From: http://www.objectivistcenter.org/articles/foundations_epistemology.asp 

Foundations Study Guide: Epistemology     Revised August 1996      

by David Kelley, Ph.D.
Executive director of the Objectivist Center
David Kelley is the author of The Evidence of the Senses

Epistemology is the branch of philosophy that investigates the basic nature of knowledge, including its sources and validation. Epistemology is concerned with the basic relationship between man's mind and reality, and with the basic operations of human reason. It therefore sets the standards for the validation of all knowledge; it is the fundamental arbiter of cognitive method.

The major issues in epistemology can be classified into five topic areas:

• The fundamental relationship between consciousness and reality;

• The nature and validity of sense-perception;

• The nature of concepts and the relation between abstractions and concrete particulars;

• The nature and validation of axioms, especially the laws of identity and causality;

• The nature of certainty and truth as characteristics of conceptual knowledge.