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Full Idea
If you claim that S knows that P, and yet grant that S cannot eliminate a certain possibility of not-P, it certainly seems as if you have granted that S does not after all know that P. To speak of fallible knowledge just sounds contradictory.
Gist of Idea
To say S knows P, but cannot eliminate not-P, sounds like a contradiction
Source
David Lewis (Elusive Knowledge [1996], p.419)
Book Ref
Lewis,David: 'Papers in Metaphysics and Epistemology' [CUP 1999], p.419
A Reaction
Starting from this point, fallibilism seems to be a rather bold move. The only sensible response seems to be to relax the requirement that not-P must be eliminable. Best: in one epistemic context P, in another not-P.
| 12569 | Knowledge by senses is less certain than that by intuition or reason, but it is still knowledge [Locke] |
| 14768 | Infallibility in science is just a joke [Peirce] |
| 14770 | Reasoning is based on statistical induction, so it can't achieve certainty or precision [Peirce] |
| 19107 | Inquiry is not standing on bedrock facts, but standing in hope on a shifting bog [Peirce] |
| 22870 | No belief can be so settled that it is not subject to further inquiry [Dewey] |
| 17637 | The most obvious beliefs are not infallible, as other obvious beliefs may conflict [Russell] |
| 12897 | To say S knows P, but cannot eliminate not-P, sounds like a contradiction [Lewis] |
| 2755 | If senses are fallible, then being open to correction is an epistemological virtue [Dancy,J] |
| 6898 | Fallibilism is the view that all knowledge-claims are provisional [Mautner] |
| 19701 | Fallibilism is consistent with dogmatism or scepticism, and is not alternative to them [Dougherty] |
| 19700 | It is best to see the fallibility in the reasons, rather than in the agents or the knowledge [Dougherty] |
| 19702 | We can't normally say that we know something 'but it might be false' [Dougherty] |
| 19718 | Indefeasibility does not imply infallibility [Grundmann] |