01 Overview

Readings: 1) Smith on the content and learning goals of the Experience, Reason, and Truth course 2) David Truncellito, “Epistemology” – Excerpts.

Learning Goals¶

Focus: Human knowledge (epistemology).
You have a complex story of sensory experiences, construction of mental and extra-mental representations of the natural world, and diverse ways of reasoning with both to develop what we call our “knowledge.” Often, our goal is such reasoning is arriving at true beliefs.

My view is that philosophy can be characterized quite generally as the effort to understand many different features of human life.
Philosophers pursue questions about
- the nature of physical reality (metaphysical / ontological answers),
  - How we come to know the various worlds we live in (physical, mental, emotional, mathematics, aesthetic, etc.) affects what claims we can reasonably make about those “realities.”
- how humans should treat one another,
- what constitutes good reasoning,
- how we “know” about the world and ourselves.
Course will combine philosophical approaches with scientific inquiries (psychology, formal models) to understand epistemology.

Knowledge acquisition and justification are complex and often unreliable.
- Yesterday’s “knowledge” becomes today’s “error".
Knowledge in the form of “justified true beliefs” - defined by Plato
- what we think we can count on to navigate and manage our environment to achieve our goals.
- justified?
  - it turns out that providing such justifications is more complex than we might hope!
- true?
  - it would seem foolish to base our decisions on beliefs which we merely hope are true.

Epistemology: Study of knowledge.
Two main tasks:
Determine the nature of knowledge (what it means to know something).
Understand the extent of human knowledge (how much we can know, limitations).
Different kinds of knowledge: Procedural (know-how), acquaintance (familiarity), propositional (knowledge-that).
Focus primarily on propositional knowledge.

"Epistemology" derives from Greek: "episteme" (knowledge) + "logos" (study of).
Knowledge used in various ways, philosophers focus on factive sense (only true things can be known).
Propositional knowledge: Expressed by declarative sentences, involves knowledge of facts or states of affairs.
One goal of epistemology is to determine the criteria for knowledge so that we can know what can or cannot be known.
Classified based on source:
- A priori (independent of experience): requires only the use of reason.
- A posteriori (dependent on experience): possible only subsequent to certain sense experiences (in addition to the use of reason).

What does it mean for someone to know something?
- Epistemologists have usually undertaken this task by seeking a correct and complete analysis of the concept of knowledge, in other words a set of individually necessary and jointly sufficient conditions which determine whether someone knows something

Knowledge requires belief. Belief is necessary but not sufficient for knowledge (beliefs can be true or false).
- the most typical purpose of beliefs is to describe or capture the way things actually are.
Truth is a condition for knowledge.
Purpose of belief: Match mind with the world.
Objective truth exists, enabling beliefs to align with reality.

Involves forming beliefs correctly.
Two approaches:
- Internalism: Justification depends on the believer's mental states.
- Externalism: Justification depends on external factors.
Goal: Achieve a match between mind and world.

Justification depends on factors internal to the believer's mind.
Involves the believer's other mental states supporting new beliefs.
Faces the regress problem: Justified beliefs requiring further justified beliefs.

Response to the regress problem.
Basic beliefs do not require justification from other beliefs.
These beliefs provide a foundation for other, non-basic beliefs.
Asserts that some beliefs are self-justified or justified by non-belief sources.

A type of internalism.
Justification comes from a holistic relationship among beliefs.
Vulnerable to the isolation objection: Coherent beliefs may be isolated from reality.