That it looked like him would be my justification.

And so you do not see that as circular?

@Hanover's account...

Justification: it looked like him
Truth: it is indeed a picture of him
Belief: Hanover believes it to be a picture of him.

Is that what you are claiming?

To know something is to have a rule for interpretting some sensory data. To know it is him is to have some prior experience which was interpretted in a way that was useful and is recalled when a similar image appears in the mind.

When we see others who resemble people we already know, from our perspective they look like the person we know, not the other way around. Our interpretaions are based on finding patterns from prior experiences that are useful.

Hmmm...

Good thread topic my friend. Could be a bit of fun.

In order for a belief to be sensibly called "justified"...fill in the blank. Does being justified require being argued for, or does it require being well-grounded by/within personal experience regardless of whether or not the thinking/believing creature is capable of offering subsequent explanation?

The fire example...

To know something is to have a rule for interpreting some sensory data. — Harry Hindu

It is? How do you know?

I would like @Sam26's opinion.

One wants to use material implication, but that's too much.

I’ not inclined to refer to ‘knowledge’ as ‘justified true belief’.

And so you do not see that as circular? — Banno

No, it's not circular. A computer can identify a picture of you as Banno. It must be matching various criteria against something in its database. That's what I'm doing at some level.

Is it circular to say I know that's not a cup because it looks like a cat?

I’ not inclined to refer to ‘knowledge’ as ‘justified true belief’ — I like sushi

Then you're not addressing the hypothetical:

If to know is to hold a justified true belief... — Banno

Does being justified require being argued for, or does it require being well-grounded by/within personal experience regardless of whether or not the thinking/believing creature is capable of offering subsequent explanation? — creativesoul

There is no distinction here. We argue by referencing our empirically gained knowledge. I know the butler did it because I either saw him do it or I saw other evidence implicating him.

Does being justified require being argued for, or does it require being well-grounded by/within personal experience regardless of whether or not the thinking/believing creature is capable of offering subsequent explanation?
— creativesoul

There is no distinction here. We argue by referencing our empirically gained knowledge. I know the butler did it because I either saw him do it or I saw other evidence implicating him. — Hanover

Non-linguistic creatures can know that touching fire causes pain. There is no stronger justificatory ground than getting burned. Are we to say that they do not know touching fire causes pain simply because they cannot tell us about it?

Few would say it was without reservation. Hence this thread.

I think he knows it is N's face, but it seems to me the knowing and justification are here the very same thing - recognising the picture as being of N.

DO others see this circularity?

A computer can identify a picture of you as Banno. It must be matching various criteria against something in its database. That's what I'm doing at some level. — Hanover

This claim carries all the paraphernalia around the guess that mind involves unconscious algorithmic processing.

I'm not buying that, and hence I am not buying your point here.

Then you're not addressing the hypothetical: — Hanover

That's right; but one approach will be to treat the hypothetical as part of a reductio. If it is the case that we agree he knows the picture is of N., and yet that this knowledge is unjustified, then so much for justified true belief.

I don’t quite know what you’re getting at tbh. At a guess it sounds something like the difference between looking at a mirror and looking into a mirror - we can switch between our regard for the mirror as mirror and what we see through the mirror (and the obvious confusion and disorientation that can happen if we fail to distinguish between the two).

That's right; but one approach will be to treat the hypothetical as part of a reductio. If it is the case that we agree he knows the picture is of N., and yet that this knowledge is unjustified, then so much for justified true belief. — Banno

The reductio is to ask not how I know Mr. N is Mr. N, but it's how you recognize anything, including the words on this page. How do you know what I mean by "Mr. N" if not those letters look a certain way?

This claim carries all the paraphernalia around the guess that mind involves unconscious algorithmic processing.

I'm not buying that, and hence I am not buying your point here. — Banno

Sometimes it's conscious processing, so it's not a guess.

No it's his body double. No it's a look-a-like. Yes, it's him. The former is more probable.

It’s banal. I am justified due to experiential knowledge of what the person looks like and the difference between the person and a picture of the person.

So what?

I agree, but why did you question the JTB definition if you now adopt it?

Quarter past three, obviously!

A picture of N is worth a thousand words. But what if the picture is lying? Pictures lie? Sure--well, they can be manipulated. Using various techniques, a person can be made to be present in a photo who was actually not there. Or, someone who was actually present in the photo can be made to look like someone else, or to not be in the picture at all.

Have not people been mistaken in identifying pictures? Our perceptions and memories can be quite wrong. ("Eye witnesses" are quite often as good as blind.)

The trouble is, we are not ALWAYS right and we are not ALWAYS wrong. A perception may be 100% accurate: What you said you saw is true. But we are wrong often enough that we can not say, "I saw the picture. It was him, all right. There can be no doubt about it" as if it were incontrovertibly true.

It's too clumsy to condition every assertion we make. No one wants to always hear, or always say, "I am somewhat confident that what I said I saw is actually what I saw, and that my memory of seeing it has perhaps not been corrupted... and blah blah blah. Most of the time, if the stakes are low, we can tolerate, "he said he saw it; most likely he did. That's good enough." But if the stakes are higher, well then "I said I saw it" just isn't good enough.

But our assertions of fact have to be verified, preferably by more than one source and verification method. I can claim to have seen my old friends Abraham, Martin, and John, but if there is nothing but my report... well, proceed with caution.

Nice. Yes.

Sometimes it's conscious processing, so it's not a guess. — Hanover

Sometimes.

Knowing that this is a picture of N. is different to knowing that water freezes at zero degrees.

It's too clumsy to condition every assertion we make. — Bitter Crank

Sure. That's not what I want.

Let's say I showed you two pictures, one of your friend Jim, one of your friend Sally. I asked you which one was Jim and which one was Sally and why.

Then let's say you were looking through your album later, and you saw the picture of Jim and later the one of Sally.

In the first case, a question is present, so is the request for a justification. In the second case, no question is present, so there is no need for a justified answer.

Is the state of apprehension of each picture the same in both cases? Probably in all relevant respects, it is the same picture. In the first case, one can summarise one's perception and compare it to facts about Jim or Sally to provide a justification - what can be seen and is relevant for justification can be said.

Does this mean the scenario with the question and the scenario without it have the same structure? No. The first allows an answer to be given, in the second no answer would be. One scenario requires modification to turn into the other, and there is no guarantee that what can be presumed about the relationship between all involved parties and objects stays the same over transposing scenario.

I asked you which one was Jim and which one was Sally and why. — fdrake

What did its being of him consist in, then? Perhaps what I later said or did.

So knowing it is N. lies in my capacity, among other things, to show you the difference between Jim and N.

I rather like your reply, and think it captures the flavour of Wittgenstein's speculation better than, say, @Hanover's response or @Bitter Crank's quiet relevant poke at excessive pedantry. One's knowing that it is N. consists in all the details of the way N. fits in to one's world.

That's so much more than a justified true belief.

Knowing how to add two numbers is shown in the act of adding numbers. Knowing how to ride a bike is shown in getting on the bike and taking off up a hill. The same is true of knowing that it is N. in the picture.

So knowing it is N. lies in my capacity, among other things, to show you the difference between Jim and N. — Banno

This makes the ability to identify someone or something, or diagnose the presence of some phenomena, an inter-relation between an agent and a social store of knowledge. This allows the continual vouchsafing of reference without collapsing all such behaviour into historical precedent or a dispositional state. Proper names can thus be rigid, but their connection to their referent is socially mediated through knowledge banks and, above all, (possibly deferred) interpretive competence towards the referent.