Abstract

In this paper, I offer an account of a conception of knowledge found throughout the philosophical traditions of the Maya, which are linked to ideas in the broader cluster of related traditions of Mesoamerica. This unique conception of knowledge is based on creativity, vision, and the centrality of human activity in bringing about, maintaining, and understanding the intelligible world. For the precolonial and colonial period Maya, knowledge was understood as both a creative ability and as an ability to access aspects of the world that are not normally available to humans. Philosophers often discuss propositional knowledge (‘knowing that’) and skill knowledge (‘knowing how’). Instances of such knowledge include everyday things, such as knowing that one has a hand or knowing how to play the guitar. The Maya tradition was largely unconcerned with knowledge in these senses, likely because given their metaphysics (which I discuss below), there is no particular problem presented for everyday knowledge in the way we see in Indo-European traditions, in which the problem of scepticism became a concern.