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Full Idea
In characterizing an observational episode or state as 'knowing', we are not giving an empirical description of it; we are placing it in the logical space of reasons, of justifying and being able to justify what one says.
Gist of Idea
If observation is knowledge, it is not just an experience; it is a justification in the space of reasons
Source
Wilfrid Sellars (Does Emp.Knowledge have Foundation? [1956], p.123)
Book Ref
'Epistemology - An Anthology', ed/tr. Sosa,E. /Kim,J. [Blackwell 2000], p.123
A Reaction
McDowell has made the Kantian phrase 'the logical space of reasons' very popular. This is a very nice statement of the internalist view of justification, with which I sympathise more and more. It is a rationalist coherentist view. It needn't be mystical!
| 6382 | The 'grain problem' says physical objects are granular, where sensations appear not to be [Sellars, by Polger] |
| 8791 | The concept of 'green' involves a battery of other concepts [Sellars] |
| 8793 | If observation is knowledge, it is not just an experience; it is a justification in the space of reasons [Sellars] |
| 8792 | Observations like 'this is green' presuppose truths about what is a reliable symptom of what [Sellars] |
| 6550 | Reduction requires that an object's properties consist of its constituents' properties and relations [Sellars] |
| 21829 | Philosophy aims to understand how things (broadly understood) hang together (broadly understood) [Sellars] |