Fifty
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Well, it was generally accepted until the 1950's, although I agree that there was never an exact consensus. It was just never positively refuted until Gettier's paper.
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What is knowledge?
- Thread starter stormbind
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Well, it was generally accepted until the 1950's, although I agree that there was never an exact consensus. It was just never positively refuted until Gettier's paper.
You're singling out evolution here as if it was a purpose. It's not. It's just a process. It's just something that happens. Scientists sometimes describe evolution as genes with a purpose because it is easier to think of them that way, but that model is limited. Gene's don't really try to evolve. We do not live to evolve.
So yes, individuals have no absolute purpose or absolute value. Purpose and value are entirely subjective qualities. Any purpose or value anything may have is defendant only on the perceptions of values and morals of individuals.
That's not a pessimistic view of the world.
Edit: It should also be pointed out, that although all atheist are non religious, some may still have religious tendencies, such as believing in a greater purpose to the world and their being.
brennan
Argumentative Brit
Can you link anything on this? Sounds intriguing.
Let's me answer the original Question: (Warning the following is a rant)
What is knowledge?
There are five kinds of knowledge.
The first is knowledge by definition. You can define something to be true. Then you can say that you know it is true. For example, you know a triangle has three sides.
The second is deductive logic. It works like this: Given a set of values, and a set of operations defined on those values, we can come up with new values. For example, Given values 1 and 2, and the usual definitions for addition and equality, we can come up with the following statement: 1+1=2. This is always true. We say we know this is true.
Third is knowledge of our selves, namely our senses and memories. We know when we can hear a tone, or when we feel cold, or when we remember something. But such knowledge is limited. We only know what we feel, the reason for the feeling must be deduced. For example, if you feel cold, you must first rule out the possibility that you have a fever before you say that it is cold. Furthermore, knowing that it is cold does not give you any insight into what temperature is.
The fourth type of knowledge is Knowledge of the natural world, specifically of how the natural world behaves. This appears in the form of natural laws, such as "Every day the sun rises in the east and sets in the west." or "Most things when placed in open air tend to fall". The problem with such knowledge, is that there is no basis for the assumption that the laws of nature hold true, except that they have always held true in the past. This basis can be easily disproven with a counter example. Yet if we assume that the basis sometimes holds, then we can and do say that we know something about the laws of nature.
The final category is the knowledge that you as a conscious being are conscious. There is no way to prove that you are conscious. Nor is it knowledge by definition, because the definition of consciousness does not involve you. Yet if you think you are conscious, then you must be conscious. It is possible to claim that it is not consciousness that fits into this category, but something else (like thought perhaps). Yet it is clear that ultimately, there is something that we know, but we cannot point to a reason for knowing, without being circular.
So this in a way provides five separate partial definitions of knowledge that together provide an all inclusive definition.
What is knowledge?
There are five kinds of knowledge.
The first is knowledge by definition. You can define something to be true. Then you can say that you know it is true. For example, you know a triangle has three sides.
The second is deductive logic. It works like this: Given a set of values, and a set of operations defined on those values, we can come up with new values. For example, Given values 1 and 2, and the usual definitions for addition and equality, we can come up with the following statement: 1+1=2. This is always true. We say we know this is true.
Third is knowledge of our selves, namely our senses and memories. We know when we can hear a tone, or when we feel cold, or when we remember something. But such knowledge is limited. We only know what we feel, the reason for the feeling must be deduced. For example, if you feel cold, you must first rule out the possibility that you have a fever before you say that it is cold. Furthermore, knowing that it is cold does not give you any insight into what temperature is.
The fourth type of knowledge is Knowledge of the natural world, specifically of how the natural world behaves. This appears in the form of natural laws, such as "Every day the sun rises in the east and sets in the west." or "Most things when placed in open air tend to fall". The problem with such knowledge, is that there is no basis for the assumption that the laws of nature hold true, except that they have always held true in the past. This basis can be easily disproven with a counter example. Yet if we assume that the basis sometimes holds, then we can and do say that we know something about the laws of nature.
The final category is the knowledge that you as a conscious being are conscious. There is no way to prove that you are conscious. Nor is it knowledge by definition, because the definition of consciousness does not involve you. Yet if you think you are conscious, then you must be conscious. It is possible to claim that it is not consciousness that fits into this category, but something else (like thought perhaps). Yet it is clear that ultimately, there is something that we know, but we cannot point to a reason for knowing, without being circular.
So this in a way provides five separate partial definitions of knowledge that together provide an all inclusive definition.
Fifty
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
A good (though nonexhaustive) introduction could be found in the Linda Zagzebski's article The Search for the Source of Epistemic Good, which was published in Metaphilosophy: Vol 34, January 2003 Issue. If you have access to an institutional library, they probably have an electronic version available via Blackwell Publishing's database. One thing that looks like it might be good (though I haven't read it) is this article. It's written by John Greco, who is a well known figure in virtue epistemology, so it's probably pretty good.
@Sauron: You really haven't done much to define knowledge, as best I can see you've only sorta described different sorts of truths, without really addressing knowledge. At least, if you think those are decent sub-definitions of knowledge, they are extremely susceptible to Gettier-style counterexamples.
Truth and knowledge are intrinsically related.
At the very least, I can claim that I have isolated categories that all knowledge falls into, and therefore provided a way to determine that somethings are not knowledge if they do not fit into any of the categories.
Except for Knowledge of the natural world, I do not see where there is any vagueness. Thus we have 4 categories of things that I think we can all agree constitute knowledge.
At least, that's how I see it.
Fifty
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Yeah, but nobody disputes that in the slightest. At least nobody who's serious (thus excluding the new-agers
).Well, even then you left something out and kinda over-differentiated in some areas. Epistemologists usually identify the knowledge-types as perception, memory, introspection, reason, and testimony. As you can see, some of those conflate your knowledge types (e.g. definitional and deductive are both under the reason category), and you left out testimony. Your categories were on the right track, but I think the traditional mode generates more meaningful distinctions.
No, they simply classify TYPES of knowledge. They do not delineate what it is to have knowledge, which is the purpose of the thread as far as I can tell.
Does evolution have a purpose? Of course, I would say it does, even one beyond the very limited one I posted regarding DNA reproduction. I recently read Robert Wright's Non Zero. It is pretty interesting and looks at the evolution life and cultural evolution from a game theory perspective. He finds some pretty convincing evidence that evolution is "biased" towards larger and more complex non zero sum solutions such that big-brained complex creatures are an inevitable consequence. Much (but not all) of the book is on line here:
http://www.nonzero.org/chap17.htm
He writes well and you can pick through the chapters on culture or evolution. He even addresses the question of god and religion in some detail.
Here is another passage.
Anyway, I do recommend the book. It has swayed me into rethinking my view on how evolution works.
You state that your view "is not a pessimistic view of the world." It may not be pessimistic, but it certainly is not an optimistic one. Purpose or lack of it, becomes an individual chatracteristic and all actions (good or bad) are 100% relative to the doer and the doee.
Saying the Evolution has purpose is a LOT like saying that Gravity has a purpose or Light has a purpose or that fusion has a purpose, etc.
They're just processes.
They're just processes.
EdCase
Defender of the Faithless
I have no illusions (or delusions) of being a philosopher.
To me knowledge is that which I know. Its truth or validity is irrelevant. I simply know it, because at some point I heard/read/thought/viewed or was simply taught ...it.
THE knowledge on the other hand is something I need to be a London cabbie.
To go any deeper into it ,for me, is simply navel contemplation.
To me knowledge is that which I know. Its truth or validity is irrelevant. I simply know it, because at some point I heard/read/thought/viewed or was simply taught ...it.
THE knowledge on the other hand is something I need to be a London cabbie.
To go any deeper into it ,for me, is simply navel contemplation.
Perhaps not a "purpose", but a "direction" then?
Damnyankee
Honest Abe
I can tell you a trait of knowledge, it is never completly definitive.
If knowledge isn't definitive, it isn't knowledge, thus knowledge in its pure form does not exist in any way. Thus everything is partial knowledge. ::falls asleep::
If knowledge isn't definitive, it isn't knowledge, thus knowledge in its pure form does not exist in any way. Thus everything is partial knowledge. ::falls asleep::
Fifty
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Why should we accept this?
Even if I granted you your crappy definition of knowledge, we still have some knowledge (namely that of our seemings at the time we perceive them).
At first I agreed with this assessment, that if there is still a chance that you will win then you do not know that you will lose. But then it occurred to me that it would be appropriate to claim "I just know I'm going to lose". If the odds are 1 in a million, then you do know that you are going to lose. If you do win the lottery, then it is true that you didn't really know you would lose, but only though you would lose. But if you don't win the lottery then it is still correct to say that you knew you were going to lose.
We have to accept this assessment as the only alternative to "conclusively justified true belief". So either we claim that we cannot know anything if there is any room for doubt, or we accept that this example and others like it are examples of knowledge. The latter has the implication that although we can know something, we often cannot know that we know.
I don't regularly study philosophy, so I don't know the "traditional" categories. I was just explaining how I saw it in my head.
When trying to find a definition it is useful to go about the problem from different angles, particularly when the strait forwards way does not seem to be yielding a clear answer.
Agreed. It's certainly less comforting than believing that purpose is assigned and directed by a being of pure good.
[Sorry couldn't resist having last word. If you want to continue this discussion, we should start a new thread.]
Fifty
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I'm not really sure what you are trying to say here.
No, there are many other possible formulations of what it is to have knowledge. It's not just either undefeatidly justified true belief, or conclusively justified true belief, there are many other possibilities. What makes you think those are the only two out there?
Yeah, and I was explaining why I think your distinction is not as good as could be, yet it was on the right track.
Yeah, and what I'm saying is that even with your various classifications you aren't getting any further on the problem. It's like if someone asked "what is color" and you said "orange and blue and green and red and yellow and etc. etc". That may be a useful thing to do, but what we are really looking for is an explanation like "color is your eyes processing light hittin' stuff (or whatever the actual explanation is)".
There are two ways to respond to the scenario. Either we accept that the scenario describes knowledge, or we put additional constraints on knowledge to exclude the scenario. I am now leaning toward the former -- that there is no need to amend true justified belief to exclude this as knowledge. Yes, in the latter case there are a number of ways to amend the definition to exclude the example.
We are not trying to define physically or anatomically what knowledge is.
By knowing that color is "orange and blue and green and red and yellow and etc. etc" but not "dark or light or shiny or opaque or translucent", we can say "ah so color is an independent circular quantity, that is not effected by the amount of light present". Here by categorizing what is and isn't color, we can draw comparisons and decide exactly what defines the boundary between color and other properties of light. This lead to a very useful definition of color.
Similarly, It may be possible to draw out identifying qualities of knowledge by categorizing what is and isn't knowledge. Specifically (as an example), if we agree that truth and belief are part of knowledge, but find it unclear what restriction on justifying that belief qualify as knowledge, then an all encompassing approach can make it easier to thin the line between what is and isn't proper justification. The particular advantage of an all encompassing approach is that if done right it should be hard to find any unconsidered examples.
You may have the the last word, but why did you add "pure good"? Couldn't such a being be beyond good and evil?
Unless you are talking about some kind of absolute Knowledge or Truth, knowledge is contextural and your various definitions fit pretty well. Absolute Knowledge would not be relative and therefore could not be defined beyuond saying it just "was".
You mean amoral, like a machine? Sure, but that's not very comforting. It is the combination of the (alleged) facts that God is good and God has a plan that is reassuring.
Please elaborate.
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