Combining Philosophers

All the ideas for Anaxarchus, Simone de Beauvoir and Edmund L. Gettier

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4 ideas

13. Knowledge Criteria / A. Justification Problems / 2. Justification Challenges / b. Gettier problem
8886 Being a true justified belief is not a sufficient condition for knowledge [Gettier]
     Full Idea: The claim that someone knows a proposition if it is true, it is believed, and the person is justified in their belief is false, in that the conditions do not state a sufficient condition for the claim.
     From: Edmund L. Gettier (Is Justified True Belief Knowledge? [1963], p.145)
     A reaction: This is the beginning of the famous Gettier Problem, which has motivated most epistemology for the last forty years. Gettier implies that justification is necessary, even if it is not sufficient. He gives two counterexamples.
13. Knowledge Criteria / D. Scepticism / 1. Scepticism
3061 Anaxarchus said that he was not even sure that he knew nothing [Anaxarchus, by Diog. Laertius]
     Full Idea: Anaxarchus said that he was not even sure that he knew nothing.
     From: report of Anaxarchus (fragments/reports [c.340 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 09.10.1
23. Ethics / F. Existentialism / 3. Angst
20761 If existence is absurd it can never have a meaning [Beauvoir]
     Full Idea: To declare that existence is absurd is to deny that it can ever be given a meaning; to say that it is ambiguous is to assert that its meaning is never fixed.
     From: Simone de Beauvoir (Ethics of Ambiguity [1948], p.129), quoted by Kevin Aho - Existentialism: an introduction 6 'Bad'
     A reaction: Absurdity precludes meaning, but being meaningless doesn't entail absurdity. Asteroids are meaningless. Presumably if existence is meaningless now (as in a depression), but it might possibly become meaningful, then it can't qualify as 'absurd'.
24. Political Theory / D. Ideologies / 12. Feminism
20746 One is not born, but rather becomes a woman [Beauvoir]
     Full Idea: One is not born, but rather becomes a woman.
     From: Simone de Beauvoir (The Second Sex [1952], p.301 (or 267)), quoted by Kevin Aho - Existentialism: an introduction 2 'Phenomenology'
     A reaction: This has become the principle idea in modern discussions of gender. It divides gender from sex, rather as Locke divided person from human being. It is an abstraction. It is part of the Hegelian-Marxist idea that persons are moulded by culture.