display all the ideas for this combination of texts
9 ideas
20783 | Knowledge is a secure grasp of presentations which cannot be reversed by argument [Stoic school, by Diog. Laertius] |
Full Idea: Knowledge itself, say the stoics, is either a secure grasp or a disposition in the reception of presentations not reversible by argument. | |
From: report of Stoic school (fragments/reports [c.200 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 07.47 | |
A reaction: Helpful, but not enough. Fools hold secure grasps which cannot be refuted, as far as they are concerned. Consensus needed. Falsification? The truth-bearer is a 'presentation' (an appearance), which is different from modern accounts. |
20868 | Two sorts of opinion: either poorly grounded belief, or weak belief [Stoic school, by Stobaeus] |
Full Idea: There are two kinds of opinion: one is assent to something which is not graspable; the other is weak belief. | |
From: report of Stoic school (fragments/reports [c.200 BCE]) by John Stobaeus - Anthology 2.11m | |
A reaction: Strong belief usually qualifies as knowledge. The Greek 'opinion' and 'belief' don't exactly map onto the modern words. This idea covers both the subjective aspect of belief (its strength) and its objective aspect (its grounding). |
19527 | We don't acquire evidence and then derive some knowledge, because evidence IS knowledge [Williamson] |
Full Idea: When we acquire new evidence in perception, we do not first acquire unknown evidence and then somehow base knowledge on it later. Rather, acquiring new is evidence IS acquiring new knowledge. | |
From: Timothy Williamson (Knowledge First (and reply) [2014], p.4) | |
A reaction: This makes his point much better than Idea 19526 does. |
19528 | Knowledge is prior to believing, just as doing is prior to trying to do [Williamson] |
Full Idea: Knowing corresponds to doing, believing to trying. Just as trying is naturally understood in relation to doing, so believing is naturally understood in relation to knowing. | |
From: Timothy Williamson (Knowledge First (and reply) [2014], p.4) | |
A reaction: An interesting analogy. You might infer that there can be no concept of 'belief' without the concept of 'knowledge', but we could say that it is 'truth' which is indispensible, and leave out knowledge entirely. Belief is to truth as trying is to doing? |
19529 | Belief explains justification, and knowledge explains belief, so knowledge explains justification [Williamson] |
Full Idea: If justification is the fundamental epistemic norm of belief, and a belief ought to constitute knowledge, then justification should be understood in terms of knowledge too. | |
From: Timothy Williamson (Knowledge First (and reply) [2014], p.5) | |
A reaction: If we are looking for the primitive norm which motivates the whole epistemic game, then I am thinking that truth might well play that role better than knowledge. TW would have to reply that it is the 'grasped truth', rather than the 'theoretical truth'. |
19530 | A neutral state of experience, between error and knowledge, is not basic; the successful state is basic [Williamson] |
Full Idea: A neutral state covering both perceiving and misperceiving (or remembering and misrembering) is not somehow more basic than perceiving, for what unifies the case of each neutral state is their relation to the successful state. | |
From: Timothy Williamson (Knowledge First (and reply) [2014], p.5-6) | |
A reaction: An alternative is Disjunctivism, which denies the existence of a single neutral state, so that there is nothing to unite the two states, and they don't have a dependence relation. Why can't there be a prior family of appearances, some of them successful? |
19531 | Internalism about mind is an obsolete view, and knowledge-first epistemology develops externalism [Williamson] |
Full Idea: A postulated underlying layer of narrow mental states is a myth, whose plausibility derives from a comfortingly familiar but obsolescent philosophy of mind. Knowledge-first epistemology is a further step in the development of externalism. | |
From: Timothy Williamson (Knowledge First (and reply) [2014], p.6) | |
A reaction: Williamson is a real bruiser, isn't he? I don't take internalism about mind to be obsolescent at all, but now I feel so inferior for clinging to such an 'obsolescent' belief. ...But then I cling to Aristotle, who is (no doubt) an obsolete philosopher. |
19536 | Knowledge-first says your total evidence IS your knowledge [Williamson] |
Full Idea: Knowledge-first equate one's total evidence with one's total knowledge. | |
From: Timothy Williamson (Knowledge First (and reply) [2014], p.8) | |
A reaction: Couldn't lots of evidence which merely had a high probability be combined together to give a state we would call 'knowledge'? Many dubious witnesses confirm the truth, as long as they are independent, and agree. |
19526 | Surely I am acquainted with physical objects, not with appearances? [Williamson] |
Full Idea: When I ask myself what I am acquainted with, the physical objects in front of me are far more natural candidates than their appearances. | |
From: Timothy Williamson (Knowledge First (and reply) [2014], p.3) | |
A reaction: Not very impressive. The word 'acquainted' means the content of the experience, not the phenomena. Do I 'experience' the objects, or the appearances? The answer there is less obvious. If you apply it to colours, it is even less obvious. |