PHILOSOPHY - Epistemology: 'Knowledge First' Epistemology [HD]

After many failed attempts to construct an analysis of knowledge, some philosophers began to wonder whether knowledge was resistant to analysis, and why that might be so. In this Wireless Philosophy video, Jennifer Nagel (University of Toronto) looks at the reasons why philosophers like Linda Zagzebski have thought that knowledge can’t be reductively analyzed, and explores the “Knowledge First” approach of Timothy Williamson.

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[rottekiwi]

Wow, this series made the writing of a paper on the analysis of the JTB system actually enjoyable. I might begin to like analytical philoso... O wait, 3000 words on Sinn und Bedeutung for next week. Nevermind.

[denjua]

I understand so much more from these animated vids than I do in class

[rolandxb]

Fantastic video! I did my Episemology paper on Zagzebski's thesis and it was very interesting. Thanks for the great explanation of Williamson's approach.

[UpsideDownMon]

knowledge first seems a little like we're getting into semantics

[Dorian_sapiens]

According to the view ascribed to Williamson in this video, _regretting that P_ is a factive mental state: I can't regret that P unless it is the case that P, and doing so implies that I know that P.
On this view, how does one describe the situation in which I falsely believe that P' and experience a mental state subjectively (and neurologically) indistinguishable from regretting that P'? Is there a less stilted, more colloquial way of referring to situations like this?

[BelegaerTheGreat]

7:19 that sounds good, though ofc still, all the "ways" in which you can learn stuff can be false, since they rely on senses/testimony/memory.

[ADHDMoneyandBusiness]

I believe the idea of 'truth' is best used in a proportional, not absolute sense. I.e. something can be more or less true, not necessarily just "true". Truth measures the degree to which something accords with reality. Like the degree to which an arrow is shot in line with the target. Whilst something being absolutely true is possible, it's impossible to prove, so it's best left as a proportional measurement.

To expand on this, truth can be usefully defined as being that which causes you and others to act in ways that produce consistently desirable and expected results in reality. So something can be demonstrably incorrect, and yet hold some truth, like a mule painted as a zebra being judged to be a zebra. It's not a zebra, but it could fool many people (possibly zebras too) to believe it is a zebra, and could evoke the equivalent result that a real zebra would evoke. If we're honest, everything we "know" to be true about the world is only proportionally true - some things more than others.

So, we'd do better to frame knowledge not as related to absolutely true statements, but rather as related to proportionally true statements. I.e. Something can eventually found to be incorrect, but if there is some consistent, global benefit in believing it, it is partially true and can thus be 'known' to be partially true.

I'd then suggest that the distinction between knowledge and belief is not the absolute notion of whether it's true or not, but rather the degree to which we've experienced the benefits of it's proportional truthfulness. E.g. we've shown the painted mule to 10 other friends and all of them have been equally fooled to believe it's a zebra. Before showing others, that person might 'believe' the creature is a zebra, but afterwards, they would be likely to 'know' the creature is a zebra, despite them being correct.

Thus I'd define knowing as being subjective to the knower. That a belief becomes knowledge when that person has had sufficient empirical experience to place confidence in their belief, and thus has conviction to act in full-hearted accordance with that knowledge.

[iwmdrxg]

Forgive me if this is way off. This debate has been going on for decades.

Facts > Hypothesis > Theory > Law

Thoughts > Belief > Justified Belief + True Belief > JTB aka Knowledge

A) To me, it seems evident that belief IS intrinsic to knowledge, and yet knowledge need not be present for belief.
B) In the Gettier cases, doesn't the justification dissolve and break the knowledge down into just a true belief?

There is a famous true story Gettier case that I have never heard in all these philosophy discussions. Einstein's Cosmological Constant. Would we say that when he scrapped the idea in favor of the expanding universe, the world 'lost' the 'knowledge' of dark energy? or that humanity had an unjustified true belief, lost the belief, then created a semi-justified true belief?

It seems the problem is that philosophers want to claim they know more than they do, trying to change definitions to turn theories into knowledge. This seems to be a rebellion to Descartes' only possible knowledge. Cogito ergo sum. This, though, implies that we run our lives on theory sans knowledge, when clearly we use knowledge to navigate our lives. So, rebel we must!

To build upon Descartes' proclamation of existence, I believe we can also assert, I know I exist in a reality. Now the tricky part.
There are many theories to the construction and nature of the reality. [the prevailing being that the reality perceived by our senses is un-simulated]
Memories reveal this reality to be predictably consistent, scientifically, from moment to moment.
Knowledge can be had within the context of the reality without knowing the workings of the reality.

Take Smith. He had an unjustified true belief. [if you believe my Gettier solution] If Jones had gotten the job, Smith would have had a true justified belief.
But if Jones had questioned the nature of his reality, would he have not had the knowledge just because he found out he is a character in a story trying to debate the definition of knowledge?
I don't believe so. He can have an unjustified true belief or knowledge in the context of his reality.

Oddly and hilariously enough, I do believe there is an X that needs to be added... time.

My proposed definition - a non-future belief with pertinent proof that has not been disproven

It's basically JTB with non-future. Justified = pertinent proof. True = has not been disproven. Belief = non-future belief
Giving justification the qualifier of pertinent helps relieve the confusion of the Gettier cases
'Has not been disproven' seems better than 'true' because of how the 'truth' is subject to change
The future is unknowable. Any beliefs about the future are only theories.

Side note for anyone that read this. How is disproven not a word? Ridiculous!

[Atlantictire]

Request: would someone please create a video on dialectical materialism? SO much political discussion on the left makes reference to it, so it would be extremely helpful to have a primer on this philosophy and what it means to condemn something as "undialectical".

[JoeySkate]

Yup. Sounds to me that we cannot reach perfection in anything. Absolutely anything in life.
We invent cars? We can get faster ones
We draw a circle? If we zoom in with a microscope its not perfect
We develop theories about everything? Oopsies they can be corrected in the futute.
We have no perfection in anything anywhere of our lives.
But lets be honest. Does it really matter? Are we trying to live perfect lives (which dont exist as well?) Or good enough ones? Good enough for the benefit of our and next generations? So who cares if i cant explain everything perfectly with perfection. What we have works. Cars work, buildings work, laws of physics work and so on.

Skeptisism should not be seen as a threat. Because it doesnt work. Should we adopt it if it doesnt work? And confuse everyone? I simply reject the idea of a perfect justification of knowledge and all that. Why? Cause it doesnt matter. Its ok if we have imperfect knowledge because we can trust it and it works everytime without fail unless in exceptions or unlucky scenarios. Thats life. It has elements of surprise, mistakes, unpredictable endeavors, and imperfections.
And its solution is not perfection. Its solution is not to doubt everything.
Its solution is to trust what works best at the time and maybe try to improve it if needed. Thats all we have to do :)

[BresciGaetano]

I'd say is gona be a bit difficult to find a common ground where all can agree... unless we don't speak about how terrible some examples made by great thinkers are. This i find very hard to disagree with.

Knowledge imo is a probabilistic statement. True knowledge is impossible to achive for our sensory system and we can only hope to find a logical coherency supported by a positive outcome chance. There will be always grey areas (even if miniscule) and uncalculated exceptions, to dismiss this even for the most basical computations is to dismiss knowledge itself from my point of view, thatìs what i call the engeeristic aproach.

[HeavyMetalMouse]

How does a Knowledge-First formulation handle the question of 'How do we gain new knowledge?' If knowledge is a basic state, not reducible into parts, then what are the conditions necessary to gain knowledge? This seems like it puts us back at square one.

[simonzak]

This channel is great. I enjoyed Nigel’s book too!

[gillapfi]

"Can we really analyze everything else by knowledge? " Anything less would be uncivilized. lol = analysis without knowledge, that just sounds dangerous and fruitless

[darrellee]

Gettier problems rely on having a single broken warrant. If a belief is true there should be many valid warrants available to support it. And we should expect to collect as many of these warrants as we can before we are ready to say we have some degree of knowledge.

[wclay]

What about illusions?
Can't I see a mosquito flying around me without knowing that a mosquito was not flying around me?
Can't I remember something that did not happen at all? Say I somehow remember returning money to a friend, when in fact, I have not, and therefore, not know that I still owe my friend money.
One way out would be to say, strictly speaking, I did not really 'see' or 'remember', but this strictly speaking seems dubious. It's a perfectly natural way to describe what happens.

[drxyd]

The fact that knowledge is defined in terms of truth is problematic. Can one really say that rocket scientists don't know how to build and launch rockets because their beliefs on how to do so are based on the false theory of Newtonian mechanics? There needs to be a more nuanced standard, knowledge need not be true only good enough.

[ZeroSumGamer]

How does knowledge first epistemology define knowledge or is it undefinable?

[leviangel]

am I correct in assuming that the main way to get paid as a philosopher is to be a professor? well... or an author i suppose

[CMVMic]

attempts at claiming knowledge seem to involve begging the question such as particularists and methodists do. fallibilism is more defendable than infallibilism. howevr, once people claim that axioms exist, that you can know things without knowing how you know you are giving support to the most crazy ideas holding just a much ground as the status quo common sense. Also i havent seen anything on epistemic luck. I for one prefer a pyrrhonian skeptic approach though it may seem untenable and not pragmatic, that is merely due to misconceptions.