Sorry. A bit flustered today. Anywho, uhh, propose something to talk about and I'll meditate over it.

Thanks!

But one cannot know stuff that is not true. — Banno

If X is known in the present, can it be said of X in some near or distant future, "I thought I knew X"?

What?

12. - For "I know" seems to describe a state of affairs which guarantees what is known, guarantees it as a fact. One always forgets the expression "I thought I knew".

On Certainty

Wittgenstein

Yep. What?

But one cannot know stuff that is not true.

Compare:
"He is certain there is a Santa, but of course that's not true"

with

"He knows there is a Santa, but of course that's not true".

All I am doing here is pointing to how the words are used; I'm not setting out which things are true, believed or known. — Banno

Seems that both words are used the same way, and therefore mean the same thing (if meaning is just use and all that)

Now, are we talking about the state of someone's belief, or the state-of-affairs that the belief is about? Could it be possible that a person could be confused about both? Is it possible to be confused about whether or not you actually know, or are certain of anything?

If we associate truth with knowledge then people misuse the terms a lot. They claim to know when they don't. In order to know that someone actually knows would require that a second party know, but then how would we know that they know if it possible to be wrong when claiming that one knows? When, how, and who knows when some belief is true?

If we just equated knowledge with JTB, and severed knowledge from truth, then we wouldn't have the problem of people using the term incorrectly. Knowledge doesn't require truth, only justification. Then people only misuse the term when they don't have any justification for what they are claiming they know.

Another thing that we need to think about is different kinds of knowledge. No, I'm not talking about knowing how and knowing that. We've already shown that they are the same. What I'm talking about is information made by humans as opposed to natural information. Take the information that Donald Trump is president and the information that the Sun will die in 5 billion years. The former is information, or meaning, created by humans. The latter isn't. The truth in the latter lies in the actual state of affairs that is the Sun in 5 billion years while the truth of the former lies in the minds of humans as something that humans arbitrarily made up. Humans created the truth of who is president at any particular moment, but nature is the one that created the conditions, or the truth, of the Sun in 5 billion years. It is much easier to know the truth of who is the president of the U.S. than it is to know when the Sun will die.

Seems that both words are used the same way, — Harry Hindu

...and this is why I don't pay much attention to your posts.

He knows there is a Santa, but of course that's not true..." — Banno

Seems that both words are used the same way... — Harry Hindu

A mother on her knee with her child might say to a grown-up about her child, "He knows there is a Santa."

But language isn't ordinarily used that way. If the child is wrong we say the child is certain. If the child were right we would say, "He knows there is a Santa."

Sure. If someone insists that they can know things that are not true, there is really no point in continuing the discussion.

The problem is not that they are misusing the word - of course the word might be used in that way. The problem is that they fail to take into account an important distinction. In this case, Harry ignores the distinction between believing, which can be either true or false, and knowing, which by definition must be true.

BY not accepting this distinction Harry places himself outside the discussion.

BY not accepting this distinction Harry places himself outside the discussion. — Banno

Cute.

Out in the cold.

When a person says, "I know", what do they really mean?

It seems inherent, that we assume that the other person "knows"; but, this is prone even to doubt and vagueness about using that phrase.

Therefore, how can we qualify the statement or word-phrase, "I know"?

Is this possible, and has already been implemented in our childhood and adolescent life that is education?

Or stated, otherwise, how does one set up a schema to decrease the vagueness of the word phrase "I know"? — Wallows

"be as wise a serpent and as gentle as a dove for he sends us out among wolves" (paraphrased slightly)

There are one to one (a type of linear), linear, exponential, inverse exponential, logarithmic relationships. There are also coefficients and constants that altar a graphical representation of a relationship. When someone says they see a exponential or inverse exponential relationship between an apple and an orange, they are somewhat saying there is a loose relationship. You can actually draw a relationship between any concept and any object or physical object. The relationship might be loose or strong.

My point is stretching the truth and lying are two different things. I someone says "I Know" , it puts what they are saying on a spectrum, and they might loosely know or have faith that you know, or they may have a very strong concept of what you are saying.

Compare:
"He is certain there is a Santa, but of course that's not true"

with

"He knows there is a Santa, but of course that's not true".

All I am doing here is pointing to how the words are used; I'm not setting out which things are true, believed or known. — Banno

Seems that both words are used the same way, and therefore mean the same thing (if meaning is just use and all that) — Harry Hindu

..and this is why I don't pay much attention to your posts. — Banno

This is why I don't expect much of a response when I point out the failure of your arguments.

So the above two sentences are not using "certain" and "knows" the same way? What do you mean by "use" if not that the words are occupying the same space among the same string of scribbles and in the same context?

The problem is not that they are misusing the word - of course the word might be used in that way. The problem is that they fail to take into account an important distinction. In this case, Harry ignores the distinction between believing, which can be either true or false, and knowing, which by definition must be true. — Banno

And like I already said in the post your cherry-picked and failed to respond to: How can we be certain that what we know is the truth? How does anyone know that some claim is the truth? We make claims all the time about our knowledge without having any proof that what we claim is true. We only have justification for our beliefs that qualify as knowledge. Without justification, it is simply a belief. How do we determine what qualifies as proper justification? - Logic.

Your qualification of truth for knowledge is unattainable, therefore "know" would could never be used correctly and would therefore be a useless word.

It seems to me that "certain" would be a stronger assertion of truth that knowledge would be. Take the Merriam-Webster definition of "certain" as an example:

known or proved to be true : INDISPUTABLE
it is certain that we exist — Merriam-Webster

So, "knowing" would be more like I said: a justified belief, whereas "certainty" is something that is often unattainable (mostly when it comes to external truths - truths that humans didn't create themselves - like how and why did the universe come to exist), hence the existence of philosophy and skepticism.

What do you mean by "use" if not that the words are occupying the same space among the same string of scribbles and in the same context? — Harry Hindu

...and here is Harry in a knutshell. Isn't it glorious to see the rich variety of thinking that is displayed in the forums?

Harry knows things that are not true.

How can we be certain that what we know is the truth? — Harry Hindu

Well, given that we know it, it follows that it is true.

But I don't think that you asked the question you meant to ask.

Harry, have a read at this:

Certainty

Do you think that this article is adequately summed up by your Merriam-Webster definition?

What, in the article, do you find to disagree with?

Are you at all perturbed by my pointing out that on your account you know things that are not true?

...and here is Harry in a knutshell. Isn't it glorious to see the rich variety of thinking that is displayed in the forums?

Harry knows things that are not true. — Banno

Isn't it glorious to see all the rich varieties of side-stepping a direct question on these forums?

Well, given that we know it, it follows that it is true.

But I don't think that you asked the question you meant to ask. — Banno

Harry, have a read at this:

Certainty

Do you think that this article is adequately summed up by your Merriam-Webster definition?

What, in the article, do you find to disagree with?

Are you at all perturbed by my pointing out that on your account you know things that are not true? — Banno

What I get from both Merriam-Webster's definition and the article you provided is that IF certainty and knowledge are not the same thing, then certainty is the carrier of truth, not knowledge. Certainty has a stronger quality of truth than knowledge. So you can't say that if "you know it then it is true" if you are implying that "certainty" and "knowledge" are distinct AND that certainty has a stronger connection with truth than knowledge does, according to the definition and the article. If you are certain, then it is true. If you know it, then it is justified yet you can still have doubts, or be open-minded to alternative possibilities that haven't been provided yet. True wisdom is often equated to knowing that you know nothing.

Saying “I know” means “I have information from a reliable source and that information is actually true.

I can say “I know” but later find out that the information wasn’t true, so in fact I didn’t know. I was incorrect when I said I know.

No one could say “He knows there is a Santa, but in fact there isn’t.” If the speaker doesn’t believe that the person referred to is right, he wouldn’t use “know” about the claim.

The source of information is also important. Suppose someone told me that Manchester United won the match and I pass the information on saying “I know United won”. Later it turned out that my informant had had no idea whether United won or lost, but accidentally United had in fact won. When I said “I know United won” I was therefore incorrect even though what I thought I knew was true.

We can of course make the claim that we can’t really be sure if anything is the truth and even if I was present at the game and witnessed United’s victory, I can’t be a hundred percent certain that I can believe my eyes. Well, that’s a philosophical point. For our daily life our normal criteria for truth are sufficient.

Aren't you really just asking what it means "to know"?

Certainty is a measure of your conviction that you are right. You might be an idiot. Knowledge is presumably a rigorously arrived at belief. There were some criteria involved. Different people have different criteria, but pretty much everyone uses I know when they are more certain based on certain criteria that have been met, criteria that have not been when they say 'I think...' or 'My guess is...'

What is considered knowledge may turn out not to be true. Hopefully one's criteria for what gets called knowledge, by you, make it a stronger set of beliefs than what you simply think is or might be the case.

When people argue about epistemology they are arguing about the criteria.

Certainty is a kind of quale, it may have nothing to do with any useful criteria, even your own. It might be based, for example, on denied feelings of terror that you might be wrong about the issue. That can actually increase one's certainty. But it's not a criterion for being classed as knowledge. That would be something like and scientists in Berlin had the same results with an even larger sample. Or I saw the puma, not just the footprints, and it was not a guy in a puma outfit. I am not one of the people who heard the story, I was there. (note, that would be a strong criterion for the speaker, but not necessarily at all for others listening to his story)

The truth of it? I doubt you mean that. But what does that leave? If I say I weigh 196 pounds, that's both vague and precise, depending on how accurate one wants to be. But the claim itself, that I weigh 196 pounds, with respect to appropriate criteria is not at all ambiguous. I'm thinking you understand my question. — tim wood

For someone who is such a stickler about proper word usage, you seem to have absolutely no idea about the proper usage of "precise" and "accurate".

Precision is a measure of how much information is being conveyed. Accuracy is a measure of how closely the information conveyed corresponds to reality.

E.g., if I were to say that I weigh between 0 and 1,000 lbs that would not be very precise, but would be perfectly accurate. On the other hand, if I were to say that I weigh 27.13856182952 lbs, that would be a very precise answer, albeit extremely inaccurate.

The claim that you weigh 196 lbs is also, in fact, ambiguous since you have not indicated the degree of precision that you wish to convey. Though, assuming some informal conventions, we might accurately infer that you were specifying your weight to the nearest pound. If you had said that you weigh 200 lbs, that inference is less likely to be correct, since you might reasonably be rounding to the nearest 10 lbs, or some such, but we have really no way of knowing unless you tell us.

In any case, this is just basic high school science and to not be aware of it, is shockingly stupid and ignorant.

|>ouglas

Certainty is a measure of your conviction that you are right. You might be an idiot. Knowledge is presumably a rigorously arrived at belief. — Coben

I dont see how one can be certain without having rigorously arrived at their state of certainty. Without having done that, they would be misusing the term, certainty.

I am pretty sure we all know people who are certain on almost no grounds at all. But the main point is that certainty is a term referring to a feeling, a quale. Knowledge is a term refering to a belief that one decides is likely to be true due to certain criteria. Sometimes, for example, we just can't face the idea that something is not true. Sometimes we can even admit this. I am certain she is cheating on me but I have no evidence. I trust my gut.

Of course the two idea overlap. They deal with different things. And presumably we tend to be more certain about what we consider knowledge. But they do not have to be connected. Further they are focused on two different things: one on a kind of emotional sense, the other on protocols.

I am pretty sure we all know people who are certain on almost no grounds at all. But the main point is that certainty is a term referring to a feeling, a quale. Knowledge is a term refering to a belief that one decides is likely to be true due to certain criteria. Sometimes, for example, we just can't face the idea that something is not true. Sometimes we can even admit this. I am certain she is cheating on me but I have no evidence. I trust my gut. — Coben

It seems like you're saying that one can be certain without any reasons or evidence for what they are certain about. That isn't how I or anyone else uses the term, "certainty". Now that I know that is how you are using the term, then I am going to expect you to provide evidence because now I can't be certain that what you are "certain" of is true. To be certain means that you put forth some mental effort to parse some bit of information for logical and empirical consistency before you say that you are certain of something. To say that you "know" is to say that you have good evidence, or justification for something but there could possibly be other explanations that you aren't aware of yet. It is a way of saying that you have a set of rules for explaining or interpreting something and those rules are amendable.

It seems like you're saying that one can be certain without any reasons or evidence for what they are certain about. — Harry Hindu

'Reasons' they obviously have. They need it to be true, they heard from their best friend, it makes sense to them, they read it in a scientific journal, they saw it happen, they think being uncertain is weak...and so on. They are saying they have no doubt. They may have doubt. They may know deep down that they are not really certain. They may have good grounds. They may not. They make be the kind of person who trusts their intuition (and shouldn't). Some people are just certain in general. Some are certain when they have good evidence. It varies subject to subject. When someone is certain this does not indicate anything about epistemology, theirs or in general. It's a mental state or a measure of one. It measure a lack of doubt or the presentation of that. Of course each person will likely think that their certainty is based on good reasons, but that is not what they are saying when they use the term.

That isn't how I or anyone else uses the term, "certainty" — Harry Hindu

Oh, yes it is. They just don't use it that way when describing themselves. But they do when describing others. And I am saying what the term is referring to. It is referring to an emotional state.

To be certain means that you put forth some mental effort to parse some bit of information for logical and empirical consistency before you say that you are certain of something. — Harry Hindu

No, that's not what it means. It's a synonym for being sure. For many people to say they are certain they need to meet the criteria you put forward, and presumably you do this. But the humans I meet are certain for a wide range of reasons and often not for the reasons they put forward.

I more or less agree with your definintion of know. But it's good you brought up your objections. It does depend who is speaking and about whom. People say 'I know' for all sorts of reasons. People tend to categorize knowledge as opposed to opinion as some more rigorously arrived at subset of beliefs and opinions. JTB more or less. IOW they have a knowledge/opinion(belief) distinction. And they can see this, in a certain sense, clearly in relation to others. And all of us have encountered people who are certain of things that have not gone through any rigorous process, even whatever rigorous process that other person would say it should.

Certainty is a quale - which may or not be affected by rigorous epistemology
Knowledge is a sub-category of beliefs/opinions and we all mean that it is better arrived at than the rest of the beliefs/opinions. How it is arrived at and if we really followed some rigorous process in this case or any case is another story. But when people use 'I know' the reasons can be just like the partial list I have above for 'I am certain.'

Knowledge and certainty however are very distinct and have very distinct referents.

For someone who is so vehemently trying to correct another person on their alleged improper “word usage”, you’re wrong. In every single sentence, the information you’ve conveyed is completely incorrect! Not only that, but there’s actually nothing even wrong with the statement from Tim Wood that you’re attempting to correct.

For someone who is so vehemently trying to correct another person on their alleged improper “word usage” — Alcyone7

Actually, I don't give a shit about his word usage. The only reason that I acted pedantically to him is that he has recently been unrelentingly pedantic to me about word usage, claiming that his word usage on certain terms is the only correct word usage and that anyone who would use them differently from how he does is "stupid" and "ignorant". While in fact the words in question can and have historically been used in many different ways. And the way that I have been using the words is well within the realm of conventional usage, and is even documented as such in respected sources like the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Wikipedia, all the scientists I work with, my boss who has a PhD in Linguistics, etc.

He deserved a taste of his own medicine.

you’re wrong. In every single sentence, the information you’ve conveyed is completely incorrect! — Alcyone7

I'm sorry. You're going to have to take this up with the professors at MIT who taught me what I regurgitated. I am just an accurate regurgitating machine for my expensive and prestigious education.

|>ouglas

You’re defeating your own argument Douglas. I can certainly sense some accuracy in that last sentence though!

You’re defeating your own argument Douglas. I can certainly sense some accuracy in that last sentence though! — Alcyone7

How am I doing that?

|>ouglas

I wonder if folk just have a hard time accepting how bare being true is. It's this bareness, this lack of anything more, that is shown by the T-sentence.

If you believe something, then you believe that it is true. You can't belief it and yet think it false.

I wonder if folk just have a hard time accepting how bare being true is. It's this bareness, this lack of anything more, that is shown by the T-sentence.

If you believe something, then you believe that it is true. You can't belief it and yet think it false. — Banno

Wait, I thought that:

Well, given that we know it, it follows that it is true. — Banno

So which is it? Does knowing it or believing it make it true, and where does certainty fall? Is it possible to believe or know something that isn't true? If not, then why do humans frequently make the "mistake" of stating that they believe or know something and then find out later that it wasn't true? Why do we often find out after making the claim whether or not our knowledge was true or not? Maybe we were getting ahead of our selves and claim to possess knowledge when we didn't have proper justification. That may be the problem - that most people use "know" to casually - often meaning a belief or hypothesis rather than real knowledge. When someone claims to know something, is their knowledge evidence, or proof, that their claim is true? Is their claim that they have knowledge evidence, or proof, that they possess knowledge? Do you possess knowledge just by claiming that you do?