You can't then propose a method of justification which relies on us knowing directly the way the world actually is — Isaac

I don't. The justification lies in someone's responsiveness to however the world is, not on knowing how in particular the world is.

Eliezer Yudkowski has said something similar, defining knowledge as "the ability to be more confused by fiction than by reality". If you can equally explain every outcome, you know nothing. This links knowledge with the concepts of information and entropy. — Echarmion

I'm planning a thread on something very much like that soon. :-)

You couldn't know anything about morality — Echarmion

You can if you assign a meaning to moral claims the way I did in the earlier thread on metaethics and the philosophy of language.

It would then presumably follow that only those beliefs can be considered knowledge that have no justified contrary beliefs, i.e. all contrary beliefs are rules out. But, if we insist on some objective notion of truth, a belief can be true before we are able to find significant arguments to rule out contrary beliefs. We'd then have to conclude we have knowledge of something even though we are similarly believing contrary things about it. That doesn't sound very useful. — Echarmion

The terminology of "knowledge" is frustratingly black-and-white; it's easier to state in terms of "justification of belief". If we have not yet checked for any possible contrary evidence, then our justification is very weak. If we have thoroughly checked for possible contrary evidence, then our justification is very strong. It is indeed possible to have some degree of justification for contrary beliefs -- the initial state of all belief is that everything and its negation is very weakly justified -- but the stronger the degree of justification for one, the weaker the justification for contrary ones must be.

Preemptively tying into the information and entropy thing to come soon, this is why more specific beliefs that are still unfalsified are better-justified: by their very specificity, they have exposed themselves to more chances of falsification, and yet survived.

I don't. The justification lies in someone's responsiveness to however the world is, not on knowing how in particular the world is. — Pfhorrest

How do you measure responsiveness to how the world is without knowing in advance how the world is? How could you possibly know what anyone is responding to?

Edit - who are these people unresponsive to the way the world is?

Take a synaesthete. When they see the number 4, they hear a high pitched ringing. They test this a million times looking at a million number 4s. Is their belief that number 4s make ringing noises more justified than if they'd done only a thousand such tests?

I don’t see the apparent contradiction. Can you elaborate? — Pfhorrest

Sure, you seemed to imply that any belief was justified, but then came and marked out "justified belief". Your explanation of Popper falsification cleared up the issue.

I’m basically applying the same standard of justification to belief as we usually do to action, at least in the modern free world: any action is by default justified, until it can be shown somehow wrong. We’re not obligated to do nothing at all except those things that we can prove from the ground up that we must do. We would normally consider than an absurd standard for justifying our actions, but it’s all too common to apply that standard to justifying our beliefs. — Pfhorrest

Hm. I think you've just put forward beliefs which haven't been disproven yet. Lets say I believe my friend Joe dated a woman yesterday. I ask him, "How did your date go last night?" supremely confident that he would date someone, just because I believe he would. No evidence, nothing. Joe replies, "It went great!"

Are we to say that I knew Joe dated a woman last night before I confirmed it? Popperian justification requires that we apply our beliefs, that they must be able to be falsified, and we must try to do so. Otherwise you're saying even induction is knowledge. Perhaps I'm misunderstanding your intent at this point, so feel free to correct me if I am.

How do you measure responsiveness to how the world is without knowing in advance how the world is? How could you possibly know what anyone is responding to? — Isaac

Everyone has direct access to a small part of the world -- that's what sensation is. (This hinges on the direct realism covered in the previous thread on the web of reality). Ignoring empirical evidence from your senses is being unresponsive to the state of the world.

Edit - who are these people unresponsive to the way the world is? — Isaac

I'm not going to reproduce a list of all fallacies and everyone who's ever committed one for you.

Take a synaesthete. When they see the number 4, they hear a high pitched ringing. They test this a million times looking at a million number 4s. Is their belief that number 4s make ringing noises more justified than if they'd done only a thousand such tests? — Isaac

Inasmuch as "number 4s make ringing noises" is understood to be a statement -- like all statements should be understood to be -- about a relation between the observer and their environment, then yes. If you mean they think that number 4s produce vibrations in the air that cause other people to hear high pitched ringing, then no, because that's not an experience that could falsify that kind of belief. But if they just think that number 4s cause them to hear high pitched ringing, then yes.

Hm. I think you've just put forward beliefs which haven't been disproven yet. Lets say I believe my friend Joe dated a woman yesterday. I ask him, "How did your date go last night?" supremely confident that he would date someone, just because I believe he would. No evidence, nothing. Joe replies, "It went great!"

Are we to say that I knew Joe dated a woman last night before I confirmed it? Popperian justification requires that we apply our beliefs, that they must be able to be falsified, and we must try to do so. Otherwise you're saying even induction is knowledge. Perhaps I'm misunderstanding your intent at this point, so feel free to correct me if I am. — Philosophim

I'm intending to agree with Popper.

On my account, you were weakly justified to believe your friend went on a date at first, and then when observation that could have falsified that didn't, your justification increased. It's difficult to state that in the terminology of "knowledge", because it's odd to say something like you "knew a little" at first and then "knew a lot" later.

Everyone has direct access to a small part of the world -- that's what sensation is. (This hinges on the direct realism covered in the previous thread on the web of reality). Ignoring empirical evidence from your senses is being unresponsive to the state of the world. — Pfhorrest

Nobody ignores empirical evidence from their senses in the construction of their beliefs. It's what our brain does, we can no more stop it from doing so than we can stop our heart from beating. If you can show me a non-clinical case of someone ignoring evidence from their senses in forming a belief I'd love to do a study on them.

I'm counting being uninterested in checking your beliefs against the senses as "ignoring empirical evidence".

Plenty of people ignore claims that there is empirical evidence to the contrary of their beliefs, rather than actually check if those claims pan out. That's being unresponsive to reality.

I'm counting being uninterested in checking your beliefs against the senses as "ignoring empirical evidence".

Plenty of people ignore claims that there is empirical evidence to the contrary of their beliefs, rather than actually check if those claims pan out. That's being unresponsive to reality. — Pfhorrest

What claims? Scientific ones? If so then no-one except the scientists involved check them out against their senses. I can't think of any beliefs that people hold which can be demonstrated to their own senses to be wrong and they refuse such demonstrations.

On my account, you were weakly justified to believe your friend went on a date at first, and then when observation that could have falsified that didn't, your justification increased. It's difficult to state that in the terminology of "knowledge", because it's odd to say something like you "knew a little" at first and then "knew a lot" later. — Pfhorrest

Hm, I understand that is a consequence of your proposal, but does that make sense? I had zero justification for believing my friend dated a woman the night before. It was just a random belief. And I think that's the problem with your proposal. If you are to state knowledge is something we simply haven't had refuted yet, you allow beliefs without justification to be declared as knowledge.

And at that point, you allow all untested beliefs as knowledge. A "belief" then can only exist if one is shown their belief is contradicted. Because if all beliefs that are not contradicted are knowledge, they're not really just beliefs anymore right? This also results in all beliefs being against knowledge. Considering you agree with Popper, I don't think that is the conclusion you are intending to draw.

I had zero justification for believing my friend dated a woman the night before. It was just a random belief. And I think that's the problem with your proposal. If you are to state knowledge is something we simply haven't had refuted yet, you allow beliefs without justification to be declared as knowledge. — Philosophim

Can you really think of a scenario where you'd have zero justification though? How would such a belief even get formed neurologically? Wouldn't it make more sense to say that the justifications were of one sort at t1 and of a qualitatively different sort at t2?

Following that, 'knowledge' would be beliefs whose justification was of a certain qualitative sort, which I think is more in keeping with his we actually use the word.

Can you really think of a scenario where you'd have zero justification though? — Isaac

Yes. I've formed beliefs that just sprang up out of nowhere. Usually I evaluate them afterwards. Sometimes though I have blurted out beliefs without thinking about them. They were not justified, more like emotional expressions. I believe justification requires some type of evaluation of your belief. It is very easy to commit to beliefs without any evaluation of them.

I've formed beliefs that just sprang up out of nowhere. — Philosophim

The question was how do you imagine that these beliefs formed. A belief, neurologically, is a very complex set of neural connections which lead to a tendency to act a certain way. Normally these get set by repeated triggering from sensory inputs and responses. What I'm struggling to see on your account, is how you see such a complex array of network connections as a 'belief' just randomly occurring without being prompted to do so by stimulus from sensory inputs?

I think you're over complicating the issue. The abstract point I'm making is we can have beliefs that are examined, and beliefs that are unexamined. Is an unexamined belief knowledge?

Further, the belief I mentioned did not tie to anything that would indicate Joe dated a woman last night. So my belief being correct was an accident, not tied to any rational justification.

the belief I mentioned did not tie to anything that would indicate Joe dated a woman last night. — Philosophim

In your thought experiment, maybe not, but what I'm saying is that such a situation is neurologically impossible. No matter how much you insist you did, there is no know (or even plausible) mechanism by which a belief can be formed without the sensory, or interoceptive inputs to form it.

what I'm saying is that such a situation is neurologically impossible. No matter how much you insist you did, there is no know (or even plausible) mechanism by which a belief can be formed without the sensory, or interoceptive inputs to form it. — Isaac

Ok? Are you purposefully being obtuse and avoiding the point?

The abstract point I'm making is we can have beliefs that are examined, and beliefs that are unexamined. Is an unexamined belief knowledge? — Philosophim

This is what my point is. You can always take a thought experiment and find a way to take it out of context. That is being dishonest to the conversation and the intent of the people involved. The thought experiment is to help you understand the abstract context of the above. If I have an unexamined belief (which has nothing to do with the technical neurological process of how that belief was formed) and it just so happens to be right, was my unexamined belief knowledge?

If I have an unexamined belief (which has nothing to do with the technical neurological process of how that belief was formed) and it just so happens to be right, was my unexamined belief knowledge? — Philosophim

If counterfactually you would not have held that belief if the world were different such that that belief would have been false, then yes. On my account, at least.

ETA: I guess technically on my account there is no such thing as an unexamined “belief“, because that would just be a “perception”: belief are what you get when you examine your perceptions and either affirm or deny their accuracy.

I guess technically on my account there is no such thing as an unexamined “belief“, because that would just be a “perception”: belief are what you get when you examine your perceptions and either affirm or deny their accuracy. — Pfhorrest

Ok, I think I see what you mean. However, that still leaves the problem that both inductive and deductive beliefs are counted as knowledge. So if you still hold to something even when it has been disproven, it then becomes something separate from knowledge, and becomes a belief.

At that point, we believe things that we know aren't true, and we know things that we can't believe are true. I think allowing inductive beliefs to be counted as knowledge is where the sticking point it. What if you held deductive beliefs that have not been disproven yet as knowledge, and inductive beliefs as mere beliefs?

However, that still leaves the problem that both inductive and deductive beliefs are counted as knowledge. — Philosophim

I don't see why that's a problem. Induction doesn't give you certainty like deduction does, but noticing patterns (which is all induction really amounts to) is still a way to form beliefs, and so long as you would not hold those beliefs if they were not true (i.e. you have made observations that would have falsified them, if they were false), then you know the things you believe.

So if you still hold to something even when it has been disproven, it then becomes something separate from knowledge, and becomes a belief. — Philosophim

I don't see how this related to the previous sentence, and also, knowledge is a species of belief, so something doesn't become a belief after previously having been known, or anything like that. I think maybe you're not following the relationship between perception and belief on my account: to perceive something is for it to seem true to you, just intuitively. Your friend seems like the kind of guy who probably had a date last night.

It's not until you wonder to yourself "is that really right though?" and then either agree or disagree with your perception that you form a belief, either a belief in the thing you perceived (if you agree), or a belief to the contrary (if you disagree; say you're aware of something adversely affecting your perception, so you don't trust it).

You may not necessarily have thoroughly vetted the idea yet, so that belief may not count as knowledge. If you have thoroughly vetted it, such that you would have already found that it was false if it were false, then you know it.

At that point, we believe things that we know aren't true, and we know things that we can't believe are true. — Philosophim

I also don't see how this follows from before, and even by itself it doesn't make sense to my understanding of these words. To believe something just is to think that it is true, and knowledge is a species of belief, so to know something is in part to believe it which is to think that it's true. So you can't believe things you know aren't true, nor can you know things that you don't believe are true, because knowing them implies believing they're true.

I think allowing inductive beliefs to be counted as knowledge is where the sticking point it. What if you held deductive beliefs that have not been disproven yet as knowledge, and inductive beliefs as mere beliefs? — Philosophim

Beliefs themselves aren't inherently deductive or inductive, those are just means of arguing for a belief. If you have a deductive argument, that is a disprove of the contrary, and so is certain knowledge. Inductive beliefs cannot be certain, sure, but that's beside any point I'm making here.

The thought experiment is to help you understand the abstract context of the above. If I have an unexamined belief (which has nothing to do with the technical neurological process of how that belief was formed) and it just so happens to be right, was my unexamined belief knowledge? — Philosophim

You're mixing up two different things and I'm getting confused. There's this issue of an 'unexamined' belief as in

The abstract point I'm making is we can have beliefs that are examined, and beliefs that are unexamined. Is an unexamined belief knowledge? — Philosophim

Then there's this issue of a belief without any basis, as in

the belief I mentioned did not tie to anything that would indicate Joe dated a woman last night. — Philosophim

The point I was making as counter to @Pfhorrest's argument here is that it is impossible to generate a belief which is not based on some interpretation of the evidence (input from the outside world). It just neurologically can't be done). So everyone already has a justification for all of their beliefs, the justification is whatever external inputs caused it.

The issue of whether a belief is 'examined' is another matter - the effort one puts in to gather even more external data relevant to the belief. Here the issue is scaler and the answer can be none, but in fifteen years of working on beliefs I've yet to see any evidence of a single belief which is 'unexamined' in this sense. People are quite keen on having their beliefs provide them with useful predictions and to do so there cannot be significant clashes with whatever objective states of the world there are.

I'm not being 'purposefully obtuse' here. It's the crux of the problem with these kinds of approaches. They disguise ideology as method. To create this categorisation of predictive though as 'beliefs/knowledge based on an ideologically defined method of checking them is fine when it's upfront about it (I personally use that method of checking my beliefs, I think it works best), but I oppose the suggestion that it is ontologically relevant, that it somehow describes the objective difference between two types of predictive thought. It doesn't There are only beliefs and there are various methods for checking these beliefs. We can say whether a belief has been more or less well-checked, but only after specifying the method of checking we're measuring that against, and the choice of method is underdetermined.

The point I was making as counter to Pfhorrest's argument here is that it is impossible to generate a belief which is not based on some interpretation of the evidence (input from the outside world). — Isaac

That's not contrary to my views at all. (I've just been saying in the past few posts that a "belief" as I mean it is formed from a "perception", which in turn is exactly some interpretation of evidence). I think maybe you're reading in more than I intend to say.

That's not contrary to my views at all. (I've just been saying in the past few posts that a "belief" as I mean it is formed from a "perception", which in turn is exactly some interpretation of evidence). I think maybe you're reading in more than I intend to say. — Pfhorrest

Ah, then I've gotten confused. You said earlier that

I'm counting being uninterested in checking your beliefs against the senses as "ignoring empirical evidence".

Plenty of people ignore claims that there is empirical evidence to the contrary of their beliefs, rather than actually check if those claims pan out. That's being unresponsive to reality. — Pfhorrest

It's this that's caused the confusion. How can it be that people are "uninterested in checking your beliefs against the senses" and yet at the same time you acknowledge that all belief are the result of interpretation of input from the senses?

How would one prove that a particular belief is positively true? I don't think that can be done, there will always be an element of doubt, however small.

Knowledge is a fuzy set, in constant revision and revolution.

How can it be that people are "uninterested in checking your beliefs against the senses" and yet at the same time you acknowledge that all belief are the result of interpretation of input from the senses? — Isaac

It’s the “checking” part that makes the difference, between acting like the observations you happen to have made so are plenty (and possibly even being averse to makings further observations that might compel you to change your mind), and actively seeking out more observations to make sure that they continue the pattern.

Also, one can form beliefs in a top-down way as well, hearing the beliefs of others expressed first, being told that something is so, and then perceiving nothing to the contrary (or else doubting the reliability of those perceptions) and so affirming the belief, without having yet observed anything that would have organically compelled one to believe.

The issue of whether a belief is 'examined' is another matter - the effort one puts in to gather even more external data relevant to the belief. Here the issue is scaler and the answer can be none, but in fifteen years of working on beliefs I've yet to see any evidence of a single belief which is 'unexamined' in this sense. — Isaac

My apologies then. I see where you drew this conclusion from my point. Of course there is a reason for every belief at some level. I mean, Joe is male, and I've seen him date women before. There's something. When I mean by "examined belief", is a consciously examined and processed belief. Its like entering into a room and feeling dread. You might instantly form a belief that the place is dangerous from that. But do you know it is dangerous? This is where a person has to actively and consciously examine their beliefs. What is evoking dread? What is actually unsafe in this room?

I think most of us intuitively feel that a "gut reaction" is not necessarily knowledge, but can be a guide that we examine to gain knowledge. The point at which instinct crosses into knowledge is the question of epistemology. I think the OP is trying to do away with that, because it can be a tricky thing to answer. I feel that it more avoids the question of epistemology though, then solves it.

Induction doesn't give you certainty like deduction does, but noticing patterns (which is all induction really amounts to) is still a way to form beliefs — Pfhorrest

Induction is not the recognition of patterns. Induction is drawing a conclusion that does not necessarily conclude from the premises, or evidence involved. Deduction is drawing a conclusion that necessarily must be concluded from the premises. With those definitions, what do you think about my earlier statement?

It's not until you wonder to yourself "is that really right though?" — Pfhorrest

You may not necessarily have thoroughly vetted the idea yet, so that belief may not count as knowledge. If you have thoroughly vetted it, such that you would have already found that it was false if it were false, then you know it. — Pfhorrest

What counts as thoroughly vetting then? So it seems we can have beliefs that have not been examined that are not knowledge. Once we start examining them, when do we stop? At what point do we say that's been enough? Who determines the criteria for what is false? What if I believe Bigfoot exists? This is where induction versus deduction comes in handy. Deduction can give a clear, reproducible answer. If we use induction to believe Bigfoot, necessarily two people could come to two contrary conclusions. I've got to run though, sorry I can't flesh this out better. Just think about induction and deduction as defined here and how that would fit in with your knowledge theory.

Also, one can form beliefs in a top-down way as well, hearing the beliefs of others expressed first, being told that something is so, and then perceiving nothing to the contrary (or else doubting the reliability of those perceptions) and so affirming the belief, without having yet observed anything that would have organically compelled one to believe. — Pfhorrest

No one can be compelled to faith: hence (each generation of historians have experienced this) the passionate character, the bitterness, the infinitude of the discussions triggered by such hypercritical assumptions: we can not 'get through', and no argument can prevail.
Henri Irénée MARROU, De la connaissance historique, Éd. du Seuil, coll. Points Histoire, 1975.

it is impossible to generate a belief which is not based on some interpretation of the evidence (input from the outside world). It just neurologically can't be done). So everyone already has a justification for all of their beliefs, the justification is whatever external inputs caused it. — Isaac

You and I went around and around about this once before, but I think I have a better sense of your overall approach now and mine has shifted toward yours. Still, I'm not quite ready to treat "cause" and "reason" as equivalent. This is right next-door to @Philosophim's question:

I think most of us intuitively feel that a "gut reaction" is not necessarily knowledge, but can be a guide that we examine to gain knowledge. The point at which instinct crosses into knowledge is the question of epistemology. — Philosophim

This is right around the usual dual-process story: it might be simplest to call what System 1 gets up to "caused" but a lot of those habitual responses are caused in a way that will pass muster and reflect repeated earlier effortful examination of things by System 2, so we might as well call those causes "reasons" in the non-causal sense too, the sense in which "justification" is not a synonym for "rationalization".

If challenged, a person might engage System 2 and begin a process of assembling the evidence they are comfortable claiming underlies a belief; we can call that "rationalization" in a wide sense, allowing that we might approve or disapprove of their claims for evidentiary import, etc. (Sellars seems more or less to claim that saying "I know" just signals we are now playing a language-game that requires everyone to put on their System 2 hats -- it puts a claim "in the space of reasons".) Or they might refuse to engage System 2 (wait -- is that even possible??) with a bare "I just know" and philosophers tend to frown upon that.

I think there's another sense in which the example @Philosophim gives is the sort of thing philosophers hope to be able rule out: we are used to thinking of a belief as being partially caused by the world out there and partially caused by us, by our other beliefs, emotional responses, and so on, and we imagine sort of measuring and comparing the contribution each makes. We want to say that your feeling of dread (a) tracks reality -- something in this room is odd and you picked up on it, or (b) is just you. There's reason to suspect no such general program is possible (if Quine was right about the analytic/synthetic distinction) but there is something to this, and it's related to @Pfhorrest's thing about being "responsive" to evidence.

So there are two kinds of criticisms that can sometimes and sometimes not be made about the same beliefs:

• formed with minimal "input" from the environment and considerable input from your other beliefs or "gut reactions";
• "insulated" or "protected" from possible revision.

Philosophers don't like either of these but will let the first slide so long as you are open to revision; the second is more or less sinful. Are there good general-purpose ways of talking about these things?

It’s the “checking” part that makes the difference, between acting like the observations you happen to have made so are plenty (and possibly even being averse to makings further observations that might compel you to change your mind), and actively seeking out more observations to make sure that they continue the pattern. — Pfhorrest

You might instantly form a belief that the place is dangerous from that. But do you know it is dangerous? This is where a person has to actively and consciously examine their beliefs. — Philosophim

This all makes sense as far as identifying a process (and a worthy one at that) is concerned, but there's still this odd ontological leap, like there are two kinds of thought 'knowledge' and 'belief'. I don't see how a scalar process can result in a binomial distinction. Are you (either of you) perhaps suggesting the the moment a sub-conscious belief is consciously checked (and passes) it becomes knowledge? Or is some degree, and method, of checking required?

Either way, how do you avoid the problem I mentioned at the beginning that one cannot distinguish the presence/absence of evidence from unchecked belief?

We cannot say that our belief in A is justified by the deductive argument 'If B then A, B therefore A' because our belief that B might be what is at fault, or our belief that 'if B then A'. — Isaac

Basically the presence and decisiveness of evidence (the consequence of this 'checking procedure) is itself a belief.

So you have a belief that A. You check it and find what seems to you like evidence to the contrary (call that a belief that B). The belief that A and the belief that B are just two beliefs. One must obviously decide which counters which, but the ontological status of A hasn't changed, it's still just a belief, despite now having a contrary belief associated with it.

It seems as if you want to set up a hierarchy where initial beliefs are somehow considered suspicious, but subsequent beliefs about evidence for/against them can be treated as practically objective fact, and I don't see any reason why you'd want to do that.

it might be simplest to call what System 1 gets up to "caused" but a lot of those habitual responses are caused in a way that will pass muster and reflect repeated earlier effortful examination of things by System 2, so we might as well call those causes "reasons" in the non-causal sense too, the sense in which "justification" is not a synonym for "rationalization".

If challenged, a person might engage System 2 and begin a process of assembling the evidence they are comfortable claiming underlies a belief; we can call that "rationalization" in a wide sense, allowing that we might approve or disapprove of their claims for evidentiary import, etc. (Sellars seems more or less to claim that saying "I know" just signals we are now playing a language-game that requires everyone to put on their System 2 hats -- it puts a claim "in the space of reasons".) Or they might refuse to engage System 2 (wait -- is that even possible??) with a bare "I just know" and philosophers tend to frown upon that. — Srap Tasmaner

This is very close to the way I think about knowledge (even 'truth', much to @banno's chagrin). As a signifying word which tells us we're playing a different game. In my experience, the game thus signified is more a social one than the private change of systems you suggest here (though I do like the fact that your model gives us the binomial distinction we're looking for).

What seems, again, in my experience, to be signified by a shift to the term 'knowledge' is that there will be agreement among others in one's social group. I 'know' the earth is round (anyone in my social group will agree). I 'believe' it's raining (someone who's actually outside might disagree). I know at a first read, most will baulk at this "I don't care what other people think" but the key is understanding that we have imaginary social groups to which we wish to belong, as well as actual groups. None of is is to undermine the processes we use to make this assessment.

The evidence for all this (as you so rightly were about to ask), is weak. It has a rich heritage though (Asch conformity), and a modern update (engagement of social status brain regions during both knowledge and evidence assessment), together with a host of studies inbetween, but you'll find plenty to the contrary as well. (Hey, my belief counts as knowledge, I've read most of the studies to the contrary!).

So there are two kinds of criticisms that can sometimes and sometimes not be made about the same beliefs:

formed with minimal "input" from the environment and considerable input from your other beliefs or "gut reactions";
"insulated" or "protected" from possible revision.


Philosophers don't like either of these but will let the first slide so long as you are open to revision; the second is more or less sinful. Are there good general-purpose ways of talking about these things? — Srap Tasmaner

I think this matters a lot, but again, as I mentioned earlier, I think it's important to distinguish simply being open to revision (our beliefs are in a constant state of being revised), and being open to revision via an approved method, much like the engagement of system 2, you mentioned. How much this relates to the ontological status of 'knowledge' as opposed to just what constitutes good habits (in the Ramseyan sense), I'm not sure.

We are very much on the same page.

((Lately I've been reading Dewey and Herb Simon, both people with one foot in philosophy and one in psychology. I may even come to see this as a strength in Hume, rather than trouble.))

What seems, again, in my experience, to be signified by a shift to the term 'knowledge' is that there will be agreement among others in one's social group. — Isaac

I'm also strongly inclined, as I think you know, toward "community first" approaches for a bunch of reasons.

How much this relates to the ontological status of 'knowledge' as opposed to just what constitutes good habits (in the Ramseyan sense) — Isaac

It's getting harder and harder for me to care about the ontological part. (I also can't help but see the dual-process story as validating the reliance of Hume and Ramsey on "habit", though it feels a little tendentious.)

Philosophers tend to want to focus on the status of claims (is it a belief? is it knowledge?) and on the status an individual is imagined as assigning to their beliefs. But it might be possible to quit doing that. In the usual case of belief revision -- I thought there were two packs of poptarts but when I look there's only one -- does it matter that my belief was marked as revisable or defeasible? I do revise with minimal hesitation, if any. The "hunh" I grunt is, by introspection, mild curiosity about how there came to be only one or why I thought there were two, but there's very minimal tension associated with the belief revision itself.

There are all sorts of stories about people resisting revising their beliefs (although one of the biggies, "backfire", turned out later probably to be wrong), but I wonder if there is really an issue there well described in terms of a belief's status at all, or if it's just more about reasoning processes, specifics of the evidence, etc.