
A simple response to that question is to make reference to sources of evidence. We know something because we have evidence of it; we have seen (or heard, or measured) it for ourselves, or we have read it somewhere and accept that someone else has evidence of it. We know what the weather was like yesterday because we experienced it for ourselves. We know the Earth is spherical because we have seen satellite images of it. We know that health and wealth inequalities in the UK have increased since the 1970s, because we can read research that provides evidence of this (Dorling, 2010, 2013). Geography students everywhere are taught to acknowledge their sources of evidence early in their studies through conventions of academic referencing, and this is an important part of the discipline of geography. Being clear about evidence, though, is only the first step in answering the question ‘How do we know?’
Every claim to knowledge involves making assumptions. These are assumptions about things such as: what exists; what knowledge is; how we can know; and what counts as ‘evidence’. In our everyday lives we usually take these things for granted without really thinking about them. Nikki’s observation about the leaves turning brown is one example. This is a claim that the colours of the leaves on the trees are changing. There are some broader, unspoken implications, but if we leave those aside for a moment and focus just on the spoken claim to knowledge it is possible to identify at least three assumptions hidden in it:
1. That leaves are ‘real’ objects, existing independently of us.
2. That our senses – in this case, sight – provide us with knowledge of leaves.
3. That Nikki’s memory that the leaves have not always been brown is accurate.
It would probably be difficult to live our lives if we did not take these kinds of things for granted. If we spent all day worrying about whether objects are real we would find it quite difficult to do anything, including eat and drink. But it does not take too much effort to realise that we can be mistaken in our assumptions. If ever you have forgotten something (as we all have), you know your memory is not infallible. If ever you have waved at somebody thinking it was a friend and then realised you were waving at a complete stranger, you know your senses are not infallible. There may seem less reason to doubt whether objects really exist, but many people have experienced hallucinations, seeing or hearing things that are not really there. Each of the three assumptions above could be unfounded. These issues – about what exists, what we know and how we know – fall within the realm of philosophy.
There are three philosophical terms that are often used in literature relating to how we do research. These are:
Metaphysics, the branch of philosophy concerned with the ‘first principles’ (or, broadly speaking, the fundamentals) of things like existence, time, space and identity.
Ontology, which is about what exists and what it means to exist.
Epistemology, which is the study of how we know.
Metaphysics therefore encompasses ontology. Philosophy texts often refer to metaphysics, whereas geography texts use the terms ontology and epistemology more often.
If we look again at the three assumptions identified in Nikki’s comment about the leaves, the first (that leaves exist independently of us) is an ontological assumption. The second, that our senses provide knowledge of the leaves, is an epistemological position. The third is more complex. Nikki is relying on her memory of the leaves, and this involves an assumption about herself; that she is a discrete entity (a ‘self’) whose existence has been continuous over the timescale in which the leaves have changed colour. In other words, she is assuming that she was not just invented yesterday, with things that seem like memories programmed into her mind. (This may seem far-fetched, but films like The Matrix and Avatar play on this kind of idea.) Nikki is also relying on her memory to store ‘true’ knowledge of the leaves. The third assumption is therefore a metaphysical assumption, containing both ontological and epistemological claims.
Although Nikki’s statement referred only to the observable colour of leaves, she was really commenting on something bigger. The implication of her comment is that the seasons are progressing and autumn is turning to winter. There are assumptions here too, but these are of a different kind. Rather than being assumptions about what exists or how we know, the implied meaning of Nikki’s statement involves ideas about how the changing colour of leaves is connected to the seasons. These ideas are along the lines of the following:
This brief explanation is a theory; a generalised, abstract idea about the relations between phenomena. Nikki has applied this generalised idea to the particular trees she can see through the bus window.
Trying to move beyond a simple answer to the question ‘How do we know?’, then, takes us into the realms of philosophy and theory. If the knowledge that we rely on in our everyday lives is dependent upon philosophical and theoretical assumptions or ideas, then it follows that our claims to specialist geographic knowledge also involve such assumptions and ideas. The study of ‘geographic thought’ is the study of the philosophical and theoretical assumptions we make in developing geographical knowledge, and how different philosophies and theories have become dominant within geography at different times.
Students often find studying ‘geographic thought’ difficult, not least because philosophy and theory are, by definition, rather abstract. Many geographers are more interested in doing ‘proper’ geography, learning about society, culture and the natural environment. Concrete issues such as wealth inequalities, flooding or habitat conservation can seem far more interesting, and more relevant, than abstract philosophy and theory. There are at least two good reasons for persisting with the difficult abstract ideas though.
Firstly, as we have seen with Nikki’s comment about the leaves, there are hidden assumptions in all claims to knowledge. Ignoring philosophy and theory does not make these assumptions go away; it just means that we are oblivious to them. As geomorphologist Colin Thorn pointed out in 1988, learning and thinking about philosophy and theory puts us in a position to make choices about what philosophies and theories we use. The alternative is to blindly rely on assumptions without being aware of them.
Secondly, assumptions about what exists and how we can know, and ideas about how phenomena are (or could possibly be) related to each other directly connect to the ways we do research. In choosing to use a particular method of data collection, we are implicitly, perhaps subconsciously, making a decision about what counts as knowledge. Our own methodological practices and our ability to judge the reliability of evidence presented by others are enhanced by an awareness of philosophy and theory.
The first of these reasons provides a justification for books such as this one, examining the key philosophical and theoretical positions that have been significant in the development of geographical knowledge. The second reason guides the particular approach taken here: the aim of this book is not just to consider philosophy and theory, but also to make the connections between these philosophical and theoretical positions and research methodology, the specific practices by which geographers produce knowledge.
The rest of this chapter returns to the beach to reveal some key differences among philosophical approaches. This chapter is designed to be read before the others in the book. Chapters 2 to 8 then address ideas that have been significant in the development of geographic thought since the ‘Quantitative Revolution’ of the mid-twentieth century. Each chapter seeks to establish what the ideas are, where they have come from and how geographers have used them. In each we then return to the beach to consider what kinds of research questions might be asked and what kinds of methods might be possible, making the connections to research ‘in practice’. These chapters are organised in roughly chronological order, in that those appearing later in the book address ideas that became influential in geography more recently that those appearing earlier. However, none of these chapters assumes prior knowledge of the others, so each can be read on its own.
Finally, Chapters 9 and 10 address issues that cut across all of the others. Chapter 9 makes the move from questions of how we know (epistemology) to how we judge right from wrong, examining moral philosophy and ethics. Chapter 10 summarises all the different ways of looking at a beach covered in the book, and considers the connections and tensions between human geography and physical geography. Some prior understanding of the different approaches to geography covered in Chapters 2 to 8 is probably useful for these last two chapters.
Geographic thought is sometimes alternatively referred to as ‘history and philosophy of geography’ (as, for example, in the Royal Geographical Society’s research group of that name). This book is intended as a ‘philosophy of geography’ rather than a ‘history of geography’ book. Really the two are entangled, but other histories of geography, such as those by Unwin (1992) or Holt-Jensen (2009), already exist and their coverage extends further back in time than this text. The aim here is to take up the significant ‘-isms’ (ways of thinking) referred to in books such as those, and e...
