What is knowledge?

[Fifty]

But doesn't an atheistic belief in science lead to the same conclusion: We are but vehicles for the reproduction of our DNA?

But doesn't a scientific belief in atheism follow to a different beginning? You are butt bicycles for the killing of your AND?

 

[Damnyankee]

But seriously though, What is Knowledge... well, it depends. I person can "know" that the world is flat, when in reality, it is not. So again, "What is Knowledge"? Knowledge is the belief in something being fact. The real question is, what is fact?

 

[Damnyankee]

Funny people are generally funny in all media.

Also, John Cleese is smart.

Ok, now your just being a dick.

 

[Perfection]

If you believe Nisargadatta Maharaj.

He seems stupid.

But doesn't an atheistic belief in science lead to the same conclusion: We are but vehicles for the reproduction of our DNA?

Piss no.

 

[Perfection]

But seriously though, What is Knowledge... well, it depends. I person can "know" that the world is flat, when in reality, it is not.

I don't believe that someone can "know" something false. They may certainly believe they know that but they don't.

Ok, now your just being a dick.

Better a dick then a guy too stubborn to admit that his saying had nothing to do with the thread topic.

 

[Damnyankee]

I don't believe that someone can "know" something false. They may certainly believe they know that but they don't.


Better a dick then a guy too stubborn to admit that his saying had nothing to do with the thread topic.

Well, I think I kinda said it didn't. A more appropriate statement would have been knowledge is nothing, nothing is knowledge. Even then though, it does have too many holes in it, and even if someone could move past them, one would eventually approach Cogito, ergo sum or I think, therefore I am. That would be a form of knowledge. Crap, defeated my whole half assed argument.

 

[Perfection]

Dude, do you actually think this has any intellectual merit whatsoever or are you just spouting random nonsense?

 

[Damnyankee]

Dude, do you actually think this has any intellectual merit whatsoever or are you just spouting random nonsense?

What, the oriental quote? Not really, it can be refuted too easily. Plus, I doubt it was meant to apply to everything, but instead, to life in general.

 

[Erik Mesoy]

I've heard that joke before, but whats the relevance here? <snip unhelpful commentary>

The relevance is that your "disproved 50 years ago" statement really means "I consider different ideas to be fashionable at present". The justified-true-belief definition hasn't been thrown out half as hard as you'd like to imply, or else you'd have started a serious discussion with Taliesin instead of butchering my quote.

 

[Perfection]

The relevance is that your "disproved 50 years ago" statement really means "I consider different ideas to be fashionable at present". The justified-true-belief definition hasn't been thrown out half as hard as you'd like to imply, or else you'd have started a serious discussion with Taliesin instead of butchering my quote.

To say this you must reject the notion of philosophical progress. Do you do that?

 

[Taliesin]

Now now, Fifty actually studies epistemology. I just muddle along by recalling what I can from my studies of the ancient Greeks. If Fifty says that the justified true belief description is outmoded, I'm inclined to acquiesce.

 

[scherbchen]

Why do you guys insist on proofs? I don't think knowledge/facts need to be proven but rather accepted.

Europe 1200 AD, known fact: the earth is flat, proof? not required -> knowledge and generally accepted fact. It doesn't matter that this belief has been proven wrong, at the given time this was knowledge and doubting it would get you laughed at or burnt at the stake. Take almost any other 'fact' that has been revised over time and you realise that 'knowledge' is not a constant but rather an evolving concept that tries to come as close to reality as possible while never getting there. Expecting any more is probably just hubris.

 

[Perfection]

Knowledge needs to have some physical truth to be called knowledge (at least for statements pertaining to physical stuff).

If someone believe my car is blue when it is in fact red then I wouldn't say that they know my car is blue only that they think it is and would say that they have no knowledge of my car's color.

I too am a bit curious to the issues behind justified true belief being outmoded because it appears at surface to be a decent discrption.

 

[GVBN]

Each point of knowledge gives you 10 mana points

 

[aaglo]

Knowledge is....

- power
- admitting that you know pretty close to nothing on big scale
- not the same as the truth

 

[Erik Mesoy]

To say this you must reject the notion of philosophical progress. Do you do that?

I disagree that I must reject the notion of philosophical progress to say that, on the grounds that the rejection of JTB hasn't been shown to be an integral part of philosophical progress. (All I've seen so far is an assertion from Fifty.)

And while I haven't decided whether to reject the notion of philosophical progress, my philosophy lecturers are strongly in favor. Mostly, what they reject is philosophy that relied on worldviews that turned out to be inconsistent with later evidence, and they have plenty of examples of systems of thought that were thrown out under the banner of "progress" and later became respectable again.

I think I'll try to talk to one of them about this.

 

[brennan]

If you 'know' something then you are in possession of information about xxx.

Knowledge=having information.

 

[Fifty]

The relevance is that your "disproved 50 years ago" statement really means "I consider different ideas to be fashionable at present". The justified-true-belief definition hasn't been thrown out half as hard as you'd like to imply,

Dude, its not unfashionable, it was simply and succinctly disproven. Nobody anywhere thinks otherwise (at least in philosophically advanced countries, I'm not sure whether Norway is or is not, but I'd guess that at least at the best unis in Norway, it is). While certain philosophical theses indeed go through resurgences, the idea that JTB specificies sufficient conditions for knowledge is definitely disproved, because when you are talking about a necessary-and-sufficient conditions approach, the philosophical thesis is extremely clear and extremely susceptible to counterexamples, which is exactly what Edmund Gettier did. Anybody who knows anything about epistemology is familiar with this fact, and much of what epistemologists have done since the 50's is try to cope with what have been dubbed "Gettier-style counterexamples". I didn't engage in a discussion with Tal because I happen to be aware, via fiftychat, that he simply isn't familiar with modern epistemology Insofar as philosophical theories go "in and out of fashion" you are basically wrong too, but less wrong than you are about the theory of knowledge.

Since you know it wasn't thrown out "half as hard as I imply", could you just point me to a modern epistemologist (that isnt some random crackpot that nobody reads) anywhere who accepts it? Many epistemologists still think JTB constitutes a set of necessary conditions on any theory of knowledge, but I'm sure someone as logical lol as you understands how a set of necessary conditions does not exhaust a definition. It's simply a fact that the idea that JTB = Knowledge is not accepted anywhere, due to these Gettier-style counterexamples (and also, more recently, because its inability to cope with the normative value of knowledge).

 

[Fifty]

Here's one counterexample to the JTB approach, which Gettier came up with:

"suppose that Smith and Jones have applied for a certain job. And suppose that Smith has strong evidence for the following conjunctive proposition:

(d) Jones it he man who will get the job, and Jones has ten coins in his pocket.

Smith's evidence for (d) might be that the president of the company assured him that Jones would in the end be selected, and that he, Smith, had counted the coins in Jones's pocket ten minutes ago. Proposition (d) entails:

(e) The man who wil get the job has ten coins in his pocket.

Let us suppose that Smith sees the entailment from (d) to (e), and accepts (e) on the grounds of (d), for which he has strong evidence. In this case, Smith is clearly justified in believing that (e) is true.

But imagine, further, that unknown to Smith, he himself, not Jones, will get the job. And also, unknown to Smith, he himself has ten coins in his pocket. Proposition (e) is then true, though proposition (d), from which Smith inferred (e), is false. In our example, then, all of the following are true: (i) (e) is true, (ii) Smith believes that (e) is true, and (iii) Smith is justified in believing that (e) is true. But it is equally clear that Smith does not know that (e) is true; for (e) is true in virtue of the number of coins in Smith's pocket, while Smith does not know how many coins are in Smith's pocket, and bases his belief in (e) on a count of the coins in Jones' pocket, whom he falsely believes to be the man who will get the job."

 

[Erik Mesoy]

Two questions:
Why does Fifty keep second-guessing and insulting me?

Isn't Gettier's counterexample invalidated by using a false belief as a justification?