ABSTRACT
In this connection, we need to consider the distinction between direct knowledge and indirect knowledge. Direct knowledge is the body of information that can be immediately derived from experience without having recourse to inferential procedures. Indirect knowledge is the set of propositions that can be derived from knowledge of other propositions and a judgement concerning the likelihood of certain associations of characters. The formation of social knowledge reflects, in a Smithian perspective, the practice of certain codes of association by which sympathy can be established (see p.111). In particular, social knowledge differs from other types of knowledge as a result of a different process by which the association of characters can be detected: sympathy presupposes a capability to ‘generate’ a specific view of other people’s situations, and the latter is made possible by imagination. The practice of imagination leads to the representation of ‘internal worlds’ different from the one that is directly experienced, and makes the association of characters to reflect a perceived commonality of possible situations rather than an actual similarity of features.
