Is knowing a mental event?

[kennethamy]

Originally Posted by Emil

It seems clear to me that Smith is e-justified in believing (0).

And also that (O) is true. Let's not forget that.

[Emil]

Originally Posted by kennethamy

And also that (O) is true. Let's not forget that.

Yes.

(It is (0) with a zero not (O) with a capital O letter.)

[kennethamy]

Originally Posted by Emil

Yes.

(It is (0) with a zero not (O) with a capital O letter.)

Sorry. Yes, it is a counterexample because (0) is both justified and true. Remember, though, it is only a counterexample to the claim that JTB are sufficient conditions for knowing; not a counterexample to the claim that they are necessary conditions. Except for Gettier, objections are usually about the latter claim, not the former.

[ACB]

Originally Posted by Emil

And Smith is e-justified in believing (0). I don't understand why you think that he is not.

I will come back to this point, but first I would appreciate your view on a problem I am having about what constitutes knowledge.

Imagine I have a friend who lives in Paris. I believe, with strong justification, that he is currently in Paris (he has told me that he has important business there today). But, unknown to me, he has actually left Paris and gone on a visit to Switzerland. The question is this:

At what point did I cease to know he was in France?

Was it immediately he left Paris? Was it when he was approaching the Swiss border? Or was it not until he actually crossed the border? Would it make any difference if he did not plan to cross the border at all, but only decided to do so at the last moment? And if he then came back to Paris, would I know once more that he was in France (and Paris)? Would it make any difference how long he had stayed in Switzerland, and how long he had been back?

The more I think about it, the more it strikes me that "knowledge" is a vague term.

[Emil]

Originally Posted by ACB

I will come back to this point, but first I would appreciate your view on a problem I am having about what constitutes knowledge.

Imagine I have a friend who lives in Paris. I believe, with strong justification, that he is currently in Paris (he has told me that he has important business there today). But, unknown to me, he has actually left Paris and gone on a visit to Switzerland. The question is this:

At what point did I cease to know he was in France?

Was it immediately he left Paris? Was it when he was approaching the Swiss border? Or was it not until he actually crossed the border? Would it make any difference if he did not plan to cross the border at all, but only decided to do so at the last moment? And if he then came back to Paris, would I know once more that he was in France (and Paris)? Would it make any difference how long he had stayed in Switzerland, and how long he had been back?

The more I think about it, the more it strikes me that "knowledge" is a vague term.

Suppose that we simplify knowledge to JTB. It seems to me that none of your friend's actions changed whether you believed that he was in France.

Neither did his actions change whether you were justified in your belief. (Since I believe that justification is internal.)

The only thing that changes, thus, is the truth of whether he was in France or not. At moment he entered another country, he was no longer in France. That means that what you believed is false. (There are some time problems here with thought experiments.)

(There is a trap here. It is thinking that propositions can change truth values. I would derail the thread if I attempted to explain it here. It is also discussed in (Swartz and Bradley, 1979) (I very much like this book and it keeps being relevant to discussions here and so I will keep mentioning it.).)

"Knowledge" is perhaps not vague, but ambiguous. There are multiple meanings of "know".

You would probably benefit from reading this:
The Analysis of Knowledge (SEP)

[paulhanke]

Originally Posted by Emil

And Smith is e-justified in believing (0). I don't understand why you think that he is not.

... but if a theory of knowledge is to be consistent (i.e., avoid the Gettier counter-example), can any proposition that can fall prey to the counter-example be said to be e-justified? ...

[Emil]

Originally Posted by paulhanke

... but if a theory of knowledge is to be consistent (i.e., avoid the Gettier counter-example), can any proposition that can fall prey to the counter-example be said to be e-justified? ...

I don't understand the question.

[paulhanke]

... to rephrase: if you want a theory of knowledge that cannot classify the Gettier counter-example as knowledge, do you need to incorporate into e-justification a check for a proposition's susceptibility to the Gettier counter-example? ... in which case Smith would not be e-justified in believing (0) due to the fact that his generalization from (1) to (0) opens the possibility of (0) being incorrectly classified as knowledge ... (unfortunately, such a move might render the phrase "scientific knowledge" an oxymoron, as the scientific method is all about making generalizations!) ...

EDIT: on the other hand, these are different types of generalizations, the Gettier generalization being a generalization of identity (Jones -> The man) whereas scientific generalization is a generalization from individual to class (a sampling of individuals -> all individuals) ... so I think "scientific knowledge" is still safe even with such an addition

[Emil]

Originally Posted by paulhanke

... to rephrase: if you want a theory of knowledge that cannot classify the Gettier counter-example as knowledge, do you need to incorporate into e-justification a check for a proposition's susceptibility to the Gettier counter-example? ... in which case Smith would not be e-justified in believing (0) due to the fact that his generalization from (1) to (0) opens the possibility of (0) being incorrectly classified as knowledge ... (unfortunately, such a move might render the phrase "scientific knowledge" an oxymoron, as the scientific method is all about making generalizations!) ...

I have no clue what you are asking of me. And what's with the "..."'s?

[paulhanke]

Originally Posted by Emil

I have no clue what you are asking of me. And what's with the "..."'s?

... it seems to me that a theory of knowledge based upon JTB has been shown to be inconsistent by Gettier ... that is, Gettier demonstrates that according to the JTB theory of knowledge (0) can be classified both as knowledge and not knowledge ... it is knowledge because applying the JTB criteria to (0) succeeds; and it is not knowledge because applying the JTB criteria to (1) (from which (0) is derived) fails ... the question is with respect to turning a theory of knowledge based upon JTB into a consistent theory ... the ellipses simply reflect the way this stuff pops into my head ...