Combining Texts

Ideas for 'The Fixation of Belief', 'German Philosophy: a very short introduction' and 'Euthydemus'

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2 ideas

13. Knowledge Criteria / C. External Justification / 1. External Justification
Doubts should be satisfied by some external permanency upon which thinking has no effect [Peirce]
     Full Idea: To satisfy our doubts it is necessary that a method should be found by which our beliefs may be determined by nothing human, but by some external permanency - by something upon which our thinking has no effect.
     From: Charles Sanders Peirce (The Fixation of Belief [1877], p.18)
     A reaction: This may be the single most important idea in pragmatism and in the philosophy of science. See Fodor on experiments (Idea 2455). Put the question to nature. The essential aim is to be passive in our beliefs - just let reality form them.
13. Knowledge Criteria / C. External Justification / 3. Reliabilism / a. Reliable knowledge
Say how many teeth the other has, then count them. If you are right, we will trust your other claims [Plato]
     Full Idea: If each of you says how many teeth the other has, and when they are counted we find you do know, we will believe your other claims as well.
     From: Plato (Euthydemus [c.379 BCE], 294c)
     A reaction: This is the clairvoyant problem for reliabilism, if truth is delivered for no apparent reason. Useful, but hardly knowledge. HOW did you know the number of teeth?