The Epistemology of Transformative Learning

by Mike Ratliff

Epistemology: noun Philosophy  the theory of knowledge, esp. with regard to its methods, validity, and scope. Epistemology is the investigation of what distinguishes justified belief from opinion.

DERIVATIVES

epistemological adjective

epistemologically adverb

epistemologist noun

ORIGIN mid 19th cent.: from Greek epistēmē ‘knowledge,’ from epistasthai ‘know, know how to do.’

On my recent trip to Oklahoma, I had one morning to myself prior to our meeting with family to do the cleanup on my parent’s house the following day. I took my camera and hiked across town from my daughter’s house with the goal of reaching the campus of my alma mater where I earned my BBA back in the mid 1980’s. It was hot and humid. I had to stop twice at stores for water, however, as I neared the campus, I began to recognize familiar markers and a few new ones that just seemed to jar my consciousness. I asked God to continue to show me what he was preparing me for. The first “new” marker was this statue just a block or so from campus.

Of course, this is Humpty Dumpty. We have been in discussions quite a bit lately as to how Post-Modernist thinking has attacked the very fabric of the meaning of language to the point that words can mean whatever one wants them to mean just like in Chapter 6 from Alice in Wonderland, `When I use a word,’ Humpty Dumpty said in rather a scornful tone, `it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less.‘

As I strolled across campus, I noticed that there was a new building going up on the opposite side of the University Center from where I was so I headed that way after I took a few shots of the reflecting pool and waterfalls. The new building was in what used to be a parking lot. It is between the two buildings in which I spent most of my time back when I was working on my degree, the Liberal Arts building, and the Business building. It was surrounding by a construction fence so I could not get very close, but I could easily read the name of it. I used the zoom feature on my camera to take this shot.

I then left the campus, headed to the nearest Starbucks to get a frozen coffee drink and digest what I had seen, meditate on this plus what I had prayed for that morning before I left, that God would be glorified in me this day, as I do every day. I mediated on this the whole time I worked at my parents house and as we drove home yesterday. I did some research on this last night after we got home and some more this morning. This piece is the result of all of that. The term ‘Transformative Learning’ really bothered me. The research I did online revealed what I thought it would. It is tied to post-modernism as the means of educating people to ‘learn to think for themselves rather than act upon the assimilated beliefs, values, feelings and judgments of others.’ The quoted part of that sentence is from a paper by Jack Mezirow. Here is the link to the paper. I suggest you read it. The part that struck me and is the reason I believe God had me write this is on page 2 in the summary under Item A. Here is the content describing how adults go through Transformative Learning:

”[Adults] cannot fully trust what they know or believe because there are no fixed truths and circumstances change. Yet we urgently need to understand the meaning of our experience. To do so, we engage in deliberate learning—using prior interpretations to construe a new or revised experience as a guide to future action. We may also engage in incidental and assimilative learning.”

The key is the first sentence in that statement. It says that the basis for Transformative Learning is that “there are no fixed truths and circumstances change.” That sorta’ rules out God’s Word as absolute truth doesn’t it? If you read the rest of that outline you will see that that Mezirow and his cohorts use a lot very complicated jargon and verbiage in explaining that Transformative Learning is nothing more than discussions and coming to resolutions of compromise, finding that place where everyone can get along regardless of differences, et cetera. As I read through that paper I just couldn’t get that picture of Humpty Dumpty out of my mind for this is nothing more than something put in motion to implement the Hegelian Dialectic throughout the world.

All of this goes against true Christianity. We should not be surprised that the unregenerate are going this way. We should not be surprised that the visible church, those professing Christians who are obviously not Christians, are going this way, However, it is very disturbing when we witness evidence of the Hegelian Dialectic being used in what we know of as Christian Evangelicalism. However, Ken Silva told me not long ago that he considered it to be nearly all apostate now. Apostates are not our brothers and sisters in Christ. I was told by a commenter who is permanently blocked from this blog in his last attempt to say something against A Tree and It Fruit that that post was nothing more than a statement of Christian elitism. If that is so then our Lord Jesus Christ was a Christian elitist since the part this fellow had a problem with was a paraphrase of a direct quote from Him. You see this is the problem and I will never stop going back to it. God’s Word is God’s Truth. The Gospel is clearly given to us in it and it is not editable by us. We are told exactly how to serve our Lord as His Bondservants and custodians of His Gospel. The apostates have neglected all of these things and are spiritually blind and have hearts as hard as hard can be.

Christianity is not open to the Hegelian Dialectic. Transformative Learning is a destructive force of the enemy of the truth and a purveyor of postmodernist thinking. We have long said that those contaminated with postmodernist thinking have lost the ability to think logically. The reason is that that they do not accept any truth as absolute. This is why we see certain once solid appearing Christian leaders “suddenly” appearing to go mushy in areas in which they should be standing firm. They claim we should all unify in Christ and they are right, but the Jesus I know and follow would not allow most of those who claim to follow Him to carry His name for they follow “another Jesus.” They are not true Christians and He knows those who are His and gave us the clear means to tell the true from the false ourselves. We are called to stand firm and not compromise, but the pressures being brought to bear on us right now are to cave in to be unified with everyone, even if they are not genuine believers at all. This is not biblical and we cannot agree to this nor do it. Yes, this will be offensive to some. Yes, we will be seen as divisive. Yes, I know that will appear to some as not being Christlike, but look what it cost our Lord and the Apostles and the first Century Christians and the Reformers for standing firm as we are being called to do.

Soli Deo Gloria

Addendum:

Here is a link to that University’s Transformative Learning Program.