MID TERM 1 Flashcards
Common misuse of ‘philosophy’
Characterize guiding principles
Philosophy as a practice vs a body of knowledge
Can have knowledge of different philosophical theories and arguments, critiques, distinctions, and argument forms
Truth of theories is a matter of debate
As a practice - philosophy is the pursuit of truth by means of reason
Issues with ‘truth by means of reason’
Truth itself is a matter of philosophical controversy
Common view of what truth means in philosophy
Correspondence - if it represents the way things are in the world
Objectivity vs relativity
Objective - some claims/beliefs/propositions are true independent of the beliefs/values of those who hold them
Relativism - truth is relative to an individuals beliefs/values
Epistemology
Metaphysics
Value theory
Epistemology - theory of knowledge
Metaphysics - theory of reality
Value theory - theory of what is value
What is value theory divided into
Ethics (morality)
Social/political philosophy
Aesthetics (beauty/value with respect to art)
What issues/qualities do philosophical problems have
Deal with fundamentals in how we organize our experiences/reality
Fundamental questions of justification
Very general
Involve clarity on concepts
Pluralism
How are philosophical questions answered
Critical argumentation, logic, and reasoning
Argument
An attempt to transition from premises (starting point) to conclusion (finish line)
A set of propositions, one being the conclusion
Is the author offering reasons to support a conclusion?
What makes a good/strong argument
Rationally persuasive (can be this but not actually strong)
Must be factually (all premises true) and logically strong (if it the premises are true, or would be true, then the conclusion is likely to be true)
Successful argument = factually and logically strong
Logical strength = independent of factual strength, pertains only to the logical relationship between premises/conclusion
Types of standards of argument evaluation
Deductive
Ampliative (abductively strong and inductively strong)
What is a valid argument?
If the truth of the premises absolutely guarantee the truth of its conclusion
Abduction
Involves inferring that a theory or proposition is true on the basis of that theory or proposition providing the best explanation of some observed phenomenon.
E.g. Black holes, Mendel’s discovery of genes, medical diagnostics.
An abductive argument is logically strong if the conclusion provides the best explanation of the premises given other possible alternative explanations
Inductive arguments
Inductive arguments involve taking a description of some sample and extending that description to items outside the sample
Factors that indicate if an inductive argument is logically strong
- sample size
- representativeness of sample
Cogent
Logically strong argument with acceptable and relevant premises
In general terms, a cogent argument is an argument whose premises (reasons) provides a good basis to believe its conclusion
Acceptable premises
Can be true, but we might not definitely know their truth-value - they are reasonable to believe
Positive relevance vs negative relevance
Positive relevance (if P provides some evidence that Q is true)
Negative relevance (if P provides some evidence that Q is not true)
Irrelevance (if P is neither positively or negatively relevant to Q)
Types of knowledge
Ability knowledge (know how)
Propositional knowledge (know that)
A posteriori (through observation of empirical reality)
A priori (the truth of the proposition known is recognized from the meanings of the words composing the sentence, together, when needed, with some deductive argument)
Relational knowledge/by acquaintance or object knowledge
Two basic requirements on propositional knowledge
Believed and true
False propositions can’t be known on this basis
We can’t know something if we don’t believe it
Justified false belief cannot be knowledge
Belief
An attitude taken towards some proposition that regards the position to be true
Dominant theories of truth
Correspondence theory
Coherence theory
Pragmatic theory
Minimal (deflationary) theory
JTB account of knowledge
Justified true belief
The idea is that Justification, truth, and belief constitute jointly necessary and sufficient conditions for correct knowledge attributions
Necessary and sufficient conditions
Y is necessary for X if the presence of Y is required to have X
Y is sufficient for X if the presence of Y is enough to ensure the presence of X
Gettier counterexamples
There are cases where we have justified true belief about some proposition, but do not thereby have knowledge
1) You take an agent who forms her beliefs in a way that would usually lead her to have a false belief (like looking at a broken clock, or a mirage).
2) You add some detail to the example to ensure that the agent’s belief is justified nonetheless.
3) You make the case such that while the way in which the agent formed her belief would normally have resulted in a false belief, in this case, it so happened that the belief was true because of sheer luck.
JTB+ to fix the Gettier counterexamples
An additional criteria is needed to fix JTB
Such as, no false presuppositions (which is hard to spell out this notion so that it is strong enough to deal with Gettier cases, but not so strong that it prevents us from having most knowledge that we think we have)
Zagbzeski’s response to Gettier
According to Zagzebski, there are two ways to avoid the Gettier problem.
First, one might say that the Gettier cases do not satisfy the justification condition since, on this view, justification cannot generate truth due to being lucky.
So, the Gettier examples would not satisfy the justification condition of JTB because Gettier justifications generate truth belief because of luck.
Hence, Gettier cases are not counterexamples to JTB.
Knowledge does not exclude luck - so despite it being true based on luck it is still knowledge
Timothy Williamson’s definition of knowledge
Suspected knowledge cannot be analyzed in the way JTB does
Williamson argues that:
1. Knowledge is a state of mind (or mental state).
2. That knowledge’s status as a mental state dooms to failure the traditional project of analyzing knowledge.
3. That knowledge is a very special kind of mental state.
Here is Williamson’s case that knowledge is a mental state
1. If knowledge closely resembles paradigm cases of a mental state, then unless a special reason disqualifies it, knowledge is a mental state.
2. Knowledge closely resembles paradigm cases of a mental state.
3. So, unless a special reason disqualifies it, knowledge is a mental state.
4. No special reason disqualifies it.
5. So, knowledge is a mental state.
What does it mean to say a state is transparent
Whenever you are in the state, you are in a position to know that you are in the state
Counterargument(s) to Williams knowledge as a mental state
Knowledge is not transparent, all other states are (countered by idea of hope)
