I can't resist replying "Yes, it is!"

My perception of the nature of philosophy keeps changing. — jgill

I'm not clear whether you think that's a bad thing or a good thing. I suppose it could be either, depending on why it changes.

It is also possible that philosophy can be seen in more than one way at the same time.

I'm not a philosopher, I'm wondering is there a single philosophical question that has been 'answered' definitively for eternity? — Tom Storm

On the surface, the answer is probably No.

But that depends on how you define the questions. Arguably, what happens is that an answer that works in one cultural and intellectual environment will seem inappropriate or inadequate in another and so the question is re-framed and re-interpreted.

There's an old saying - or possibly a quotation whose source I've forgotten - that it is differences of opinion that make horse races. And when there's a winner, the race is over. My point is that it is differences of opinion that make philosophical dialogue - and reflective dialogue is the heart of philosophy.

I'm opposed to people who think that the questions must have a final answer - especially when they think they have found it. It leads to dogmatism and squashes dialogue. Perhaps I should have distinguishes between answers, which shut down dialogue, and responses, which don't.

There seem to be a lot of people around who worry about the lack of "progress" in philosophy. I'm suggesting that the demand that philosophy makes progress by providing conclusive answers is only one view and that there are alternatives that perhaps should be better developed.

I don't know how philosophy will develop, but I'm sure that it will continue in one way or another - for better or worse.

philosophy must offer answers in order to generate new questions. — Joshs

I agree with that. But then, an answer that is correct, job done, doesn't generate new questions.

Perhaps we should distinguish between answers (2+2=? Answer 4) and responses, which do. Or perhaps we can just rely on disagreement and elaboration to keep the conversating going?

Sorry, I was a bit vague. They know where they parked their car and assume that it's still safe, and where they left their respective cars. They assume that the cars are still there and that they will be there when they return. I'm waiting to see how the story turns out before I decide whether they know or not.

The Theaetetus doesn't point to the inadequacy of the JTB, but only to the inadequacy of Plato's idea of an account or an explanation or a justification. Insofar as it can be taken to suggest that the JTB is inadequate, it doesn't offer any clue as to what the alternative might be.

I've just had a light-bulb moment. I was thinking that the J clause enabled a chain of transmission to form. The J clause provided assurance that the person I got the information from did know and the T clause provided my endorsement for the next person in the chain.

But the T clause means that every link in the chain has to test the information for itself. In other words, we never get away from first hand evidence.

That isn't quite clear, but it means that while second hand knowledge might be knowledge, third hand knowledge isn't.

But we live and third, fourth and fifth hand knowledge! Nobody could establish the truth of all the information we live by in even a long lifetime. That's why knowledge is so important.

I'm missing something.

Pause for thought.

In addition, you seem to place far more importance and justificatory weight than I do upon common speech patterns/practices. — creativesoul

I do place emphasis on common speech practices. That doesn't mean that I rule out all technical or specialized language, just that everything needs to have a basis in the shared language.

I'm not sure that our differences are as radical as you seem to think. You misunderstand me about beliefs and propositions. Perhaps I didn't explain myself clearly enough. First, given the lack of clarity about both beliefs and propositions, it seemed better to talk about beliefs without talking about propositions. Second, I don't think that beliefs that are reasons for believing something are clearly distinct from or identical with the belief that they support. From one point of view they are. From another, they aren't. In other words, their beliefs are similar in that they can both be partly expressed by "John should not marry Jane" but different in that Max's belief is expressed in more detail by "Jane is a horrible person, so John should not..." and Jessica's belief is expressed in more detail by "marriage is a terrible practice, so John should not ...". Perhaps it is clearer to say that their beliefs overlap?

Does that help?

A posteriori, he does, but not as a necessary fact. — Wayfarer

I don't know what this means. The echo of Kripke doesn't help.

No, it hasn't been discussed - so far as I remember.

It's a good point. That's why "I know that p" is a pleonasm, i.e. adds nothing except rhetorical emphasis - or possibly a claim to being in a particularly good position to know.

The definition only really has meaning with "You know that p" or "S/He knows that p", where the speaker is different from the knower. Then, the J clause works to ensure that the knower has access to the basis for the knowledge. It really is pretty vague. Philosophers always concentrate on first hand knowledge, for understandable reasons. But the vagueness of the J clause allows the justifications other than the first hand evidence - for example S may know because he has it on good authority without knowing the first hand evidence. That enables me to report what I have learnt from someone else.

In order to determine if an argument is true, to have the ability to discern a true from a false logos, requires knowledge. But this knowledge is not itself a justified true belief.

Well, there are issues here. It's just that the discussion in Theaetetus is not of much help. — Banno

It's nice that people quote Plato in this context, but the Theaetetus really is no help at all. It doesn't even really represent what Plato would like to say about it.

In the Theaetetus, Plato raises the question how we distinguish knowledge from belief by means of an analogy, supposing an aviary in which various birds of knowledge and of false belief are flying about. How are we to tell the difference? That's a real question, even if the metaphor is flaky. He also raises the problem in the Meno, and resolves it by appeal to reincarnation.

In the Theaetetus the discussion of knowledge moves smoothly through belief and truth. When he reaches the final point, he does use the word logos. This is usually translated "word", but extends more widely than that to include "story" and "account" but can mean "explanation" or even "justification". Socrates suggests that an account explains the elements of which something consists. Theaetetus accepts - (he has more or less given up by this point). Socrates then asks, innocently, how we can give an account of the elements; which sets off an infinite regress. So the Theaetetus is indeed no help.

What might be more help is the Gorgias. Plato there paints a picture of the captain of a ship, who does not have knowledge but a tribe (long "e"), which is usually translated "knack". I take a knack to be what one acquires through experience without training and without necessarily understanding why it works. If he is to have knowledge, he needs episteme, which is usually translated "understanding" and is derived from the same root as one of the Greek words for "know" epistemi. (Yes - epistemology) He has in mind, of course, the understanding of a philosopher and I'm sure this is much closer to something he would accept. It is not much help to philosophers, but is a lot more help than the Theaetetus.

We distinguish between true and false accounts by means of of intellectual skills. Which are not beliefs, so the regress is ended.

Sorry if this is a long way to a short story, but I have been looking at mentions of the Theaetetus and swearing to myself for a long time and I couldn't resist telling the story that is always left out.

Philosophers put themselves in the position of the conjuror revealing where the queen really is after taking the sap's money. — unenlightened

It's perfectly true that examples are, inevitably, constructed or selected - usually to prove a point. Al and Betty are no exception, even though this one presents itself as asking a question. The author of this one is not simply asking a question, however, but taking the reader through a process. As each complication is revealed, the doubt whether Al knows increases, and finally, the comparison with Betty puts Al in a new light because we see an inconsistency between our assessment of Al and our assessment of Betty. So the moral of the story (and presumably of the author) is that we change our assessment of these matters, not only on the basis of facts about Al, but also because of the context we see them in.

As to the question whether Al knows, and indeed, whether Betty knows until the car disappears, I wonder whether we should resist being pressured to make a decision. After all, the situation for both of them is perfectly clear. They have parked their cars and assume that they are safe and will be safe until they return. This is a perfectly rational assumption. Millions of people do the same thing every day and find their cars safe. But the story is not yet finished, so although we could grant that their car is safe while it is safe, we should hold off deciding whether either of them knows their car is safe and certainly whether it will be safe and sound on their return. Then, we make different decisions, because different decisions are appropriate, but their is no inconsistency because we didn't make a decision earlier.

Perhaps in some way this isn't a legitimate move in philosophy. Nevertheless, I think it is rational.

Philosophy is like..... — Banno

:up:

..... supposing themselves to have the answers — Banno

:up: There are two things about philosophy that are not quite polite to mention. But they are important, nonetheless. Answers are not the point, and in fact are the death of philosophy. Similarly, agreement about the answers are welcome as an episode, but disagreement is what keeps us going.

It's just preferable to argue about the meaning of "gavagai" on a full belly. That's pretty much the reason i decided not to pursue academia. — Banno

I agree about the full belly. However, having started another career which would have provided considerable comfort as well as a full belly, I had to put up with feeling like a fish out of water. In the end, I decided that a full belly had too high a price and started postgraduate work to put off making another choice between unappetising options and see how it went. Somewhat to my surprise, in the end, I got a job.

I see from later comments that others had experiences similar to mine. I compromised, because what I was doing was better than any alternative that I could think of and it kept my belly (and my family's belly) full, though holidays tended to be on the cheap. Perhaps I was just hooked on philosophy. But it was all a severe disappointment; I started with idealistic ideas about philosophy being available to everyone and working closely with other subjects. Some of that has happened, but a great deal of it has not. My Department no longer exists, in spite of trying hard to adapt to the changes; the University decided it could not afford any luxuries. We did try arguing that philosophy was not a luxury, but no dice.

Folk think philosophy easy, a topic for dabbling dilettanti. — Banno

Yes. But. I knew some quite annoying professionals. In any case, philosophy, like sport and classical music benefits from a lively fan base and surely should be available to as many people as possible.

The truth is, that although I have some regrets, I don't regret my career. What surprised me most was that when I retired, I had had enough and I turned my back on philosophy for some years. But gradually I found myself drifting back to it, and now here I am - obsessed with it again and much happier for it.

It doesn't matter if "gavagai" is a rabbit or an undetached rabbit leg. What counts is making the stew. — Banno

How very pragmatic of you. :smile:

What this high-lights is that we rely on a whole heap of assumptions in deciding what is true, or may be true, or isn’t true. But when we are reminded of them, we pause and question them and this can change our minds. Gathering evidence for all of them is impractical, so it is hard to see that this can be avoided. One might draw two conclusions from this.

1. There is an element of luck in all our knowledge claims, which makes it more difficult to distinguish lucky guesses, which most people would classify as not knowledge, from knowledge. To be honest, I’m not sure what to say about this.

2. Knowledge can be fallible. Or rather, it is obvious that knowledge claims are fallible. The question is whether a knowledge claim that fails because it is wrong is still to be classified as knowledge or whether it should be re-classified as belief, (until and unless an infallible, conclusive claim is established). It may be that this is just a linguistic question and doesn’t really matter. But if one accepts that knowledge (as opposed to a claim to knowledge) is fallible, I don’t see what distinguishes it from belief, so I’m inclined to the latter option.

This case is is too simple to do more than start considering the problem. We should consider a variety of cases. For example, consider another risk that Al has not taken into account, that his car may be smashed by a falling meteorite. Does that mean he doesn’t know about his car? Again, suppose Al’s car has a sun-roof. Rain is not certain, but has been forecast. Does Al know his car is safe?

Each of these cases is different. Do the differences make any difference? I’m not sure, but we should consider whether the question “Does s/he know?” is appropriate in the sense that it can really be answered.

Vogel seems to think that there's a difference between Al's and Betty's epistemic circumstances. — Agent Smith

The problem is set by the similarity between the two, which suggests that their epistemic classification should be the same, and the difference in their circumstances (i.e. the fact that Betty’s car has been stolen), which strongly suggests that it is different. So the fact that Betty’s car has been stolen makes me classify her as believing and rather than knowing. Conclusion – knowledge is not just about the psychological state of the knower. Hence, for example, how confident they each are is irrelevant.

So, on the ground, as a person in the world of those scenarios, I wouldn't consider having said one or both of them knew where there car was as some big error should it turn out that the car is not there. Because when I say 'know' it doesn't mean 'cannot possibly be revised stuff'. — Bylaw

It is certainly true that philosophers often get very dogmatic, especially about knowledge. I deduce that you would say that both of them know, except that Al’s knowledge is correct (so far) and Betty’s knowledge is not correct and hence should be revised. I think that does reflect how we actually use the word. When she finds out her car has been stolen, she will know that. Would that be a fair summary?

May I ask what would you say to this possible outcome? Her car is stolen but only for a joy ride, and the thief, being cautious, took the trouble to return her car to its place and managed to do so before she came back to retrieve it. So she never knew her car was stolen and believed it had been safely parked all the time.

But knowledge about the world is never infallible. What we hold to as something known can change over time. — Fooloso4

You’re right. The parallel universe is a bit over the top. I based this on Jennifer Nagel’s version of it (I couldn’t find the original). You’re also right that we only know what the example chooses to tell us, and that is usually very limited, which can be frustrating.

Surely, we can sometimes be conclusively right. For example, one could say that Al and Betty both have fallible knowledge. But then, when they get back to the cars and drive back home, they will know conclusively, won’t they?

The situation would change if the crime rate was so high that it was reasonable to expect that one's car would be stolen, in which case one would presumably take extra precautions, or expect trouble. — unenlightened

The situation would change if the crime rate was so high that it was reasonable to expect that one's car would be stolen, in which case one would presumably take extra precautions, or expect trouble.
Your point that Al has no justification for believing that his car has been stolen is a good one. Until she discovers that her car has been stolen, the same is true of Betty, of course. That’s a key problem, of course. Justification can be less than conclusive.

An induction based on logic, reason, and memory, but an induction none-the less. — Philosophim

Quite right. I’m not sure whether you think that induction can never result in knowledge because it is always uncertain or not. Certainly, in this case, it is an induction that can be replaced by certainty – when they get back. Though actually, I would say that unless one embraces full-blown scepticism, induction can also justify certainty. What is less clear is when we reach that point. I suspect that philosophers would be much less optimistic than everyday people.

Pretty soon you'll get to the Gettier problem. — T Clark

That's unlikely. I've been there and done that. But epistemology is perhaps in an impoverished state because all the big questions have been spun off into distinct philosophical fields. If you're not interested, that's fair enough.



I have to say, the only alternative to the JTB that I've come across is the "knowledge first" idea. That might have something so recommend it, but I haven't caught up with it yet.

I've posted a starting-point with the title "Vogel's paradox of knowledge"

It seems that there is something of a consensus here.

In On Certainty Wittgenstein addresses examines claims about such things as knowledge and certainty. — Fooloso4

What I was getting at it that Wittgenstein doesn't say "Here is scepticism. This is my solution." in the way that Descartes, Berkeley, Hume &c. &c. He seldom does that. I think there are reasons, even good reasons for that. It doesn't mean that I think that nothing that he says is relevant to scepticism and intended to be relevant to it.

What I make of the itch and scratch metaphor is that what progress means can be different in different contexts. My point was that the despair about progress in philosophy depends on a particular definition of what progress is and that definition does not apply in a lot of other cases - including, of course, scratching an itch.

Is there a Philosophical Investigations, or are there only un-detached Philosophical Investigationsparts? — Banno

I'm not sure I want to answer that question. I think the point is that the themes in the Investigations are linked and interwoven. That's one of the strengths of his writing.

This does not mean that there is or ever will be an interpretation without problems. — Fooloso4

In addition to the different practices you mention, there is also the point that interpretations will vary to work in different contexts - which will include questions and interest that the author could not have had in mind.

Thanks. I'll check it out.

What Kripke fails to see is that by denying just such a fact Wittgenstein is not agreeing with the skeptic, but rather calling into question the very assumption that there is such a fact. — Fooloso4

My memory may be fallible, but I'm not sure W directly confronts the sceptic. He certainly thinks that many of the philosophical questions that he does address contain mistakes and he certainly does philosophy in a unique way.

Hacker, in his categorial framework, mentions with approval the idea that philosophy is conceptual, or rather grammatical, in an extended sense of the word. That's helpful in some ways, but still gives a purchase to the idea the philosophy should make progress.

My suggestion to understand this is to look more widely at the intellectual and cultural world that we live in. There are many disciplines that can be said to change and develop, but are misunderstood if one supposes that they should or could progress. It seems to me that the Arts, by which I mean music painting dance drama stories etc. are all like this; the obvious explanation is that they have no goal or purpose, because they are done for their own sake. They are done in their cultural and historical traditions, but add to them rather than superseding them. Mathematics, it seems to me, is like them in that respect - it adds to its traditions without superseding them. It is true, of course, that mathematics often turns out to be useful, but I can't accept that that is its point. Science seems more like an outlier in that it seems to have a goal, though I'm not absolutely sure that is the whole story. In this context, our question becomes how philosophy fits in to this collection of activities. It's probably best to think of them as a family united and divided by family resemblances.

I have thought about this. I would like to start a new discussion for it. If we start what I have in mind on this thread, things will get confusing for me and probably anyone else who joins it.

Is that OK with you?

However you want to tackle it, Gettier in his criticism of a base JTB theory of knowledge is unquestionably correct. — Philosophim

So what is your solution?

Although Alien has terrified me, I generally favor bold exploration into new territory, hazards notwithstanding. — ucarr

I've no problem with exploration. But I'm also cautious enough to find about as much as I can about what I'm getting into, and a clear idea of what I'm going to get out of it.

I saw "Alien" and one of the sequels. Not they're talking about "Alien %". It's turned into a franchise. I'm not a fan of horror movies. I just don't enjoy being scared.

We seem to have two quite distinct threads running through this thread. Never mind.

I get quite worried about Wittgenstein's hints that there are things hidden in the Investigations. He does the same thing in the Tractatus in that he says that we cannot speak about the really important things. But at least I understand why. It's less obvious what is going on in these bits of the Investigations.

But then I remember that I'm rarely satisfied with anything I write for longer than about five minutes and if I worry about misinterpretations I get absolutely paralyzed. If Wittgenstein felt the same way, I can understand that.

One has to accept that text (or speech) is never all that we would like it to be. Communication is always subject to noise and distortion - there's no way of escaping from that. One does one's best and that's all there is.

OK. But it will take me a while to get things together.

Thanks for that link. It's nearly as good as Christmas. But I was thinking that perhaps it was time I read it again, so it is well timed.

Hah! I may be somewhat up to date about Gettier. About nearly everything else, I'm hopelessly out of date and scrambling to catch up. Although many things have not changed much.

[reply="ucarr;779591"

Oh, I think that all of those ways of coping are flawed.

I'm often reminded of the painting "Landscape with fall of Icarus". It seems brutal, but somehow necesary.

Oops! We seem to have a crossed wire. I don't think that Gettier found a major flaw in theory of knowledge, but I did get interested in how Gettier created the illusion that he had. It did worry me that our discussion was turning me into a defender of Gettier. But my aim was only to make sure that the flaws were correctly identified.

I concluded that weaknesses in the propositional calculus and the vagueness in the J clause, coupled with a reluctance to acknowledge the possibility of borderline or ambiguous cases were the main issues. I don't think they can be remedied within the requirements of Gettier's idea of philosophy. But then I discovered a major difficulty.

Refuting the cases one-by-one seemed futile, because new cases kept coming along, designed to get round the problems revealed in the old ones. (So, for example, after Gettier's original article, there are no new cases that use definite descriptions (case 1) and no new cases that use "or" (case 2). By implication, his supporters accepted they are flawed.

But the appearance of new cases suggested that there must be a general solution. However, the proposed cases morphed. In the process a problem was thrown up that I couldn't and can't fully resolve. These can be classified (I found this in a blog by Jennifer Nagel) as the "Harman-Vogel" paradox. They turn on false assumptions or unconsidered assumptions or the lottery paradox. Russell has no problem with it - if a claim to knowledge relies on a false assumption - it is unjustified and so merely a belief. But we make so many assumptions so it would seem that knowledge is a rare and precious commodity. My suggestion of considering the JTB as a paradigm rather than a definition was one attempt. My insistence that if a claim to knowledge turns out to be false, for any reason, it isn't knowledge and the claim is false is another.

At that point, I was distracted by other (philosophical) problems. However, it turned out that not everyone agreed with me about Gettier, so I got involved in this discussion. I have learnt some things through it. But I'm beginning to get itchy feet - a desire to think about other things for a while.

If we follow up that problem, it could well be considered off-topic and some forums are quite strict about that, so I'm cautious about doing so. In addition, I don't know whether I'm qualified to start a new discussion and not sure there would be interest in it.

Perhaps that was too much information, but you do seem to be asking where we go from here, and that's where the Gettier problem is leading me.

:smile: :up:

There's no doubt that coping with all the information available demands some sort of strategy or mechanism. Skepticism is not the only possibility. How about trivialization - reacting to information and then forgetting it quickly - which prevents ever really thinking about it? Or treating info as entertainment - infotainment as they call it? Or knowing all about what's going on the other side of the world, and ignoring what's going on your doorstep?

But perhaps I'm just getting old.

Back to philosophy. The question of adaptation to the changing environment reminds me that philosophy seems to worry about the definition of knowledge (and, by implication, Knowledge) without ever asking what the point might be. My suggestion would be that identifying and passing on information is a crucial part of forming and being in a society and a great advantage to all the individuals. In fact, it's so basic and so useful that animals and birds do it too - even posting sentries (meerkats) and ignoring cheats who sound the alarm so the others leave the food for the cheat (birds). That's what the concept of knowledge fosters.

Thank you for that collection.

Typical, isn't it? He mentions a metaphor and passes on, as if it was transparent. Then elsewhere, you find another metaphor from which he passes on. And another and another...

Yet they all seem to work together somehow.

I may have missed something - "surveyable representation" does not sound familiar - that's not a criticism - but "perspicuous representation" does. Is there a translation other than Anscombe's around?

Your distinction between Knowledge and knowledge reminds me also that what can be known depends on the conceptual framework within which it is known. How this affects the definition of knowledge needs thinking about. Epistemology as discussed in the literature doesn't seem to want to take it on.

I'm always inclined to notice the link between Knowledge and knowledge and notice that there is usually an answer to the question "Who knows this piece of Knowledge". Presumably, the idea is that Knowledge is what is available to everyone, but it usually means what is available to me and my circle. Your distinction seems to recognize that.

Your example is interesting. What I take from it is that knowledge is time-based and that there is a difference between what is the case and what someone knows. The interaction between the two is crucial to the Gettier problems, though it hasn't been discussed in what I've read.

I agree that our discussion is getting rather confused. Perhaps we've gone as far as we need to.

I agree with you that

Gettier "problems" are pseudoproblems — Agent Smith

.

Getter problems are all narratives in which different contexts - points of view - collide. I doubt if that could happen in a mathematical problem.

There’s a book or two to be found in these contributions. Forgive me if I don’t reply in detail.

For what it’s worth, I’m very taken with Wittgenstein’s remark that “a philosophical problem has the form ‘I don’t know my way about’”. That fits with his idea that what he is looking for is an “oversight” (Übersicht) which I take to mean something like a map. Perhaps when one has a starting-point and a map, one moves into another mode of thinking which is more like other disciplines. Unfortunately, the world we live in changes, confusion returns and so philosophy continues. It may not look like progress, but that doesn’t mean there is no point.

Some further observations:-

The priority given to “science” (which is usually taken to mean the ‘hard’ sciences) and mathematics is not universal in philosophy but is local to ‘analytic’ philosophy. There are plenty of other kinds of philosophy.

It seems to me that the most helpful characterization of philosophy is ‘reflection’; this doesn’t mean just anything that might be called reflection but means a disciplined reflection – disciplined by the examples of other philosophers. Too narrow a conception of philosophical method risks (and usually falls into) a narrow focus, which, I think, is almost always fatal, except, perhaps, as a temporary tactic.

The institutional environment for philosophy and other disciplines has been revolutionized in the last hundred years of so by the its institutional context. Unfortunately, the search for a definition of philosophy has too often been weaponized in pursuit of the inevitable struggles within academia, in which it is necessary for each discipline to stake out its own territory and claim on resources. Philosophy suffers if it is too closely confined in that way.

I’m not quite sure what the context is of your argument. But I do find that context is always important and it’s true that general epistemology, like what we’re doing here, doesn’t pay attention to the context of knowledge claims. However, I don’t think ordinary knowledge claims are in any way insured against surprises in the future.

The idea of scope is interesting. I’m not quite clear how it would apply to the everyday knowledge that epistemology usually discusses. One could suppose a general qualification along the lines of “so far as I/we know”. But I think knowledge expects all relevant considerations to have been taken into account and copes rather badly with unexpected developments.

Scientific theories are a somewhat different kettle of fish. It is true that they don’t always get thrown out when their limitations are revealed and can remain useful for specific purposes. But surely they can’t insure themselves against future developments? If they do, they are useless for making predictions and so pointless.

I can’t help feeling that there is a difference between Knowledge (“what is known”) – I would argue this is a variant of the concept - and people knowing things – I would argue that this is the basic use. I think of them as different contexts and what may be appropriate for one context may not be for the other. The kind of conditionality you are talking about may well be appropriate for Knowledge, but I don’t see any reason to think it is implicit in the ordinary one. But perhaps I’m just stuck in my ways.

In my book, they certainly are failed and attempts at knowledge, so that’s fine.

It is also true that my tipster believes that his horse will win. So that's my preferred classification.

One of the most interesting features of the modern world, to my mind, is the interpenetration of the great traditions of the world. Western science seems to travel better than Western philosophy. Buddhism has, and still is, very attractive to many people in the West, but also great interest in Confucius and Daoism. Islam, of course, is also very present. Hinduism less so. I don't anticipate some great confluence where all are absorbed into one, but there are certainly influences at work.

Beyond that, it's very difficult to say anything coherent about what's going on. It would be wonderful to be able to see what has happened in, say, 50 years time.

Unlike beliefs simpliciter, fallible knowledge has an accompanying justification. — Agent Smith

I disagree. Having a justification does not automatically promote a belief to knowledge. In particular, if the justification fails, we call the result a belief, because knowledge is only knowledge if it is true.

How do you classify "I knew that horse would win because the stars were aligned."? If the horse loses, it is clearly a belief. Yes? If the horse wins, would you classify it as knowledge? I think not. But we do not think the justification is valid.

How about "I knew that horse would win because the jockey told me it would"? Again, if the horse loses, it is clearly a belief. If it wins, the justification is plausible because you would think that the jockey might know what s/he is talking about. Is it fallible knowledge? Is it belief?

But the underlying question is, Why does it matter what we decide?

I did a Ph.D. in philosophy, taught philosophy at degree level for a long time, ended up in edmin (education administration), and finally jumped into retirement before I was pushed. I don't know whether I count as a professional philosopher or an academic philosopher or both.

I'm a bit hesitant about "coming out" because I found academic philosophy tends to reduce itself to a dance around a small number of doctrines with very little illumination at the end of it. Not knowing the background of members encourages an open mind. So I value the anonymity that this environment provides. Though I suppose I had better update my profile now.

The relationship between philosophy and other disciplines has been fraught for as long as I've been involved. People in other disciplines are seldom comfortable with interventions from philosophy; I think they think that they are best qualified to pronounce on anything to do with "their subject" and it seems reasonable to expect that a philosopher knows something about it before pronouncing on it. Some philosophers seem to manage it. Moreover "I don't know anything about *** but ..." is not a good starting-point for a discussion with a specialist. On the other hand, it seems reasonable (and even inescapable) that people outside the specialist walls, including philosophers, will have opinions about *** and should not be prevented from discussing it and making sense of it in their own way.

Philosophy struggles to define its own field and methodology. This presupposes that the model of other disciplines, like mathematics and science. But that model doesn't necessarily apply There is a version of the history of philosophy that identifies it as the chaotic starting-point of all other disciplines, which have spun off from it as they have developed through the chaotic discussions of philosophers.

Philosophy is not unlike mathematics or science in some ways. But it is also like disciplines such as Literature or History, and like them, a small number of texts function as canonical. These texts open the field of philosophical discussion and show what it is like; they also provide common reference points for discussion as well as a mine of philosophical mistakes - and since there are so few philosophical successes, the mistakes are all the help we are going to get. I have even heard it said that in philosophy, getting it right is less important than being wrong in interesting ways.