WHAT IS MYTHICAL KNOWLEDGE? - PHILOSOPHY - 2024

The mythical knowledge are the explanations on facts of nature and life that generates human being, not based on facts or science, but in beliefs, myths and religions. For example, thinking that the sky was created by the gods of Egypt is mythical knowledge.

It is about the tendency of the human being to try to give answers to certain and spiritual concerns that do not have a foundation based on science or scientifically verifiable processes.

It is born from the first searches that man made to explain the environment that surrounded him, sometimes attributing the results of nature to non-existent entities, and that hardly took shape in the mind of man.

Mythical knowledge was based, for a long time, on superstition, in the absence of a previous baggage that could provide explanations. The mythical is born as a way to give answers or explanations to some phenomena, their origin and their behaviors.

Mythical knowledge arises as a mechanism to give a certain order to the destiny of the community, exploring causes and consequences on different aspects. It was considered as a limited knowledge, and with a lot of emotional baggage.

After contemplating his own existence, man began to attribute his concerns and all those things still incomprehensible to heaven; to deities and superior beings that would give way to the birth of mythology and religion.

Today mythical knowledge is still present as part of the culture of peoples and societies, although without the same importance as in the past. It is preserved in order to have a better notion of what man was capable of creating in the past, in his search for an answer.

Origin of mythical knowledge

Mythical thought or knowledge emerged in the first human communities as a legitimator of the social order of that moment.

The imposition of norms and processes to carry out certain activities provided the space for the first forms of division and social hierarchy, leaving decision-making and the future of the community in the hands of a few.

Mythical knowledge is not attributed to any thinker or author who has developed its characteristics; Furthermore, it is considered totally anonymous and prior to the first manifestations of recorded rational thought, which would emerge centuries later.

Despite this, it was a necessary precedent to guarantee the continuity of man as a social being.

In its search for answers, mythical knowledge is characterized by having gone beyond what is present and palpable in nature; phenomena take place because imperceptible supernatural forces make them possible.

This highlights the unquestionable character that mythical knowledge had, since there was no one who could refute what was raised so far.

The separation that existed between the first communities of man, and how isolated they could be considered from each other, allowed mythical thought to take root in each community in a different way.

Specifically, it gave way to specific beliefs and considerations about certain phenomena, which may be different between each community around the world.

In this way the first mythological and theological manifestations were born, which later would take on great importance for life in society, and for the cultural history of each one; arriving to stay present until modernity.

Characteristics of mythical knowledge

Mythical knowledge was characterized by seeking to be explanatory, with an emphasis on the ethnocentric, the search for the cause for a consequence, and vice versa. The practicality of its processes was crucial for the formation and consolidation of social processes.

Being considered as the beginning of theological or religious thought, and because certain manifestations only fit into the attribution of the cause to superior and supernatural forces, mythical knowledge had something dogmatic in its processes.

Superstition and religion are tied to dogmatism, and the imposition of certain behaviors becomes visible. The magic was also present in mythical knowledge. There was something fantastic in the things that the man was discovering as he sought his explanation.

This caused him to exalt some things above his normal conditions, and that also determined the cultural perceptions that would develop over time in each community.

Despite its simplicity as a form of knowledge, mythical knowledge gave growing communities and societies a better notion of their existence and of their character and function as social beings, whose main qualities among them, and in front of the environment, had to be exploited to the max.

Perhaps, had it not gone through a process of curiosity and exploration such as that represented by mythical knowledge, the first steps would not have been taken towards what would be rational thought and knowledge, and our evolution as a civilized species.

Mythical knowledge in modernity

At present, and in the globalized society, mythical knowledge is completely out of date. Even in social groups and communities less adapted to the rhythm of the rest of the world, there is already a non-anachronistic thinking, which allows a better adaptability of the environment.

The main human concerns have been answered, and new ones emerge as others are answered, always adapted to the rhythm of the present.

Those related to our most basic perceptions and instincts in front of what surrounds us; our existence and function as beings and our ability to survive have been answered, and even so, their development does not cease.

However, the social and cultural creations that were born during the development of mythical thought and knowledge have permeated the history of cultures.

This is manifested in how they have adapted their existence, their fantastic but representative foundations, their images and symbols, as well as their practices and superstitions, to their respective current societies.

As entrenched as they may seem, these elements have found their way through the processes of globalization; not only to provide a better notion of identity on their own, but also to expand borders.

The images that were once representative of a community, and whose existence or veneration determined the course that it took in the face of its destiny, can now be approached, studied, investigated and reflected by a large number of cultural views.

References

1. Acevedo, C. (2002). Myth and knowledge. Ibeoamerican University.
2. The Telegraph. (February 17, 2013). The illustrated vs. mythical thought: combat of Latin American modernity. The Telegraph.
3. Gheradi, S. (2003). Knowing as desiring. Mythic knowledge and the knowledge journey in communities of practitioners. Journal of Workplace Learning, 352-358.
4. Mumford, L. (1967). Technics and Human Development: Myth of the Machine, Vol. 1. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich.
5. Zerpa, JA (2016). Possible defining elements of ordinary knowledge. Magazine Contributions to the Social Sciences, 12.