Knowledge Question:

To what extent should an academic disciplines be judged upon the usefulness of its knowledge?

CLAIM: Producing useful knowledge increases the value of a discipline.

• knowledge we deem useful holds value to us 
• If we can reason how knowledge within a discipline can be or is applicable we may value that discipline more 

COUNTER CLAIM: A discipline is still valuable if it produces knowledge that is "useless" to some.

• Even if most people agree that certain knowledge is of no particular use, it is still valuable
• An academic discipline is therefore never not valuable 
• Many universities use Johnson's theory to justify granting funds to research where the likelihood of obtaining useful knowledge is slim.

CONCLUSION

• a dicipline may be perceived to be more valuable if a knower is aware of of ways in which the knowledge can be used
• however, th

CLAIM: It is possible to deem some disciplines more useful than others.

• a dicipline is useful if progress can 
• disciplines are useful if they produce knowledge that has real world uses
• for example mathematics could be considered more useful than many disciplines in the natural sciences because it serves a essential use to them. It is used as a language to communicate ideas. Ex. looking at projectile motion in physics. Through the use of mathematics you can Mathematics make predictions as too how far high and fast an object will be at different points in time

COUNTER-CLAIM:  the extent to which a discipline is considered useful depends on the perspective of the knower asked therefore it can not be true universily that a discipline is more/less useful than another

• A discipline considered useful by a knower may not be considered useful by another knowers

this perspective could be shaped by vested-interests. as somebody who has diabetes for example, I would consider and chemistry particularly useful because they help me understand my disease 

CONCLUSION

• making a judgement about the usefulnes of a discipline is possible but highly subjective
•  the perspective of the individual asked to rank disciplines will influence the order in which they are ranked

CLAIM: The extent to which knowledge is useful changes with time, thus the rank of disciplines could change with time

COUNTER-CLAIM: Knowledge that currently has no significant use could find some in the future, thus disciplines should not be ranked knowledge based on usefulness

• Knowledge that currently appears useless could find practical application in the future, thus the value of knowledge should not be measured with regard to practicality.
• Ranking disciplines lower because they are not currently producing knowledge that we deem useful may prevent us from "unleashing it's potential"

• CONCLUSION

• how practical certain knowledge is to us may change with time
• all knowledge hold "potential" value​ 
• arguably, more value lies in knowledge where this "potential" has not been explored