Hey Sam! Good to see you. Hope this finds you well.

As you may remember, pre-linguistic beliefs are pivotal to my own position. It seems that we agree regarding the problems 'seeing' these beliefs. I also agree that non linguistic beliefs are causal in the sense that one acts upon them.

I think that the largest hurdle we have in front of us is overcoming the limits that conventional notions of belief impose upon us. It is common, perhaps most common, to hold that beliefs are propositional attitudes. Of course, that notion has significant difficulty straddling the divide between prelinguistic belief and linguistic. I mean, it doesn't make much sense to say that a language less creature has an attitude towards a proposition, or has belief that consists of such a thing.

The content of belief is important here, it seems to me. If belief is prior to language, then it exists in it's entirety before our awareness of it. Keeping this in mind as a guiding principle will better serve us to help discriminate between the sorts of things that such foundational belief can consist of, and that which is just simply cannot.

What do you think of this approach?

What does language have to do with knowledge and our sense of reality and being part of the spirit/earth or separate from it? — Athena

That's an excellent question actually. There's much to be said about it.

I think I can, I think I can, I think I can...



So, what do you think of my approach to Gettier here... the distinction between the inference(by entailment) as a proposition, and the inference(by entailment) as Smith's belief? Do you agree that those have different truth conditions, and thus meaning? Do you find the point about the rigid designator cogent?

Seems undeniable to me.

You seem to think you have a stunningly good point — Bartricks

I don't think... I know.

:kiss:

Now, if a belief can be useful yet not true, then we know - or those of us who have powers of reason can know - that truth and usefulness denote different properties
— Bartricks

That's true, if one holds that truth and usefulness count as properties then the terms "truth" and "usefulness" are used as a means to denote different properties.

Not all powers of reason lead to that...

Just saying, it seems you're overstating the case you have. — creativesoul

No, it is just true. You can 'hold' whatever you want, that isn't going to make usefulness and truth denote the same property. — Bartricks

You certainly believe that it's true, Who said anything about making usefulness and truth denote the same property?

Arguing with your own imagination.

Some hold that truth is a property. Others do not. There are other frameworks following Reason that truth is a sort of agreement between thought and belief about what's happened and/or is happening and what's happened and/or is happening.

We find the same agreement between thought and belief about the way things are and the way things are; between thought and belief about the case at hand, and the case at hand; thought and belief about the world and/or ourselves, and the world and/or ourselves, etc.

magine that Smith has justified beliefs that Jones will get the job and that Jones has 10 coins in his pocket. Now imagine that prior to the interview someone pickpockets Jones and steals the 10 coins. Then imagine that, by pure fluke, just after the pickpocketing incident, Jones finds 10 coins in the street and puts them in his pocket. Then Jones gets the job. — Bartricks

Looks fine by me. Jones got the job. JTB.

What's the pickpocket bit aside from a red herring? The part about how many coins Jones has in his pocket at the time of his interviewing and getting hired is not justified to begin with. I mean, who in their right mind would think that one was justified in believing that the quantity of coins in one's pocket would remain the same over that timeframe?

So...

Meh.

Like I said, I'm not granting the justification aspect out of hand.

Gettier got the belief aspect wrong, and you've gotten the justification aspect wrong, in this example anyway. Got another one?

Manners, matey - get some. — Bartricks

Pots and kettles.

...for any proposition P, if S is justified in
believing P, and P entails Q, and S deduces Q from P and accepts Q as a result
of this deduction, then S is justified in believing Q.

There's your format.

Quid pro quo...

I'll look if you answer the simple questions I ask.

Well, I've already looked, and this...

Imagine that Smith has justified beliefs that Jones will get the job and that Jones has 10 coins in his pocket. Now imagine that prior to the interview someone pickpockets Jones and steals the 10 coins. Then imagine that, by pure fluke, just after the pickpocketing incident, Jones finds 10 coins in the street and puts them in his pocket. Then Jones gets the job. — Bartricks

I'm not granting the justification out of hand.

Argue for it, and I'll look again. What belief is justified to start with, and which belief is rightfully inferred from that(by the rules of entailment) that amounts to JTB, but not knowledge.

Spell it out.

You seem to think you have a stunningly good point - that Smith's belief about the occupier of the roles trouser content rigidly designates Jones.

a) it doesn't — Bartricks

Really?

Are you saying that Smith does not believe that Jones is the person with ten coins in his pocket?

Are you saying that Smith does not believe that Jones is the person who will get the job?

Are you saying that Smith believes someone other than Jones will get the job?

:brow:

you're just plain wrong. — Bartricks

Blather...

You've not offered a valid objection to what I've offered. Hand waving won't cut it. Bald assertions won't do either.

Have some bloody manners and read them. — Bartricks

Pots and kettles.

No.

You need to deal with this properly first. I love these problems. I'd be more than happy to discuss your own barn facades or whatever other Gettier style example you'd like to provide. After you deal with what I've put forth here...

Easy question.

Since Smith believes that Jones will get the job, and since Smith believes that Jones is the person with ten coins in his pocket...

Who... exactly... is Smith thinking about, who is Smith's belief about, when he infers 'the person with ten coins in his pocket will get the job"?

Who?

:brow:

Have the decency to read my example. I — Bartricks

Likewise. Have the decency to at least offer valid objection to what I've offered here tonight.

I have not carefully read your examples. Let's stick to Gettier, for now. Resolve that first. Then we can move on.

Now Smith believes that the person who gets the job has 10 coins in his pocket. And it turns out that the belief is true. — Bartricks

If that person is anyone other than Jones, IT IS NOT Smith's belief. That's the accounting malpractice.

It's a conflation between "the man with ten coins in his pocket" when examined as an inferred proposition(which is what Gettier mistakenly does), and "the man with ten coins in his pocket" when examined as Smith's inference from his own belief.

They are not the same thing. They do not have the same truth conditions. Therefore, they do not have the same meaning. That much is clear. In Smith's belief "the person..." refers to Jones, and only Jones. When regarding a general proposition, "the person" could refer to anyone and everyone who has ten coins in his pocket and gets the job.

We're taking account of Smith's belief.

Salva veritate.

As I said, what's core to a Gettier example is that a person forms a belief in an epistemically responsible fashion, and the belief is true... — Bartricks

Smith's belief is that Jones is the man with ten coins in his pocket who will get the job. That belief is false. No problem for JTB.

The relevant belief is... ..."the person who will get the job has 10 coins in his pocket". — Bartricks

Yes!

Bullseye!!!

Whose belief is it, and who precisely does it refer to?

Who is it about?

Who is the referent of "the person with ten coins in his pocket"?

Not Smith.

It's Smith's belief and it's all about Jones.

Therefore, it's false, and again poses no problem for JTB.

I suggest you re-read what I've written tonight.

Which makes it all the sadder that you don't understand them. — Bartricks

:wink:

Yeah, that's it...

:kiss:

That's it?? — Bartricks

Yup. That's it. Simple. Common sense. Eloquent. Easy to understand. What more could you ask?

He believes 'the person who will get the job has ten coins in his pocket". — Bartricks

That's the sleight of hand my good man... As I've explained several times heretofore. The rules of entailment permit a change in the truth conditions and meaning of Smith's belief. It does not have to be that way though. We do not have to conflate belief and propositions, which is what Gettier has done, and neglected the details of Smith's belief in the process. He did the same thing in Case II.

We're taking account of Smith's belief here. "The person" refers to Jones. "The person" does not refer to Smith. Smith does not believe that anyone other than Jones will get the job. Gettier needs him to. He doesn't. He can't.

Gettier needs "the person with ten coins in his pocket" to refer to Smith. It doesn't, not in Smith's belief anyway. That's the conflation between the truth conditions of that inference as proposition and the truth conditions of that inference as Smith's belief. They are not one in the same thing.

It's Smith's belief about Jones, and it's false. Therefore, not a problem for JTB.

QED

Read the article and then read some commentaries on it. — Bartricks

Oh, believe me... I've studied it very carefully. It's just been a while, and it's not the only thing going on in my life....

:wink:

Hold your horses... Jeez. Don't be such a dick. You give me two minutes to refute Gettier? I had to revisit the paper, just to make sure I was not involved in an accounting malpractice. Two minutes to do what you said cannot be done? That's a bit unreasonable a timeframe, dontcha think?. No worries, my good man. Thing is, I can do it on the fly, because I know the underlying issues by heart. Took me seven minutes.

:razz:

Smith believes Jones will get the job. He knows Jones has ten coins in his pocket. He infers that the man with ten coins in his pocket will get the job.

Here's the rub...

Smith's belief - and hence his inference is about Jones, not anyone else. Someone other than Jones gets the job. Smith's belief is false. The referent of "the man with ten coins in his pocket" is Jones... not Smith.

That's the accounting malpractice.

It's a conflation of proposition and belief.

To overcome them you'd need to specify a mechanism of belief acquisition that did not guarantee the truth of the beliefs it leads to, yet is immune to Gettier-style refutation — Bartricks

That's not true. I've overcome them(it's a refutation as best I can tell) by virtue of showing how Smith does not believe what Gettier needs Smith to believe. It's common sense. I'm more than happy to explain it, if you're willing to listen.

I mean, how the hell does this:

Smith believed Jones would get the job, and no one else.
— creativesoul

refute them?!? — Bartricks

Calm down. I'll show you.

First...

Smith believes Jones will get the job. We agree here, right?

Smith believed Jones would get the job, and no one else. — creativesoul

That's the refutation of Gettier Case I in a nutshell. Do you understand that?

They're called 'fake barn' cases. — Bartricks

Yeah, I've heard of 'em. Those are easy to refute as well.

Argh! My apologies. You're right. I forgot details. No matter though, if my understanding of the accounting malpractice is right, and it is....

:yikes:

Let's look at Case I...

CASE I
Suppose that Smith and Jones have applied for a certain job. And suppose that
Smith has strong evidence for the fol1owing conjunctive proposition:
(d) Jones is the man who will get the job, and Jones has ten coins in his
pocket.
Smith's evidence for (d) might be that the president of the company assured him
that Jones would in the end be selected, and that he, Smith, had counted the
coins in Jones's pocket ten minutes ago. Proposition (d) entails:
(e) The man who will get the job has ten coins in his pocket.
Let us suppose that Smith sees the entailment from (d) to (e), and accepts (e)
on the grounds of (d), for which he has strong evidence. In this case, Smith is
clearly justified in believing that (e) is true.
But imagine, further, that unknown to Smith, he himself, not Jones, will get the
job. And, also, unknown to Smith, he himself has ten coins in his pocket.
Proposition (e) is then true, though proposition (d), from which Smith inferred
(e), is false. In our example, then, all of the following are true: (i) (e) is
true, (ii) Smith believes that (e) is true, and (iii) Smith is justified in
believing that (e) is true. But it is equally clear that Smith does not KNOW
that (e) is true; for (e) is true in virtue of the number of coins in Smith's
pocket, while Smith does not know how many coins are in Smith's pocket, and
bases his belief in (e) on a count of the coins in Jones's pocket, whom he
falsely believes to be the man who will get the job.

So, originally(without revisiting the paper) I had thought that the referent of "the man with ten coins in his pocket" needed to be Smith. I was mistaken about that. It needs to be Jones, because - as you've noted - that is who Smith believes will get the job...

There... humble pie and all. My mistake... but an insignificant one. My charge of accounting malpractice still hold good. The rules of entailment permit a change in both meaning and truth conditions. Case I shows this nicely.

Smith believed Jones would get the job, and no one else. Gettier needs Smith to believe someone other than Jones will get the job in order for his belief to be true, but he doesn't.

What Gettier does show is that the rules of entailment are not logical for they do not preserve truth.

OMg - you really don't understand Gettier cases. No, in the original case Smith believes that Jones - Jones - will get the job — Bartricks

Alright, that's enough. You do not know what you're talking about. I suggest you peruse the paper.

By the way - the example I gave in which the person, by fluke, looks at the one working clock in a town in which every clock bar one has stopped.....does that remind you of a case? — Bartricks

We can go through that one if you like... Gettier's been solved, whether you realized it not.

In Case I, the bit about 'the man with ten coins in his pocket' is the problem my good man... it's arrived at via entailment, which as I've already stated once, is not a problem as long as the referent of 'the man with ten coins in his pocket' is Smith himself.

Do you understand that? Do you follow me here, so far?

So, Smith believes Jones will get the job — Bartricks

Try again...

Smith believes that he - Smith - will get the job. His belief is well grounded(justified). It's also false.

That's not a problem for well grounded true belief. Invalid inference is not well grounded. You seem to be a bit confused.
— creativesoul

Er, I think you're the confused one. You don't seem to understand how Gettier cases work, or have any stable notion of what a 'well grounded' belief is.

Gettier style cases can be constructed for any mechanism of belief acquisition that does not guarantee the truth of the belief.

Here's why. A belief can be justified, or well-grounded, or warranted, or whatever, yet false. — Bartricks

I'm going to attempt to get you to understand something... one more time...

If a belief is justified(well-grounded) and false, then it poses no issue whatsoever for justified true belief. False beliefs are irrelevant.

A claim need not be believed in order to be exist.
— creativesoul
But this was my point. There is a world of difference between a belief upon which you would stake your life, and one that you just cook up. — Pantagruel

We agree. That was never at issue. Whether or not all claims are believed by someone... that was at issue.

The one you cook up really doesn't qualify as a belief at all, it is just an arbitrary statement.

Correct. It's a meaningful claim that no one believes. That proves the point that there are such things.

The universe was created by my imaginary friend, the invisible pink and black unicorn.
— creativesoul
And do you genuinely believe that? — Pantagruel

Of course not, but that is the very point. A claim need not be believed in order to exist.

It seems to me that if you are saying "This sentence is false" isn't either true or false, then the reason it isn't true or false is because it doesn't actually refer to anything. — Harry Hindu

There is nothing that can make it true/false. That's the reason that it is neither. It doesn't have what it takes in order to be either.

So contradictions and sentences without any clear reference, are meaningless — Harry Hindu

Contradictions are not meaningless. Rather, contradiction requires a plurality of meaningful statements.

A claim has to be believed by someone to exist. — ovdtogt

The universe was created by my imaginary friend, the invisible pink and black unicorn.

As for being well-grounded - well, I refuted that view. That view is refuted by cases in which someone's belief is based on another true belief, but fails to qualify as knowledge. — Bartricks

Invalid inferences can be based upon true belief. They are not knowledge.

So what?

That's not a problem for well grounded true belief. Invalid inference is not well grounded. You seem to be a bit confused.

Truth value is not equivalent to truth.

That would mean things can be true but have no truth value or vice versa. — TheMadFool

Correct.

Having truth value is the result of following the rules of correct inference.

6. (is truth & ~has truth value) or (has truth value & ~is truth)

Can you give me an example for the first disjunct of line 6 - a truth that doesn't have a truth value. — TheMadFool

I do not subscribe to the idea of "a" truth.

The easiest explanation I have to offer is simple. All true belief requires truth. Some true belief is prior to language use. Truth value is what we attribute to that which is said to have followed the rules of correct inference. The rules of correct inference consist of language use. That which consists of something else is existentially dependent upon that something else. The rules of correct inference are existentially dependent upon language use. Truth value is existentially dependent upon language use. Some true belief is not.

Either true belief can exist without truth or truth value is not equivalent(adequate for is probably better) to truth.


To the other...

A completely coherent argument is said to have logically true(valid) conclusions. That is to be given truth value. A coherent argument can have false conclusions, and/or false premisses unbeknownst to the language user. Hence, there are times when truth value is mistakenly assigned to falsehood even though the rules of correct inference are being followed. Truth cannot be false. That which is given a truth value can.