







































Education, Society and Human Studies 
ISSN 2690-3679 (Print) ISSN 2690-3687 (Online) 

Vol. 3, No. 3, 2022 
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8 

Original Paper 

Thinking, a Diverse and Inclusive Process: An Epistemological 

Look 
José Manuel Salum Tomé1* 

1 PhD, Doctor of Education, Catholic University of Temuco, Temuco, Chile 
* José Manuel Salum Tomé, PhD, Doctor of Education, Catholic University of Temuco, Temuco, Chile 

 

Received: June 23, 2022         Accepted: June 30, 2021         Online Published: July 11, 2022 

doi:10.22158/eshs.v3n3p8                       URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.22158/eshs.v3n3p8 

 

Inclusive education is the transformation of the system; it highlights difference and diversity, to 

strengthen the development of skills, under the premise of respect for difference and diversity (Barton, 

2013). Today, educational inclusion is carries out and attends to the educational needs of students 

individually, where the actors of the educational process contribute to learning while respecting the 

differences and diversity of each individual, by fulfilling the transforming and integrating role that 

improves skills and breaks with barriers to learning. 

 

Resume 

Contemporary education has taken on the challenge of promoting different programs aimed at 

promoting inclusive teaching-learning processes that facilitate attention to diversity. It is evident that 

the integration of students with special needs in regular educational centers has caused significant 

changes in the curriculum, infrastructure and training among teachers. In the last ten years, 

educational inclusion has made significant progress, but much remains to be done to expand inclusive 

spaces. 

Keywords 

educational inclusion, epistemology, inclusive classroom, inclusive teacher 

 

Introduction 

This article carries out an analysis around the main epistemological difficulties that the inclusive 

education and diversity approach faces today, in public policies of equal opportunities. Initially, it 

describes a certain epistemic vacuum within the educational sciences and, therefore, an unclear 

pedagogical knowledge, regarding the foundational dilemmas that it has proposed to solve. A 

displacement model is observed that advances above the problems of the new century, evidencing a 



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hybrid or preconstructed paradigmatic model or approach, facing the challenges and transformations 

that postmodern societies demand in times of exclusion. It is concluded about the need to advance 

towards the assurance of a field of timely curricular, didactic and evaluative problematization in the 

matter. 

 

The Epistemology of Education and Diversity 

A large percentage of children and adolescents between 5 and 17 years of age are part of school 

exclusion. In the 60s, 70s and part of the 80s, the genesis of exclusion from education lies in 

mistreatment, discrimination, neglect of basic physical and emotional needs, among other factors; at 

that time only normal children received education. 

Epistemological Foundations of Inclusive Education and Diversity 

The epistemological foundation of inclusive education at the beginning of the 21st century opted for a 

transdisciplinary enrichment that allows promoting a genealogical critique of its founding paradigm of 

Special Education. Ocampo (2015) in epistemic terms, inclusive education must address the total 

eradication of exclusion, that is, it seeks to eliminate school failure and exclusion. 

This study presents reflections, to contemporary education, to deal with traditionalist pedagogy, which 

impede the development of skills, proposes epistemological meditation, which positively contribute to 

overcoming the conflicts faced by students with special educational needs. 

“Currently, the scenarios in which inclusive education and education for all are promoted have 

diversified and new subjects and new forms of acceptance and/or social elimination have appeared”, 

Kaplan (2007) that condition social life and school of multiple students. 

An important step is to understand, from an epistemic perspective, that inclusive education is a model 

or current trend that is different from education for all. Therefore, it is the educational systems and the 

designers of educational policies who are more aware of what they promote today, because under the 

model of inclusion, poorly built, new forms of homogenization, marginalization and some 

contradictions in the management of education become visible institutions and training practices. The 

challenge now is that the programs on the matter signify and redefine all our citizens. 

Accepting our own history of ways of thinking about the world, we should situate ourselves in what the 

different narratives and explanations have called the Western tradition of thought, which, in addition to 

its logical types and rationality, has proposed the paradigm of simplification , this from Plato to classical 

science has affected philosophy and science, which would not be a major problem if it did not directly 

impact the field of decision-making, and therefore ethics, aesthetics and politics. Its aim is to idealize, 

rationalize, normalize, that is, conceive of reality as something reducible to schemes or ordered and 

computer concepts, understood from the perspective of identity logic and the principle of disjunction. 

As for ethics and politics, they are also presided over by rationalization and the unifying order, so that 

they reject or exclude the “less developed” or “irrational” forms. In short, it is a thought that is based on 



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reifying concepts and an epistemological ideal that is characterized by assuming an absolute point of 

view, that is, an external, omniscient observer. This epistemological conception implies in parallel the 

idea of an illusory objectivity that is also absolute, which is not affected by the subject/observer. Such an 

ideal of knowledge, typical of classical philosophy and science, is impossible. From the point of view of 

action, it is also shown by social and political history, in particular that of our century, which, when it has 

tried to determine/unify society, has succeeded in the best of cases for a short time. 

From the above, we can affirm that our role as educators is to respond to the diversity of the student, the 

objective of inclusive education, and possibly it is the challenge that the educational system must face, to 

achieve a quality education that benefits all students at different levels. The changes proposed in 

education have caused teachers to feel pressured by the demands regarding the constant curricular 

overload, updating and professionalization of teachers, among other factors. In order for these pressures 

to be overcome, it is necessary to promote reforms, both in the cultural, organizational and good practices 

of schools, in order to achieve a change in the attitude of teachers and thus guarantee access, relevance, 

participation that facilitates learning of all students. 

Inclusion is a right to education under equal conditions; in this sense, the participation of people is 

carried out under the slogan of respect for diversity, to contribute to the advancement of society. It is 

important to be clear that each individual is a different world, and each one has their own learning style, 

which confirms that they are all different. 

All of the above allows us to socialize the term THINKING in our students; it is made clear that everyone 

has this ability, which is why we will give a perception of Thinking from an epitymological perspective. 

Philosophy thinking and philosophy 

When one hears the word Philosophy, one thinks of a person, relaxed, who begins to see and think 

about everything he does and wants to draw conclusions from all actions. It is seen as something dark 

and mysterious that few men are able to understand and not be able to think about its meaning. 

However, we see that Philosophy is the most natural activity of man; it is something that comes with 

his essence. It is simply the curiosity of man for each and every one of his actions and to know how? 

And for what? is in this world, as person. 

Man, because he is not born in the adult stage, gets used to having some questions unanswered and 

seeing things that he may not understand, but it has always been like that. If man were born an adult, he 

would ask himself many questions since he would not even know how? why? or what for? is here, 

therefore the power is restricted To think. Philosophy is the knowledge that human reason claims 

immediately and naturally, its definition is as follows: Science of all things by their ultimate causes 

acquired by the light of reason. 

For its ultimate causes. This speaks of the fact that he studied all the meanings of a subject, not by parts, 

nor by specialization, but rather everything in general, so that there is a greater understanding. Acquired 

by the light of reason. This tells us that Philosophy is not based on facts of faith, but on real facts, on 



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questions verifiable to man’s reason. 

In this sense, we can say that the sciences do not think. This does not mean anything negative; on the 

contrary, the sciences know much more than thinking. They accumulate knowledge about the world 

that “is there”. Thinking, on the other hand, does not accumulate knowledge, it only questions the 

origin of the world. We don’t think because the memory of our essential historical being was expelled 

from the beginning of history. We have entered history expelling from memory the original being that 

opened this history. Due to this forgetfulness, we are not thinking. This forgetting of what essentially 

originates us, this expulsion from memory of the foundation of our essential historical way of being, 

constitutes a peculiar way that we human beings have of linking ourselves with the history. 

Epistemology, Thinking and Knowing 

Think and Knowledge. The act of thinking and its results, thoughts are still a complex problem for 

Philosophy. In fact, to think is to know. But what is thinking? Plato says that it is to remember. 

Descartes that is to doubt, affirm, deny, want, not want, imagine, feel. While Hegel affirms that it is the 

realization for himself of the effective reality of the absolute through human language. 

However, diversity, we can characterize thinking as a psychological activity, as the act that occurs in 

the consciousness of a subject in a certain period of time, which can be performed with full attention, 

distraction, with pleasure or dislike. The result of this activity is the thought that as such is indifferent 

to who thinks it, how and when they think it, maintaining its identity with itself. 

In this sense, thought is spaceless and timeless; the Socratic maxim “know yourself”, as a thought 

remains unchanged, regardless of whether it was thought in very particular conditions. Socrates in the 

5th century BC, or let me think of it now in a different sense. On the other hand, thought is usually 

accompanied by perceptions or images, I can see something or imagine it; but these elements are not 

essential to thought, every time I read a book, I do not imagine everything I am reading. The expression 

of thought also appears the signs that express it as its meaning or meaning. Finally, we can point out 

that the object of thought, the reference. All thought is thought of something. There are no mere, empty 

thoughts. We must not, however, confuse thought with its object, since objects as such are not modified 

by thinking about them. 

 

Epistemology 

Think Epistemology 

The human being lives inserted in a determined physical and social environment. Throughout space and 

time, he has tried to get to know this medium in various ways and using different procedures, each of 

which has provided him with a concrete explanation of reality. This explanation has nourished the 

capital of knowledge that has been accumulating. Sometimes, summarily, other times, an explanation 

has replaced the previous one. 

Knowledge is therefore a possibility and a necessity that all societies have developed in one way or 



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another. In our context, in which social work is located, scientific knowledge is the instrument that we 

have given ourselves to point out the difference between what is true and what is false. No one can 

doubt the importance of science in our society. Its development is at the base of the organization and of 

life Social. 

We must question its repercussions in all areas of society. Social work, insofar as it is present in a 

society where science is the dominant criterion in establishing what is true and what is false, has to ask 

itself about its scientific character or not. Epistemology will be a means for this. The conception that 

we have about it would be determined by considering that it consists of an analysis of the conceptual 

structures of a particular science and of science in general. This analysis is located at a second order 

level with respect to scientific reflection itself. Its object of work would be determined not by limited 

space-time entities..., but by the concepts that the specialists of this science handle for its development 

(Ulysses Moulines, (1988). Epistemology does not want to impose an a priori system, dogmatic, 

authoritatively dictating what should be knowledge scientific, otherwise study the genesis Y the 

structure from scientific knowledge, that is, studying scientific production from all its aspects, without 

forgetting that the concepts used, and science itself, are produced in a specific context, so the 

relationship between science and society should be analyzed (Mardones & Ursúa , 1982, 41-44). 

 

Science Thinking as a Creative Act 

It doesn’t seem like these are good times, it’s for philosophical reflection; however, it is urgent that 

thought be strengthened in these times when scientific and technical development would be capable of 

putting an end to the evils that the world suffers. It is neither possible nor desirable to return to a 

pre-scientific world, from which many can be learned things, but never idealize it; everything that 

anarchism has already combated since its origins was present in that world: poverty, exploitation, 

ignorance, prejudice, disease...; All this is possible to eradicate today by delving into the problems 

thanks to technological progress. 

It depends on us to be capable of a renewal of philosophical thought that helps to rationalize and 

humanize societies, as well as to seize the power that is perpetuated in the hands of a few, or, being 

consistent with the libertarian point of view, to enable that power is diluted in society as a whole, and 

that hinder the construction of a decent future for everyone. 

Today, more than ever, we have the possibility to plan the world we want and we can be capable of 

being the legitimate owners of our lives, thoughts and our destination. It can be concluded that a 

“philosophy of science” is necessary, although it is difficult to determine what its real mission would be. 

Some authors have decided that Philosophy must precede science and provide it with a solid base; 

others, that what must be achieved is a theory of knowledge, either popular or academic, or a 

professional language that synthesizes all scientific, technical and practical languages. Habermas, so 

critical of Marx for subordinating knowledge to the productive forces, considers that the true mission of 



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philosophy is to be critical of science: “Criticize the objectivist self-conception of the sciences, the 

scientistic concept of science and scientific progress; it should deal in particular with basic questions of 

a social-scientific methodology, so that it does not hold back. But it is required, the adequate 

elaboration of basic concepts for systems from action communicative”; Habermas (1981), not 

denies the science as the productive force, but it only admits it if it is accompanied by science as the 

emancipatory force. 

 

Ontology 

Nothing is broader than the sum of thinking and being. Everything, both real and unreal, both existing 

and nothing, is located in one of these two areas, and there is no more. To take them into consideration 

is to encompass everything and there is no room for a broader totality. However, the sum of thinking 

and being is not a totality, in the sense that there is a genus to which two species belong, respectively 

thinking and being. 

It is a totality only in the sense that any “data” belongs to one or another area; it is a merely quantitative 

totality, and therefore abstract. Next, it will begin to clarify what is the relationship in which thinking 

and being are with each other. They do not intend to go through all the aspects of the matter, but they 

do touch on the characteristic points. The historical investigation, so important, but so extensive, is left 

aside, and it is limited to trying to show the outstanding features of the relationship thinking-being 

compatible and required by “metaphysical realism”. 

I understand by such realism, from a historiographical point of view, the one found mainly in Aristotle 

and Saint Thomas Aquinas. From a dogmatic point of view, it is that it admits the possibility of 

metaphysics, that is, of the science of being as such. Of course, within this path there are numerous 

variants that are incompatible with each other at some points that are not secondary or little ones. 

The “problem” of thinking and being is exercised by thinking. It is a problem for thinking, because 

being itself does not question thinking. Thinking questions its relationship with being insofar as 

thinking understands itself as a modality of being, as a particular way of being, and, on the other hand, 

insofar as thinking is situated on the horizon of thinking the being, that is, to the extent that thinking 

wants to be thinking being. It is, therefore, a problem initially raised from thinking and for thinking. 

It is the entire thinking, from the outset, that is in question, when it questions itself about being. 

Final reflection 

Epistemologically, education is a diverse and complex process that encompasses all human beings, 

cultures, religions, ideologies etc. and that allows us to realize that diversity is present in our society. 

Although transformational learning is complex, it is possible and necessary, it invites us to reflect on 

ourselves and on our work as human beings in a world of which we are a part, and on our ability to 

understand the processes of change and adapt to them creatively, and our survival will depend neither 

more nor less. 



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Thinking as a normal process of the human being and viewed from different epistemological 

perspectives, more so in the case of the human and social sciences, also shows that we are facing 

different epistemological positions. Thinking is a discipline that belongs to this category. There is a 

clear difficulty in defining its object or objects of study, which causes a proliferation of theories based 

on diverse philosophical assumptions. Teaching has to think implies making these presuppositions 

patent. In this way, the different theories can be ordered showing the configuration of the world that 

they presuppose. Teaching the Thinking process involves influencing the configuration of the students’ 

network of beliefs so that they can place their object of study within the framework of a certain vision 

of reality. 

Epistemology, evidently, is complexity. It is transcomplexity. But, it is authentic rationality. However, 

all this is better appreciated when it is developed as a work of intellectual craft characterized by the 

deep desire to know and, to that end, by the yearning to find a type of knowing that, once it becomes 

conscious, is diluted in new understandings. Because this is another feature of epistemological thinking: 

to evolve—this concept is applied to oneself. In addition, it transcends mere grammatical categories; it 

is transformational and transgressive of all order. 

Epistemology overcomes the statements of opportunity and context and is always open to the scenario 

where the probable, the possible and the uncertain come together, again, in favor of the historical 

formulation of new knowledge, in direct and proportional relationship with the future of the science. 

Without neglecting that epistemology, it takes flight, in such a way that, on occasions, it assumes 

scientific leadership. 

It has been said that epistemology is a sine qua non condition for any attempt associated with science, 

in addition to being a direct access door to philosophical insight. 

 

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