Esther Lightcap Meek presents the most devastating little critiques of epistemological dualism I’ve ever read near the beginning of A Little Manual for Knowing.

Epistemological dualism describes the way we “distinguish knowledge from beliefs, facts from values, reason from faith, theory from application, thought from emotion, mind from body, objective from subjective, science from art” (2). The first member of each binary are set against the “opposites,” and we strive to keep the first “purified” from the second. (Pitch-perfect description, since epistemological dualism is a part of a modern purity movement.)

The effect of this is to distance the knower and the known from the knowing, and hence ultimately to dissolve knowledge entirely.

In the name of certainty, for instance, we insist that knowledge or the known is “objective,” and attempt to keep it uncontaminated by subjective elements. But I’m subjective, a subject, so the more I stress objectivity the more I become alienated from the object I’m supposed to know and the knowledge I’m supposed to have.

Meek writes, “we believe that we should keep ourselves and our passion out of knowledge if we are to be objective. So we actually cut off knowledge from ourselves, the knowers. As a result, we can be bored or indifferent about knowledge” (3).

Or, “Epistemological dualism cuts us as knowers down into disconnected compartments unable to work together - information here, body there, emotions in a third place. It depersonalizes us at the moment of one of our greatest opportunities for personhood - coming to know. It dispels any sense of adventure” (3).

When tempted by dualism, we need epistemological “therapy.” Meek, a seasoned therapist, diagnoses and prescribes with skill.