Hello folks! Get ready to take a roller coaster ride through the world of knowledge. We'll discuss knowledge as a tree, a journey up a mountain, and even dive into your own mind to understand the influences that make you the thinker you are today!

Imagine knowledge as a tree. It's like a big ol' oak with a single trunk (the core) and branches (different knowledge domains) sprawling out in all directions. This single-trunk-tree idea is rooted (pun intended) in European societies, where we picture core subjects as the trunk and the more specialized ones as the branches. It's like seeing physics as the trunk, with branches of biology, chemistry, etc., growing from it. It’s a straightforward, linear image, right?

But what if knowledge was not like an oak tree, but more like a banyan tree? The banyan tree has multiple stems, with no one stem more important than the others. This gives us a sense of "epistemic pluralism"—there are many equal, valid ways to understand reality. Think of the banyan tree as a giant round table where science, Indigenous knowledge, religion, etc., all have a place and contribute to the larger picture.

Fun Fact: Did you know this banyan tree metaphor was used by Vedic philosophers thousands of years ago? The Bhagavad-Gītā describes the banyan tree as a symbol of eternal life and knowledge.