Yes. That's why Russell thought that knowledge by acquaintance was important - and different from knowledge by description (i.e. at second hand).

Odd, though, that direct experience of an event is well known not to make one a reliable witness. Perhaps it is over-rated? — Ludwig V

Perhaps! But I still think that first-hand experience is the best way to learn something and therefore the best way to obtain knowledge. To learn about something through a textbook or through another person is never as useful as to have experienced it yourself. But of course, this is just my perspective.

The issue with this is that people perceive things with certainty through their senses all the time and yet are mistaken in their conclusions. Given this, I am skeptical that we can readily identify how we can tell when someone knows something this way. Something else needs to be present. — Tom Storm

Yes, good point. It is difficult to know how reliable our senses can be sometimes. To gain true certainty of our senses, we need to think critically and logically about what we are experiencing. This is what I would consider true knowledge. This type of knowledge is not just a "gut feeling" or random, irrational thought. Instead, it is a logical conclusion that we arrive at based on experience. When we think critically and logically about what we experience through our senses, then we can gain a greater degree of certainty about our experience.

There are counterexamples. I am certain, for instance, that this post is in English, and my certainty is not a theory that I could revise if further evidence came along. — Banno

You could have woken up from a dream or a coma years later. Note: I am not arguing you should go around doubting such things.

I'd just say that if we counted something as knowledge and later it turned out to be false, then we were wrong, that it wasn't knowledge, and we have now corrected ourselves. — Banno

I can certainly live with this version and in many ways do. I suppose it depends on how long I worked with the 'knowledge'. The notion of absolute space and time, it seems to me we can place in the history of knowledge. If it was more hypothetical or worked for a very short time, then no.

I suppose what I am suggesting is that we don't give knowledge some utterly distinct ontological quality, especially in the present. If it's working really well, great, call it knowledge.

But the idea that folk can be wrong has fallen into disfavour, and it seems it is now considered no more than bad manners, even in a philosophy forum, to point out people's mistakes. Oh well. — Banno

I didn't undersand this. I do think people can be wrong. I am not saying that we don't make mistakes or we don't have mistaken theories, even, let alone hypotheses that seem to work for a while, but are false.

Of course, if folk are never wrong, then they have no need to correct themselves, and hence no way to improve their understanding. — Banno

Agreed, again. I can see, I guess how what I wrote might seem to mean that we are always right. Hm. My point is more that we don't need to go back and say X wasn't really knowledge. I am looking at the term 'knowledge' as a term meaning here's stuff we categorize as very trustworthy because of Y (our batch of rigorous criteria). So some now no longer consider true theory from the past is still part of our history of knowledge. The stuff we arrived at rigorously. Oh, it wasn't really knowledge. No, it was. Now we know better.

And this may seem like some petty or even self-contradictory idea, but my concern is not so much about the past, but the present. Oh, this is knowledge, it's true...period. That's the kind of thinking I think is problematic. Just because it passed rigor now it is seen as immaculatley in a different category. Rather than as the best we can do now.

So, in terms of JTB, I've often been bothered by the T part. It seems both hubristic and redundant. We have a very well JB. It isn't falsified so far (so a neo-Popperish criterion). There'e no better or more parsimonious explanation (a neo-Occam's Razor) and we'll keep it until it doesn't work or there's something better to replace it.

I don't see how a person's own feelings of certainty can assist us with this. — Tom Storm

I'm sorry. I wasn't clear about this. For some, the question may well be "Did this come from God?" How that should be assessed is not for me to say. (But I do know that the Roman Catholic Church does have procedures in place - which is not altogether reassuring!) For others, such as me, the question is whether this person is a danger to themselves or others.

I can doubt anything. — T Clark

You speak as if you had been practicing and become a champion doubter! Or is it that you can ask yourself of any empirical proposition whether it could possibly be wrong and answer "Yes" just because it is not self-contradictory to do so. That wouldn't prove that p was subject to rational doubt. You would need some evidence that it is false for that.

A property with no contamination is not considered a site under site cleanup regulations. — T Clark

So when you create a site conceptual model, you must be certain that there is some contamination. Right?

I guess I was unclear. I do not consider JTB as useful definition of knowledge. I do not think knowledge has to be true, only that I believe it is true and am justified in that belief. Those are the only things I have control of. — T Clark

Well, no-one can ask more of you that you believe it to be true, so long as you stop believing it to be true when you have sufficient evidence that it is false. Then you will also also know that your justification was insufficient and will stop having faith in it. At that point, you will want to say that you did not know, after all. Fair enough. In practice we agree.

All that anyone can ask of you is that you do your bit, and you clearly do that. But I don't think it follows that the outcome (success/failure) is always defined by that. Sometimes success or failure is assessed by other people. You can try your best to win the race. Whether you do win or not is not in your control. For me, knowledge is a success and other people are entitled to assess that for themselves.

You speak as if you had been practicing and become a champion doubter! Or is it that you can ask yourself of any empirical proposition whether it could possibly be wrong and answer "Yes" just because it is not self-contradictory to do so. — Ludwig V

Look, @Banno is right that there are lots of things out there we take for granted, and with good reason. But that doesn't mean they are absolutely certain. I gave a couple of examples where that might be the case. You can't use any real world event or phenomenon as an example of something that is absolutely true. This is not a new idea. Maybe Descartes took it a little too far, but he wasn't wrong, just a bit overexcited.

I don't doubt that we are all writing in English and I don't think about it except when prompted by philosophical questions, but I know all truth, all knowledge, is contingent.

But the idea that folk can be wrong has fallen into disfavour, and it seems it is now considered no more than bad manners, even in a philosophy forum, to point out people's mistakes. Oh well. — Banno

I don't think there's anything very new about people accepting they can be wrong. Think what happened to Socrates.

But I still think that first-hand experience is the best way to learn something and therefore the best way to obtain knowledge. — Bret Bernhoft

I agree that first-hand experience is often the best way. But sometimes text-books and classrooms are useful. It depends what you are trying to learn.

My point is more that we don't need to go back and say X wasn't really knowledge. I am looking at the term 'knowledge' as a term meaning here's stuff we categorize as very trustworthy because of Y (our batch of rigorous criteria). So some now no longer consider true theory from the past is still part of our history of knowledge. The stuff we arrived at rigorously. Oh, it wasn't really knowledge. No, it was. Now we know better. — Bylaw

Sometimes going back and correcting knowledge claims is pointless and irritating. But it can be important if the knowledge is going to be relied on in the future or is still important in influencing people in the present. I agree that people are far too quick to pronounce that Aristotle or Newton were wrong. They were right, up to a point, and up to a point it is not wrong to say they knew a thing or two. New theories must explain more than the old ones, but also need to explain everything that the old ones explained, because the data they were based on is still true, irrespective of the theory.

It may be we are not far off the point where our disagreement becomes just a question of vocabulary. But I'm going to stick to the JTB as I understand it (for the time being).

You caught me seconds before I logged off. I have to go soon.

In philosophy, "contingent" doesn't mean "open to rational doubt". It means it is not self-contradictory to assert the opposite. Which is quite different. When I say that something is certain, I just mean it is not open to rational doubt. Descartes' arguments for scepticism consist of an invalid argument and a paranoid fantasy. That's about it. It's not enough to establish what he wants to establish.

There is a category of doubt that Hume calls "excessive"; for Hume it was invented by Pyrrho, the ancient Greek. It's very liek Cartesian doubt. He recommends ordinary life and concerns as the best cure for it. He also identifies "moderate" doubt, which I would call a healthy scepticism. Hume thinks it is an excellent policy in general life.

So when you create a site conceptual model, you must be certain that there is some contamination. Right? — Ludwig V

Certain? Sure, I guess. I generally worked on sites that had been investigated before, so there was existing data. But when I'm looking through the data I'm given for a site, I definitely look at all the data to verify that levels of contamination in soil and groundwater actually exceed regulatory levels.

Many real estate transactions require what is called a preliminary site assessment at properties where no previous environmental investigations have taken place. For investigators who are first on the site, they have to identify locations where there might be contamination, but they don't assume there has been any.

Then you will also also know that your justification was insufficient and will stop having faith in it. At that point, you will want to say that you did not know, after all. — Ludwig V

You say the justification was insufficient. I don't say "sufficient," I say "adequate." "Adequate" means known at an appropriate level of uncertainty. I'll say again - knowledge can never be 100% certain. From an engineering perspective, we never just know something, we know it with a given level of uncertainty. Maybe that's the solution.

All that anyone can ask of you is that you do your bit, and you clearly do that. But I don't think it follows that the outcome (success/failure) is always defined by that. Sometimes success or failure is assessed by other people. You can try your best to win the race. Whether you do win or not is not in your control. For me, knowledge is a success and other people are entitled to assess that for themselves. — Ludwig V

If I'm taken to court as an engineer, I'll have to show what I did was in accord with appropriate engineering practice, including the quality of the data I used. I don't have to show I was absolutely certain. That's the best that it's reasonable to expect.

In philosophy, "contingent" doesn't mean "open to rational doubt". It means it is not self-contradictory to assert the opposite. — Ludwig V

Yes, my use of the word "contingent" was based on everyday usage. Here are some definitions from the web:

• Possible but not certain to occur; possible.
• Dependent on other conditions or circumstances; conditional: synonym: dependent.
• Happening by or subject to chance or accident; unpredictable: synonym: accidental.

The bolded one is closest to what I was trying to convey.

There is a category of doubt that Hume calls "excessive"; for Hume it was invented by Pyrrho, the ancient Greek. It's very liek Cartesian doubt. He recommends ordinary life and concerns as the best cure for it. He also identifies "moderate" doubt, which I would call a healthy scepticism. Hume thinks it is an excellent policy in general life. — Ludwig V

I guess it comes back to this - doubt isn't the question. Calling it "moderate doubt" doesn't always work in real life. When possible consequences are significant, you need more. You need knowledge of the likely facts and understanding of the level of uncertainty. There, there's your definition of "knowledge" - Understanding of the likely facts and their level of uncertainty. Here's one of my favorite quotes. I use it all the time. It's from Stephen Jay Gould and I've already used it once in this thread - "In science, ‘fact’ can only mean ‘confirmed to such a degree that it would be perverse to withhold provisional assent.'"

Descartes' arguments for scepticism consist of an invalid argument and a paranoid fantasy. That's about it. It's not enough to establish what he wants to establish. — Ludwig V

As I noted, he was a bit over-excited, but not wrong.

I agree that first-hand experience is often the best way. But sometimes text-books and classrooms are useful. It depends what you are trying to learn. — Ludwig V

Agreed! Textbooks and classrooms can be incredibly useful in providing a more theoretical view of a subject and giving us the tools we need to understand our own experience. For example, when we read a textbook we can learn about the anatomy of the human body and how it functions. This allows us to better understand and process what we are experiencing. So both first-hand experience and the theoretical approach are essential for learning and gaining knowledge. There is no one right answer.

First, that anyone who passes on knowledge has to endorse it. That's the consequence of the Truth clause in the JTB account. Second, the authority of the source can be a justification for passing on - and therefore endorsing - knowledge. — Ludwig V

Yep.

You've made use of justified true belief here in order to paint a picture of knowledge as a communal activity, In a somewhat different way to my approach. Nice.

One of the reasons is that the Justification condition is very, very hard to articulate in the way one would expect for a definition. — Ludwig V

And that's the problem with Justified true belief. One wants the justification to be strong. But logical implication is too strong, leading to an oversupply of justifications. And mere opinion appears too weak, being little more than one's personal belief. So instead we have something like a general acceptance by a community, without the rigour for which one might have hoped.

I don't think there's anything very new about people accepting they can be wrong. — Ludwig V

Oh, nor do I. Accepting that one is wrong and seeking correction is the beginnings of rationality, and of philosophy, as you point out. Rather, it seems to me that in recent times it has become less acceptable to point out that someone is wrong. But that might just be my curmudgeon speaking.

Descartes' arguments for scepticism consist of an invalid argument and a paranoid fantasy. That's about it. — Ludwig V

Waggishly accurate. :smile:

...you only know something when you have perceived it undoubtably through your senses. — Bret Bernhoft

I don't think that captures the subtlety of what knowledge is. Hallucinations are an obvious counterexample, but they keep the discussion on the level of perceptions. I see @Tom Storm has already made a similar point. I think knowledge needs to get well beyond that. See the discussion of the knowing's social aspects elsewhere.

In science, ‘fact’ can only mean ‘confirmed to such a degree that it would be perverse to withhold provisional assent. — T Clark

You need knowledge of the likely facts and understanding of the level of uncertainty. — T Clark

Engineers and scientists need to be careful and accurate. Lawyers, with their concept of "beyond reasonable doubt" are similar. I don't have a problem with philosophers adopting the same policy. Ordinary life will no doubt continue with its rather slapdash ways.

But if there is some poisonous chemical contaminating your site, do you say that maybe it isn't a poison after all? You would be asked for evidence. You don't have any. You know that compound XYZ is poisonous, and you would have a bad time in court if you messed about with the process of removing it. Of course, you wouldn't ever just say it is poisonous. You would say it is poisonous at such-and-such a concentration and you would have evidence what the concentration is. If there was doubt about it, that would have to be mentioned and rationally justified as well. All those things are things that you know. Perhaps the problem is not that knowledge is uncertain, but that it is complicated.

Dependent on other conditions or circumstances; conditional: synonym: dependent — T Clark

I agree that's the definition of contingent. And when the conditions or circumstances are met, the contingent statement is true. And when you know they are met, you know that statement is true.

So both first-hand experience and the theoretical approach are essential for learning and gaining knowledge. — Bret Bernhoft

Quite so.

So instead we have something like a general acceptance by a community, without the rigour for which one might have hoped. — Banno

But surely, it is better for a philosopher to admit that rigour isn't available when it isn't. It would not be philosophical to pretend otherwise.

Engineers and scientists need to be careful and accurate. Lawyers, with their concept of "beyond reasonable doubt" are similar. I don't have a problem with philosophers adopting the same policy. Ordinary life will no doubt continue with its rather slapdash ways. — Ludwig V

It looks like you've missed the point. Slapdash ways are appropriate when the consequences of being wrong are minor. Engineers often work in situations where the consequences are significant, so more stringent justification is required. It's not the difference between engineering and everyday life, it's the difference between minor consequences and significant ones.

But if there is some poisonous chemical contaminating your site, do you say that maybe it isn't a poison after all? You would be asked for evidence. You don't have any. You know that compound XYZ is poisonous, and you would have a bad time in court if you messed about with the process of removing it. Of course, you wouldn't ever just say it is poisonous. You would say it is poisonous at such-and-such a concentration and you would have evidence what the concentration is. If there was doubt about it, that would have to be mentioned and rationally justified as well. All those things are things that you know. Perhaps the problem is not that knowledge is uncertain, but that it is complicated. — Ludwig V

This whole part of our conversation started because you said:

So when you create a site conceptual model, you must be certain that there is some contamination. Right? — Ludwig V

I just explained why it wasn't as simple as that. So, yes, it's complicated, but it's complicated because of the uncertainty in our knowledge.

You could have woken up from a dream or a coma years later. — Bylaw

Even if this post were but part of a coma-induced dream, in that dream the post is in English. I don't agree that the coma and dream arguments are as strong as many folk suppose. We do understand the difference between dreaming and reality. One can tell one form the other, which is why we different words for each.

I am suggesting is that we don't give knowledge some utterly distinct ontological quality — Bylaw

Sounds fine. Knowledge is a composite notion, having a family resemblance of uses. No one definition will do, which is where we came in. But most especially, knowledge is not just useful information.

I didn't understand this. — Bylaw

The comment was just this curmudgeon grumping about the apparently thin-skinned. Nothing too significant.

I am looking at the term 'knowledge' as a term meaning here's stuff we categorize as very trustworthy because of Y — Bylaw

It's interesting that "true" and "trustworthy" have the same PIE root "*deru-" ...as does "tree". All good solid upstanding words. So to Foucault's brilliant analysis of truth and power. Curious that he has not been mentioned here until now, since his work is important - yet overly emphasised in some circles.

Sure, there's a long, worthy criticism of the notion of truth, especially when folk unwittingly prefix "absolute", as if that added anything. "hubristic and redundant" indeed. It's had the unfortunate result that it is now popular to suppose that there are no truths, that nothing is true, or everything can be doubted, or a bunch of other memes.

I love the graffiti, writ large on a tunnel wall, "Question everything!", to which someone had added the small tag "Why?"

Universal skepticism undermines itself.

But if we keep truth small and simple then it is undeniable that there are true statements. Like that you are now reading this.

But surely, it is better for a philosopher to admit that rigour isn't available when it isn't. It would not be philosophical to pretend otherwise. — Ludwig V

That's one of the lessons learned, and subsequently taught, by the natural language approach.

Your three examples are trivial. — T Clark

Of course they are – that's what makes them good examples. You can pretend that this post is in French, but it will remain no more than a pretence, and be contradicted by your replying to it. If you doubt that three in a row wins noughts and crosses, then you haven't understood the game, and you stand outside the community of nought and crosses players.

Two points. We cannot doubt everything, because doubting requires a background against which the doubt is formulated. And the compliment of this: some things must be taken as indubitable in order to proceed - that three in a row wins, that this sentence is in English, and that there are sites on which engineers may do their stuff.

All this by way of pointing out that some sentences are true.

Nothing is absolute. There can always be doubt. It only matters how uncertain things are. — T Clark

In engineering, yes. But not everything is engineering. Philosophy, like life, is complicated.

We have at absolute pressure; that's something.

Do 'properly basic beliefs' or 'basic beliefs' mean anything in contemporary philosophy? I'm assuming they come out of a foundationalist epistemology? Personally, I would tend to lump them into a kind of 'brute fact'' argument of the kind Russell mentions when talking about the universe... 'it's there and that's all.."

Problematically there are religious thinkers who would say god is a basic or properly basic belief - I guess it's the 'foundation' from which all other beliefs are built up from. In your view is it possible to not hold any such axioms as a foundational starting point? Personally, I don't see how we can argue that god has the same epistemic status as the universe. The latter is hard to doubt, but the former, it seems to me, can only be arrived at though intellectual calisthenics...

We cannot doubt everything, because doubting requires a background against which the doubt is formulated — Banno

And perversely such doubting has become a form of certainty.

You and I never seem to have productive discussions. Our posts don't seem to be very responsive to each other. I think we just think about things too differently. The things you think are important I don't and those I think are important you don't.

And perversely such doubting has become a form of certainty. — Tom Storm

See PM. All of this has a so far ignored ethical dimension.

I just explained why it wasn't as simple as that. So, yes, it's complicated, but it's complicated because of the uncertainty in our knowledge. — T Clark

It may be just a linguistic issue, but I prefer to say, not that knowledge is uncertain, but that we know less than we think we do.

That's one of the lessons learned, and subsequently taught, by the natural language approach. — Banno

Is the natural language approach the heir of the ordinary language approach? If so, that's me.

foundationalist epistemology — Tom Storm

The endless and fruitless search for foundations of knowledge certainly looks like a misapplication of an idea like the format of Euclid's writings about geometry.

But if we keep truth small and simple then it is undeniable that there are true statements. Like that you are now reading this. — Banno

If there are any propositional foundations for knowledge, these small and simple truths must be them. But the deeper foundations are the skills that we begin learning as soon as we are born (and possibly before that.) In my opinion.

And the justification for the skills, is, in the end, pragmatic. Evolution takes care of that.

It may be just a linguistic issue, but I prefer to say, not that knowledge is uncertain, but that we know less than we think we do. — Ludwig V

As I noted previously, you and I seem to agree on most of the substantive issues, [joke]so I'm going to forgive your misconceptions about the language.[/joke]

I'm grateful. Arguing about such an issue is no fun, just annoying. So I reciprocate. :smile:

Knowledge is experience whether second hand or no.

The endless and fruitless search for foundations of knowledge certainly looks like a misapplication of an idea like the format of Euclid's writings about geometry. — Ludwig V

Could be. It's probably down to the notion of god which has historically been posited as the foundational grounding of human knowledge. So we get the inevitable question - how can knowledge be true or objective or foundational if god does not guarantee it? And then you get arguments like the evolutionary argument against naturalism by people like Alvin Plantinga.

And the justification for the skills, is, in the end, pragmatic. Evolution takes care of that. — Ludwig V

What works, what is useful, what is pragmatic; or just that it's what we do? I'm not sure that the use of "pragmatic" isn't a bit too teleological, giving the impression of serving an 'ends' that isn't there.

And in these fora, evolutionary explanations abound. I tend towards Mary Midgley's mistrust of their overuse.

But you might be right.

Leaving aside the notions of knowledge as acquaintance and know-how. the idea of knowledge implies certainty, even if common usage sometimes contradicts that in applying the term to beliefs about which we are not certain.

So, why speak about propositional knowledge at all then, why not speak about more or less justified propositional belief instead, thus dissolving all the attendant paradoxes, and saving us from going over and over this same old boring ground ad nauseum?

Our posts don't seem to be very responsive to each other. — T Clark

I don't see that. Rather, you said JTB was silly and I showed a few ways in which it is of interest to philosophers because it displays some of the characteristics of knowledge. You didn't much take to my comments,

You also claimed that we cannot be certain of what we know, to which I gave a few counterexamples.

I'd like to think that where we stand now is in a broad agreement that neither JTB nor pragmatism give complete, nor even sufficient, accounts of knowledge.

broad agreement — Banno

No, I don't think so. For me, any definition or description that doesn't take into account how people use knowledge on a day to day basis is misleading. You call it pragmatism and I'm ok with that.