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Ryle's distinction between know how and know that is fairly basic, and both Thomas Deane Tucker and William Brown seek refinements – in complementary directions. Thomas seeks to distinguish two types of knowing that - film theory, and film philosophy.  A quick (or premature) answer would be to think of film philosophy as a subset of film theory, but I'm sure that raises too many objections.

William aims to bring know how and know that together (whereas Ryle wants to keep them completely separate). The following example suggests we should keep them separate:

Knowing how to ride a bicycle may be explained as a constant adjustment of the curvature of the bicycle's path in proportion to the ratio of the unbalance over the square of the speed (V. A. Howard in Artistry, referring to a famous example from Michael Polanyi)

We learn to ride a bicycle without knowing the physics. Film theorists (and film philosophers) produce this type of knowledge about films, or the cinema in general. But such knowledge does not (and is not meant to) have any influence on knowing how to make a film.

But then again, know how is not a singular, monolithic concept. William is referring to one type of know how, and I'm probably referring to another. 

Warren

Warren Buckland
Reader in Film Studies
Oxford Brookes University




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