<Epistemology
Value, what we seek to achieve or keep according to some standard of evaluation; importance or worth we attribute to something, so knowledge is probably not a good in and of itself.
Some kinds of statements are outside our search for knowledge, like considerations regarding our subjective or cultural values for example.
Since knowledge seems to consist in belief, it seems relevant to ask whether belief itself is valuable? Is it avoidable?
What is the value of true belief, and so on, is knowledge itself valuable?
Without belief it seems we would be unable to do anything at all, so some kind of belief seems necessary in order to guide action, otherwise action in its entirety would be aimless, and lack intention.
Most philosophers (who?) don’t think that knowledge is intrinsically valuable. The fact that something is a truth, doesn’t mean that something is valuable. But when we combine truth with belief, it seems truth has some kind of value in that it corresponds with the world in some way.
The belief in a trivial truth however can still be worthless.
True beliefs seem like they might be able to let us achieve goals whilst untrue beliefs do not.
One could make an argument like: achieving our goals is valuable
true beliefs let us achieve our goals
therefore true beliefs are valuable.
Do instrumental and non-instrumental values exist? (Do we need an epistemology of how we know that concepts react with eachother?)
Ceteris Paribus (All else being equal)
Having true beliefs is better, than having false beliefs.
Ceteris Paribus is a tool for thought experiments which is used to isolate a topic ”unto itself”. Given that some thing is the case given only what has been said, and all other things do not matter in this context, then a certain state of affairs will be the case. It is a kind of true experiment, though in thought experiment form.
Given these kind of defintions, it seems that beliefs have a wholly instrumental value. The reason we want to have true beliefs is so that we can do certain actions which we would be unable to manage otherwise.
Sometimes a false belief can be useful despite being strictly false, whilst there are true beliefs which, whilst strictly true, are actually enttirely non-contending.
”On average” however, doing fucking epistemological statistics, it seems that true belief is better.
Knowledge then, seems even more valuable, because it infers that there has been more meticulous ”searching” into why that piece of true belief has merit. Knowledge implies true belief, but mere true belief is not yet any kind of knowledge. So all else being equal, knowledge is more valuable than true beliefs.
So knowledge here basically just means true belief, but you also did a little more ”thorough”, whatever that implies, uncovering.
True belief by itself is all about epistemtic luck and can easily be wrong.
Knowledge seems to lack this luck component. You typically stick to knowledge and often do not suddenly form new false beliefs out of a prior piece of knowledge. Knowledge is stable and so therefore more valuable than true belief.
Is there knowledge that is valuable in and of itself, knowledge lacking instrumental value?
Wisdom seems to be an example of a knowledge that is valuable in and of itself. Even if it does not help you immediately, it seems to be able to still be knowledge, despite lacking instrumental value,
Truth seems to confer and advantage on belifs, and knowledge seems to have advantages over true beliefs, but that relies on what the difference between knowledge and true belief is.
But for this to be the case, we need to have an adequate example of what sort of knowledge we are talking about, what is that extra x that we need for it to be stable.
One way to identify a suggestion for that kind of x, is by making a list of which things we already consider to be knowledge and see which similar features these instances of knowledge have.
However, this method has an inherent circularity as a part of itself, and so seemingly confers little knowledge.
Identifying instances of knowledge requires knowing what the criteria for knowledge are
Knowing what the criteria for knowledge are requires being able to identify instances of knowledge
So,
this leads us to the problem of the criterion.
As old as Pyrrhon and Sextus Empiricus, and rearticulated by Roderick Chisholm.
The problem of the criterion is a general problem and so any method that leads to the problem of the criterion needs to be avoided.
Two ways we give meaning to a term:
Intension: the set of principles that pick out the objects
Extension: the set of objects in the world to which the term corresponds
In regards to the problem of the criterion, we are left with extreme skepticism only.
First principle:
You are able to identify instances of knowledge only if you already know what the criteria for knowledge are
Second principle:
You can know what the criteria for knowledge are only if you are already able to identify what knowledge is
Give up one of the principles.
Petitio principii
Occurs when the premise of an argument already assume the truth of the cocnlusion, or the premise and the conclusion are the same proposition.
eg. Opium induces sleep because it has soporific quality.
One way out of this skepticism is particularism, to give up the first principle.
You can know what the criteria for knowledge are only if you are already able to identify instances of knowledge.
A lot of epistemologists seems to hold this position. Or a lot of people start from here anyways, basically going from particulars to universal instances.
”Less extravagant”, we only suppose that we can correctly identify particular instances of knowledge, not its defining features
The skeptical position is not taken seriously, and is ruled out a priori. By starting from specific instances of knowledge, we assume that we have knowledge about things in the first place.
Then there is methodism, to give up on the second principle
You are able to identify instances of knoledge only if you already know what the criteria for knowledge are.
Descartes is an example of a methodist. With rational considerations we can find general principles which we then can find in the way.
The problem of skepticism is taken seriously, and, like in particularism, skepticism is not assumed to be a false position.
achieving knowledge about the criteria for knowledge in this way seems to be very difficult.
A third option, skepticism, both principles are false.
There is no independent way to establish either principle, and if neither of the principles can be established independently, they cannot be answered at all
This response also begs the question however.
If the criteria for knowledge are pretty obvious, coming to know them through reflection is pretty realistic
But if the criteria for knowledge are complicated, coming to know them through reflection seems unrealistic.
The criteria for knowledge seem to be complicated, so perhaps methodism then too is implausible.
In the ”classical account of knowledge”, the third x that is added is the condition of justification.
It seems that this tripartite definition entails sufficient conditions for knowledge.
To be epistemically justified, amount s to having good reasons for believing that a proposition is true.
Gettier partially agrees with the tripartite account
JTB is a necessary condition for knowledge, but not the other way around. (Justified true belief)
You can sometimes have JTB without having knowledge.
No false lemmas
We need to have correct presuppositions of things as well
Inverse correlation between presuopposition and knowledge
A 4:th y to add in order to remove gettier cases.
It’s difficult to know what kind of presuppositions are liberal/restrictive enough in order to not create too much or too little knowledge.
Goldman created the Causal Theory of Knowledge in 1967
S knows that P IFF S’s beleief that p is caused by the fact that p.
S knows that P IFF S’s belief that p is causally connected in an appropriate way with the fact that p.
This definition only works for empirical knowledge, and has no impact on for example mathematics
Problems with Goldman’s theory-
Suppose that Henry is driving through the country-side and points to barns in the field.
On the causal theory, Henry knows that there are barns in the field
However, moment later Henry enters ”fake barn county” in which farmers have put up lots of fake barns around a real one
Henry points to one of the barns and says ”there is another barn”
The fact that Henry happens to point to a real barn is here happenstance
Henry’s belief that ”there’s a barn” is not causally connected in an approporaitae way to the fact that it actually is areal barn
Had henry picked another barn, the same causal connection have produced a false belief
Thus henry’s true belief is due to lck, rather than an appropriate causal connection
Henry lacks knowledge.
Chisholm’ argument for particularism
Particularism, methodism and skepticism all question begging in relation to each other
Methodism, given the difficulty of finding the right criteria for knowledge leads to skepticism
skepticism doesn’t lead anywhere
particularism does not
particularism is therefore the best set out of bad options.
Chisholm thinks that the criterion has no solution.