Talk:Epistemology

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The Caption...

218.101.17.149 03:38, 10 June 2006 (UTC)There are many ways of knowing and and epistomolgy is only one way. We can acquire knowledge through perception, introspection, emotion etc. Therefore if epistmology and knowledge were to be merged then all these would have to be covered in that merged section.218.101.17.149 03:38, 10 June 2006 (UTC)--218.101.17.149 03:38, 10 June 2006 (UTC)www.google.com/justify go to first listing--218.101.17.149 03:38, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

I'm very much against the Merger. Epistemology is a theory of knowledge, the philosophical study of how human beings could have knowledge, it's not one way in which people come to know things. The major reason I have against the merger is that epistemology is really studying a specific use of the term 'knowledge.' If you read the beginning of Lehrer's Theory of Knowledge, he talks in there about how epistemologists are really only interested in how it's possible to have knowledge in the sense of correct information, but what the philosopher is really analyzing is something much more than the mere possesion of information. Epistemologists aren't doing learning theory in psychology and attempting to show how people come to know things, they're trying to find the most logically possible way in which a subject could know something. --Brizimm 20:17, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

Inevitably, any small jokes placed into an article are removed. The diagram here is intended to show the relation between knowledge, belief and truth; it should also at least point to the problem of justification or warrant. This was done using the ellipsis, pointing out that there was more to the definition than is represented in the diagram. This strikes me as preferable, both stylistically and philosophically, to any longer literal construct. Opinions? Banno 21:57, 19 November 2005 (UTC)

Should the Venn diagram be altered so that "Knowledge" overlaps an area of "Belief" that is not part of "Truth"? Certainly there is such a thing as false knowledge.--Ratsobrut 23:15, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

• I'm torn about what to do here. Obviously, the existence of knowledge itself is a topic that's debated within Epistemology, so having a section defining "knowledge" in any way becomes a POV in that debate. Except in the rigid world of mathematics, the "True" part of JTB is something that always comes after-the-fact, ya know? "I believe the bridge is safe because of xyz" can be a justified belief, but doesn't really become "true" until you walk across the bridge. However, it's equally (if not even more) absurd to assume that because humans are capable of error, that they must inevitably be in error in all cases. That just denies the existence of knowledge, which plunges the proposer of that theory into the hopeless land of inconsistency -- as he professes a theory about knowledge which, in effect, says that no human can ever profess any theories about knowledge.

  Anyway, that's neither here nor there. The point is to write a good encyclopedia article that would present this topic and debate to a layperson, with sufficient links for the more advanced individual to dive into the subsections (such as Justification Theories and whatnot). I think the whole top section defining knowledge needs a rewrite with that in mind.

  As for the caption -- I see your point about the "and ...". However, I still maintain that it does not really look good in an article. I propose that the picture be reworked to include a "Justification" circle, and bear a title that says something like "Plato/Socrates definition of knowledge". Either that or rework the caption to explain the debate, as opposed to looking like an omission. Ex: All philosophers agree that knowledge must be true beliefs, but the necessity of further components (such as justification) is still debated). --Michael ^(talk) 06:56, 20 November 2005 (UTC)

Gettier and quality

I'd like to see this article become featured, but it's not very cohesive. I think that a big part of the problem is the over-representation of Gettier. While the Gettier problem is important in epistemology, I'm not sure that it has to be explained at length in three separate places (here, the Gettier article, and the Gettier problem article). Could we just trim it down? Alienus 21:39, 11 December 2005 (UTC)

I'm not sure what is meant by the term gettier. As I continue my look into knowledge i'd like to understand some more of the terminology and I haven't been able to find anything to explain a lot of these things. (The Mule 01:20, 27 February 2006 (UTC))

Edmund Gettier is a philosopher who came up with a way of challenging the traditional (back to Plato) idea that knowledge is justified true belief, which was widely accepted before he came along. His example showed that a belief could be a true and justified (to the believer) belief, but nevertheless was not knowledge. This is called the Gettier problem which dates to a short article published in the 1960s. Some philosophers disagree that it is a problem, or claim to have solved it, but for many it remains a problem. Perhaps the explanation of the Gettier problem could use a little clarification... from the example in the article Smith's belief that ‘a person with ten coins in his pocket will get the job’ is justified and true, but arrived at accidentally, and therefore should not constitute knowledge, according to Gettier. Let me know if that helped, or if it is still unclear. WhiteC 05:00, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

Gettier move

Moving Gettier to the definition section breaks the roughly historical sequence in the article. It also places it before the discussion of knowledge and belief, and so the criticism of JTB appears before some elementary theory is discussed. This considerably reduces the readability of the article. I will re-move it. Also re-insert biographical link. Banno 21:03, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

Hi, I've never entered into discussion about an article before, but here goes, this is why I think that my edits should be reinstated:

• The article isn't in historical order anyway and in any case all my edit did was move insert a description of Gettier cases at the first point they are mentioned. For example, the previous ordering had: Gettier, JS Mill, GE Moore...
• Surely all the material under Justification and Epistemological Theories should definitely go after a full discussion of Gettier cases?
• Gettier cases are the foundation of the modern debate about knowledge; they shouldn't be relegated to the end of the article.
• If you want to define 'belief' before the term is invoked, then it should be defined before the introduction of the theory of JTB. Which it isn't. In fact, since the common-sense definition people have of belief is sufficient for understanding both JTB and Gettier, I don't believe it matters. But I think a coherent solution should be proposed.
• The only interesting thing under the Knowledge and Belief heading is the reference to Moore's paradox which is marginal to the question, since very rarely does it obtain.
• I also believe that my edit added detail and was written in a clearer fashion - was, in fact, easier to read.
• Though my entry on Gettier was longer than the one before, it remains much shorter than the Gettier problem article.
• I removed the biographical link because Edmund Gettier was wiki-linked in the first line anyway, and a biographical article shouldn't be (and isn't) where information about his theory of knowledge is best situated. People are better off looking at the Gettier problem page.

I'd like too revert to my edit, and also move the Contemporary Approaches section upward - let me know what you think. Best, Breadandroses 21:45, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

You are right, the article is no longer in roughly historical order. I'll eat my words. So my case now becomes one of readability. The section on knowledge and belief is very elementary. It is also very important. The distinctions made in that section remove several misunderstandings that have previously plagued the article. The article will be read and edited by those who are unaware of the distinctions made in that section, often resulting in gobbledygook. Those with a background in philosophy might not see the point of that section, but remember that this is an article for the general reader. Remove it at our peril.

Now it seems to me obvious that such elementary material should come before the far more difficult material discussed in the Gettier section; that is, that the article should proceed from quite elementary discussion of knowledge, through the various historical theories, to the present discussion about Gettier. In that way, the reader will proceed from elementary material through material of increasing difficulty, and then the Gettier problem can be presented in its proper context.

But it is also important that the Gettier objection receive mention in the introduction - hence the brief mention.

In any case, the Gettier material should occupy only a brief section of the article. This is not an article on Contemporary epistemology, nor should the material at Gettier problem be re-produced here.

Take these comments into consideration; be aware that your changes affect the overall readability of the article, and be prepared to edit more of the article. But if you wish to revert to your version, I will not interfere, and will list this discussion with Wikipedia:WikiProject Philosophy, so that others might comment.

Welcome to the Wiki! Banno 23:17, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

Cheers Banno - well, I've reverted, and done a few more changes, such as add a note early on in the article to look at the section on belief (which I've slightly shortened), moved the a priori/posteriori section (which isn't really about definition of knowledge) and moved the contemporary approaches section up. I'd be interested to hear what people think. I'm not sure I've got the time for it, but I think a 'definition of knowledge' page might be an idea, as the Gettier Problem page is getting very long, and could lead into debates only marginally connected with that problem... for example, Timothy Williamson's approach. Breadandroses 11:30, 13 January 2006 (UTC)

OK. Perhaps you would like to do some editing on Knowledge? Banno 22:04, 13 January 2006 (UTC)

Interlanguage links

There is a big problem with the interlanguage links. In many languages (e.g. French and Spanish), the word epistemology (with slightly different spelling) doesn't mean epistemology, bur rather philosophy of science. I have now edited the French link, and deleted the Spanish one (couldn't find a Spanish article on this topic), but maybe other links also need to be edited. We need to work out, which articles in other languages are really equivalent to the English "Epistemology". Marcoscramer 15:23, 23 January 2006 (UTC)

I have now found the right Spanish article: es:Gnoseología. However, we should still check whether all the other links are right. Marcoscramer 22:06, 27 January 2006 (UTC)

The Norwegian link is OK. --Alvestrand 22:32, 27 January 2006 (UTC)

epistemological (as adjective)

I have a question: what is an "epistemological" something? The article explains what Epistemology is, but I'm having a rather hard time grasping the meaning of things like "epistemological confrontation" or "epistemological subject". What are those? --Eqvinox 19:00, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

An epistemological confrontation is a confrontation about the origin or scope of knowledge. An epistemological subject is a topic centrol to epistemology, so the Gettier problem is an epistemological subject. The Rod (☎ Smith) 21:36, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

epistemology and religious faith

Not very sure if this is the place to put a thought such as this but I am wondering if it would be able to produce some kind of section about the knowledge that is attributed to the respect and fear of God. As Proverb's 1:7 says "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and instruction." What then can we really accomplish if we are not within this realm of fear. Can it be possible to have any true understanding? Would epistemology be more "credible" if it were tied through fear of God, if it were then it would seem that it would be close to impossible to not find what we are looking for in the scope of knowledge. Hopefully we will be able to figure how to handle this kind of idea. (The Mule 01:16, 27 February 2006 (UTC))

Descartes is one of the most famous philosophers who tied knowledge of the world to God's existence, at the start of what is called modern philosophy (1600?). He starts by doubting everything, then says 'I think therefore I am', and later goes on to mention God, although several philosophers disagree with his reasoning even before he gets that far.

Your "credibility" would presuppose God's existence, and simply moves the question from "how do we know the world exists" to "how do we know that God exists?" and "how does this show us that the world exists?" WhiteC 18:45, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

I suggest, if you'd like to study Epistemology more in-depth, picking up books by Nicholas Wolterstorff and Alvin Plantinga. Also, Van Til. Perhaps there should be a section about these three somewhere in the main page.--NWalterstorf 21:26, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

Clean up

Article removed from Wikipedia:Good articles

This article was formerly listed as a good article, but was removed from the listing because although there is a lot of excellent content, references and external links should be in separate sections so that the sources used in writing the article can be identified. Also, 'see also' sections are generally not necessary - relevant links should be in the main text anyway. Worldtraveller 22:03, 25 February 2006 (UTC)

References & citations clean up

I just separated the references and external links section. I also cleaned them up and alphabetized them. They could use some more cleaning up though. The article also needs to cite the sources more and so on. There's a lot that could be done in the way of improvement. - Jaymay 00:35, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

The External links section is still pretty long. It seems to have a lot of links that would be better fit to be placed under sub-topics in epistemology. For example, there are a couple of links to thinks on Reformed epistemology. But, there's an article here on Reformed epistemology. Any objections to moving these kinds of links over to those more specific articles? - Jaymay 04:56, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

Epistemological theories

Suggestion: Cut down the descriptions under the "Epistemological theories" section to only couple of sentences or just links to the main articles. There are simply too many theories and many of them warrant their own articles. We can even merge the descriptions we have with existing articles or use them to create non-existing ones. Any objections? - Jaymay 06:55, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

Lack of belief in things that are true and justified?

I was wondering if anyone knew the term for this. It seems like an opposite of a belief, in that it is an actual justified truth, yet one is unable to believe it. I can't really class it under an opposite belief, because... is a lack of belief a belief? It may just be due to a lack of grasp or personal acceptance. Tyciol 03:57, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

Does the term "justified truth" make sense? Wouldn't that just be "actually the case" or just simply "truth"? After all, what is "justified" in JTB is the belief and not the truth... Ig0774 04:04, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

Yep. Justification refers to the belief. Namely, whether you're justified in believing something to be true. Alienus 04:31, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

Skepticism? I would say skepticism (in its many forms) is a part of epistemology. WhiteC 18:30, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

Skepticism is certainly an important part of epistemology, but I am not sure that even a skeptic can fail to believe something that is both true and (somehow) justified. What are they skeptical of? The truth of something that is true? This might be possible, but I tend to think that even a diehard skeptic would question something justifiably true. I might go for "stupidity", but that has some serious POV to it. I'm not sure there is a particularly neutral term for what Tyciol seems to be getting at...

Let us say for the sake of argument that there is something that is justified and true, but I don't believe it. Now the question arises: do I know that it is justified and true? If I do know that it is justified and true, my lack of belief probably qualifies as "faith in the absurd" (cf. Camus and Kierkegaard). On the other hand, if I do not know that it is justified and true, then my lack of belief seems to be on the same psychological level as my lack of belief in the Invisible Pink Unicorn (for all you true believers out there, no offense intended), which is to say it is psychologically "disbelief" and epistemologically probably best called "ignorance". Ig0774 23:59, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

It's possible to be convinced by some justification for the truth of a thing, yet still admit that there is the possibility that it's false. It's called fallibilism. Alienus 23:19, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

True, but the specific thing here seems to be something that is true and justified as true, at least as I understand the original point. Ig0774 23:59, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

This is a different approach, anyway. Usually I think of justification as referring to a belief. If something is (objectively) true, but I do not believe it is (probably) true in spite of what I think is a good justification for believing that it is true, then... this IS absurd. If the justification does not refer to the belief, then I would need to know what it does refer to. WhiteC 01:20, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

In the whole JTB thing, the word "justified" does refer to the belief. But on the other hand, "justification" can be understood independently of my beliefs (impersonal first person). That is to say, when I hear a justification for a particular point of view, I can either believe that it is a good justification or that it isn't a good justification. Now, the proffered justification may be a justification of someone else's beliefs, or it may be a justification of what someone might believe, even if no one actually believed it. All that is just to say that justification doesn't necessarily refer to my belief, but JTB, as I understand it, is primarily concerned only with the justified beliefs "I" have. Ig0774 19:26, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Hmm, the way I take the J in JTB is that it refers to their being sufficient evidence and argument to justify this belief over the alternatives. In other words, if I shared the justification with other rational people, they would likewise be compelled to believe. Alienus 19:36, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

I don't think what I said is necessarily in conflict with your definition, but by that account, not everything for which a "justification" can be offered would therefore be "justified". Ig0774 01:20, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Indeed. The fact that something is offered as a justification does not mean that it succeeds. For example, if I tell you that my justification for believing in the inherent superiority of women is that I'm a woman, you can probably understand my thinking just fine, and yet you would not consider it to be sufficient evidence and argument to compel a rational person (such as, presumably, yourself) to agree with me. In contrast, if I offered you a syllogistic proof that Socrates was a man, you would have to accept my conclusion as necessarily true, given the premises. Pardon the rather pat examples, but I think they're at least clear. Alienus 09:30, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Sorry, my terms were bad. What I mean is that you have formed an intellectual conclusion, agree that other people's beliefs are justified and probably true, yet are unable to accept them due to mental/emotional barriers or habits, like you do not incorporate the truth into your life. It's not really disbelief, yet it's as if you do not really believe it. Mental conditioning perhaps? Lack of connection with reality? All nice and descriptive but a single word would be much greater. Tyciol 08:23, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

"Irrationality" Alienus 09:30, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

I might go with "intellectual belief" as opposed to "belief". Ig0774 09:40, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Epistemology and gnoseology

Yes, yes, I know, there is no such distinction in English-speaking philosophy. In Italy, and apparently in several other European countries, what is called epistemology (what does on know, what is the nature of knoweldge,, justified true belief, warrant, reliabilism, etc) is called gnoseology (even among analytic-school philosophers and in the Universities). Epistemology proper, on other hand, deals with scientific knowledge and methods of achieving knowledge. Just an interesting fact that not many people are aware of.--Lacatosias 11:40, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

Interesting... you could list that as another meaning or refer to a separate gnoseology section I guess... Tyciol 02:40, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

No, actually I just noticed that this had already been discussed earlier. It's basically the same as in the Spanish case, I just linked this article to gnoseologia and linked philosophy of science to epistemologia. There does seem to be some very slight distinction between epistemologia, as intended in Italian, and philosophy of science, however. Once I get clear enough on exactly what the heck it is, then I can probably add some mention of this subtle distinction in one of the articles.--Lacatosias 09:06, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

You may base your research on the assumption that the etymological origin of sciences like epistemology and gnoseology is the same despite the language, for example English and French (where many words, especially relating to sciences, share common origins). However, phonems in words, by analogy, helps us to clarify (or create) meanings out of puns: for example in the french word "Épistémologie", you find the word "piste", which means "track", "trail" -which implies that there should be such puns in English. Although this is historically accidental, it creates analogies in the human mind which differ form culture to culture, especially in non-written ones, like Eastern societies. Here I assume that philosophy has a social value thus basis; perhaps two different philosophic branches could be complementary in the fact that their predominant quality is either theoretical or functional. --OllieTheKid 00:37, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

O.K. After some experimentation, I have arrived to the conclusion that puns don't bear the slightest philosophical value (my apologies to Freud fans, but I'm sure they'd understand). --OllieTheKid 22:56, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

Neologisms

Look, I cited one published source (Keith DeRose) and you deleted it. I will cite fifteen billison others if you give me a moment to lok them up. Why did you delete DeRose?? You ibviously know nothing whatver about philosophy, my friend!! What the hell is going on here?

--Lacatosias 09:46, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

You and I both had the article open for editing at the same time. Your citation had not appeared when I opened it to revert. That happens sometimes. Try to be civilized about it. Feel free to add it back if you like. --Nate Ladd 09:04, 12 March 2006 (UTC)

Is the Internet Encylopedia of Philosophy satisfactory...

HMMMMMMMMM???

Actually, no, it wouldn't be. It is not a peer-reviewed publication. But journal articles would be fine. --Nate Ladd 09:05, 12 March 2006 (UTC)

I meant does this help you to get the idea that the concepts are well-known even outside the mainstream philosophical community. They are not only commonly used and univerally recongnized terms among anyone with a serious philospherical education but they are also probably known even by the average man on the street!! But I've given you about fifteen journal references just in case. I'll give you thirty more later. The point is: you could have googled the term and found thousands of journal articles and books about the topic. It is central to morern epistemology. In fact, it may have surpassed in importance the old dicussions about justified true belief and Gettier cases. Ok, you're making me exagerrate now out of frustration. Ill find more links right now and add all of them!!--Lacatosias 09:20, 12 March 2006 (UTC)

I'm not exactly sure what this is about, but coming across it I had to say something: the IEP is peer-reviewed. Nathan's statement is false, unless by "peer-reviewed" he means that Putnam, Kripke, and the like review the articles.

De re-de dicto?

Frederick beleives that the sun will rise as midnight is true. Is there a problem with this sentence? Does it say "Frederick beleive that the sun.." is true OR "Frederick beleives that the sun... is true" is true? In order to clarify, I've reformulated this as "S beleives that it is true that the sun..." because I suspect that the de re reading was intended. --Lacatosias 19:44, 23 March 2006 (UTC)

Fredreick believes that the sun will rise at midnight is true says excatly the same thing as Frederick beleives that the sun will rise at midnight. The truth-predicate adds absolutely nothing to this assertion. What about "S believes that it is true that the sun.."? Still ambiguous. Does S beleive that it is true that "the sun will rise at midnight" or soes he beleibe that it is true "of the sun" that it will rise at midnight. The introduction of "is true" accomplishes nothing to clarify the anmbiguity of opaque contexts. I can see no other reason why it was introduced, so I have eliminated it. Also, as I explained on my talk page, S,P, A,B, etc.. are all sentence or proposition variables. Hence, no need for brackets. Thank you.--Lacatosias 09:44, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

Lacatosias, you seem to have reached an important point, one that others have reached in the philosophy of language. The statement of say, "snow is white is true," doesn't seem to be a statement contingent upon facts of the world, it's merely a statement of truth value. If "snow is white" is made true by the world, "x is y is true," specifically the "is true" in the sentence seems to be completely unecessary and tautological. I might just be misinterpreting the whole of some philosophers of language here, before Kripke but maybe now Russell, but it also seems to be the case that there are different scopes or occurances of the use of "x is y" in regards to adding "is true." On the one hand, "x is y is true" and on another interpretation or use we get, "it is true that x is y." Kripke writes about all of this in his work on names and definite descriptions and even in his theory of truth. Perhaps a more practical example making explicit the different uses would be that it is necessarily the case for the person named Bush that that person and only that person is the president, or it is necessarily the case that the president, which there is one and only one of, is Bush. In other words, it's necessarily true that Bush is president, and it's necessarily true that the president is Bush. The truth conditions in both statements change because they contains different scopes. Hope this helps and I'm not just talking out my ass. --Brizimm 00:42, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

No, you seem to be on the right track. What you have identified is precisly the problem of de-re and de-dicto ambiguity in attitute attributions. But there are really two issues: the scope issue (de-re versus de-dicto) and the meaningfulness of the truth predicate itself. It's important not to confuse these. The truth-pedicate question is more a matter of truth theories than philosophy of language---see my recent article on deflationary theory of truth which discusess the main versions of deflationism and the interpretations of "it is true" or "is true" as predicate, anaphoric prosentence and so on.--Lacatosias 08:00, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

P.S. for readers who have no idea what the relevance of any of this is to the article on epistemology: the whole matter arose because someone kept adding "is true" and [P] with brackets to the logical statements made in the article. I interpreted this as some way to clarify that the statements were intended to be interpreted de-re and not de-dicto. But after further clarification on my talk page, it turned out that it was a simple matter of misunderstanding the standard notation for sentence variables.

Now,since this has nothing to do with epistemology, if there is still any confusion please discuss on User talk:Lacatosias. --Lacatosias 08:12, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

Bateson's Epistemology

I would like to request a article on Gregory Bateson's cybernetic epistemology - it was suggested that I ask here before starting an article on the topic. Just to give some view of the popularity of Bateson's epistemology:

• There are 102,000 hits for Bateson+epistemology on Google.
• There is less than 10 results in PubMed and only a small number of articles indexed on Bateson's Double Bind theory.
• According to Google Scholar "Steps to an ecology of mind : Collected Essays in Anthropology, Psychiatry, Evolution, and Epistemology" is cited in at least 2000 books and articles. ---=-C-=- 09:58, 10 April 2006 (UTC)

I would strongly suggest that you write up a summary of Bateson's epistemology and then add it to the main article on Bateson with a link to a more specific and detailed article on Bateson's epistemology. I don't see what objections there could be. If it IS such an important part of Bateson's work, then it should be mentioned in the article dedicated to him. If there is opposition this proposal on the Bateson page, then I personally would just go ahead and create the separate page. After all, there are infinitely more dubious or absolutely worhtless topics (e.g. Buffy the Vampire Slayer) that have entire projects dedicted to them on Wikipedia.--Lacatosias 10:18, 10 April 2006 (UTC)

If you're asking for someone to write it for you, I can't help you out there. I don't know anything about Bateson's epistemology nor very much about Bateson.--Lacatosias 10:24, 10 April 2006 (UTC)

When I have some more time, I'll write an outline and first draft. I'd appreciate if I could get some feedback from experts in this area. ---=-C-=- 12:13, 3 May 2006 (UTC)

Deletions

The irrationality section should be deleted, it has little to do with the current epistemological literature. It is POV.

“ It is common for epistemological theories to avoid skepticism by adopting a foundationalist approach. To do this, they argue that certain types of statements have a special epistemological status — that of not needing to be justified. So it is possible to classify epistemological theories according to the type of statement that each argues has this special status.”

- I deleted this because it is an inadequate introduction to the following section which doesn’t mainly concern types of foundationalism and the beliefs they identify as primary.

“or positivism, which places higher emphasis on ideas about reality rather than on experiences of reality.”

- Deleted because Postivists who place primary emphasis on experience, that’s what verificationism is about after all.

“The central problem for epistemology then becomes explaining this correspondence.”

- Deleted, not everyone supports the correspondence view of truth. The central problem of epistemology is standardly viewed as the problem of the meaning and possibility of knowledge.

“The Scientific Method was once favoured as the reason for scientific success, but recent difficulties in the philosophy of science have led to a rise in coherentism.”

- Deleted because coherentists usually support the “Scientific method”. The debate between foundationalism and coherentism little concerns the validity of the scientific method.

“Empiricists have traditionally denied that even these fields could be a priori knowledge. Two common arguments are that these sorts of knowledge can only be derived from experience (as John Stuart Mill argued), and that they do not constitute "real" knowledge (as David Hume argued).”

- Deleted because it’s inaccurate. Historically it’s safe to say that most empricists have believed that logical and mathematical knowledge ( especially logical knowledge) are knowable a-priori.

“Analytic statements (for example, mathematical truths), are held to be true without reference to the external world, and these are taken to be exemplary knowledge statements.”

-The section on idealism is inaccurate. This was particularly inaccurate. It was deleted because beliefs about the status of mathematical and logical knowledge vary from idealist to idealist, the views described above ( which are, by the way, poorly phrased) are not held by all idealists.

“The opposite theory to this is solipsism.”

- Deleted because it is (a) confusing and unnecessary (b) not necessarily accurate ( c) simplistic. The whole section on naive realism looks suspicious to me.

- The section on Pragmatism should be deleted or expanded because there are “as many pragmatisms as there are pragmatists”. Between the Neo-Pragmatism of Rorty and the Pragmatism of Quine there is little common ground. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 220.236.173.165 (talk • contribs) 2006-04-25 10:50:55 (UTC)

Merge with knowledge

Epistemology is not knowledge. It is how we know what we know, not what we actually know. It should not be merged.

>> Agreed, epistemology is not at all the same as knowledge. 71.141.103.182 17:33, 3 June 2006 (UTC)

Merging with knowledge

I would agree that is should not be merged, and would add: Many people arive at this page quite correctly by searching for the term 'epistemological'. If this page did get merged then not being able to find this page would do them a disservice.

(From another reader): I am surprised to hear that some believe "epistemology" should not be a distinct Wikipedia article. As any philosophy student knows, epistemology is one of the major branches of philosophy, on an equal standing with ethics and metaphysics. It would be quite bizarre to not find a distinct article on the subject.

I agree that the articles should not be merged. "Epistemology" and "knowledge" are not the same thing. Epistemology is the theory and study of knowledge, not knowledge itself. For example, knowledge would deal with the results of the studies of Epistemology (such as "I am being appeared to Father-like" [Plantinga]), a rational, justified belief, studies of the theory of knowledge. Epistemology is it's own field of study.--NWalterstorf 21:19, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

Merging with knowledge

I recommend leaving epistomology in its own category because next fall i'm taking a senior level epistomology class and insist that it be in its own category for this reason.

Epistemological Theories and Irrationalism

I've noticed that some of the epistemological theories listed in the article have little to do with contemporary epistemological theories. Specifically, one will not find empiricism, idealism, naive realism, phenomenalism, or representationalism in a book used or written by some of the leading epistemological scholars. Instead, you find much more written about Gettier, reliabilism, skepticism, etc. Perhaps one could argue that these are historical epistemological theories or have some use in continental philosophy. I motion that these theories either be deleted, or even better, have a separate category. Maybe this isn't such a great idea, but what I really want to hear are peoples opinions about whether or not these are still valid epistemological theories.

Also, while I respect that there are types of philosophers and religious people who believe that knowledge can be obtained through non-rational methods, I don't see the relvance those methods have to contemporary epistemology. Once again, a leading contemporary scholar in epistemology (yes, of the analytic tradition), would want to talk about contextualism, Gettier, or evidentialism, for example, rather than nihilism and mysticism.

I believe a great deal of this article would be better if non-rational, Eastern Religious, continental, and analytic ways of approaching epistemology were more distinctly separated rather than oddly thrown together. Of course, this proposal may only show my analytic ways, but it must also seem awkward for a person of a different philosophical persuasion to see their theories juxtaposed with something else that has nothing to do with it. Maybe, there really should just be different articles on knowledge and epistemology, or at least a better introduction, or lay out, flow, and outline of the article that would be sure to not give the reader such a confusing impression.

One last thing, while the article labels foundationalism, coherentism and the like as being a part of rationality, such a label doesn't capture the essence of what these philosophies are attempting and I've yet to see such a label applied to them. Of course, they're dealing with reasoning and are philosophies made by very rational analytic scholars, but things like foundationalism are really attempting to argue for a form of reasoning immune to the Agrippan or Pyrrhonian modes like hypothesis, and regress ad infinitum. The label "rationality" may be the best label for them, but they're more concerned with justification and chains of reasoning rather than mere rationality. Also, "irrationalism" may be just as poor a label for the other theories.

publications in philosophy

at List of publications in philosophy, there is an ongoing editwar of inclusion/exclusion of one of rand's texts that clearly doesn't fit on the list, please comment or expand the list with enough other popular texts so the rand text would be appropriate.--Buridan 12:16, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

Fear & Tweaking & the [Sic]ness Unto Death

JA: There's a problem that's arisen with the last few tweaks to the Empiricism and Epistemology articles:

It is generally taken as a fundamental requirement of the scientific method that all hypotheses and theories must be tested against observations of the natural world, rather than by relying principally on abstract reason, intuition, or revelation. Hence, science is considered to be methodologically empirical in nature.

JA: The scope of the qualifier principally is now ambiguous. Does it cover only abstract reason? Or does it extend over intuition and revelation, too? If the reader takes it to be the latter, then reason, intuition, and revelation have been lumped together and the restrictions on intuition and revelation have now been weakened. Another thing, intuition is a very ambiguous word. It can mean anything from ordinary common sense to the term of art, as in Kant, that connotes an infallible source of knowledge. The aim of setting up a dichotomy between experience and reason is just not a good idea. Best to avoid it. Jon Awbrey 06:30, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

Hello JA -- (1) Frankly, I think that the sentence is true with or without the "principally" and that it is appropriate for there to be an ambiguity concerning whether the "principally" applies only to reason or to all 3 (reason, intuition, and revelation). Contemporary scientific method demands that postulates be tested by means of empirical observation of the natural world, and this means that any other cognitive faculties we may have can, at best, have a supporting role and, at worst, no role. Like you, I have no doubt that scientists will inevitably use their faculties of reason (and intuition!) during the testing process, but reason takes a back seat in the sense that no scientist can permit a postulate to be verified solely by means of any kind of pure thought experiment (and please note that I was careful to say "abstract reason" in the edit). (2) "Intuition," "reason," and even "revelation" and "natural world" all have complex ranges of meanings, but that just comes with the philosophical territory. I appreciate the perplexities of this as much as you do, and, specifically with respect to intuition, I have just been over in that article trying to improve its discussion of the philosophical meaning of the term. (3) I don't think that the paragraph you've blockquoted asserts that there is a "dichotomy between experience and reason". Every act of personal knowledge acquisition (whether via sense perception, reason, or intuition) is experiential in its own way. This paragraph simply points out, rightly, that contemporary scientific method embraces a theory of knowledge which gives precedence to empirical observation as the experiential sine qua non for verification. Anyhow, JA, you do too much good work in Wikipedia for me to enjoy arguing with you. - WikiPedant 07:26, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

Hello again JA -- I just saw the tweak to the tweak to the tweak which you made late last night, to wit:

It is a fundamental requirement of scientific method that all hypotheses and theories must be tested against observations of the natural world, rather than resting solely on a priori reasoning, intuition, or revelation. Hence, science is considered to be methodologically empirical in nature.

I'm completely satisfied with replacing "principally on abstract reason" with "solely on a priori reasoning." That is a definite improvement. I'm still a bit uncomfy with the structure of the first sentence though. There's something wrong with "must be tested against..., rather than resting solely on...". Isn't there an inconsistency between the verb formations in the 2 halves of the sentence (before and after "rather than")? - WikiPedant 19:43, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

JA: I have a few remaining scruples about the guilt by association involved here, as if reason, intuition, and revelation were a line-up of "usual suspects", but as Fagin says, "I'm reviewing the situation".

JA: Resting on means two things here, supported by and terminating with, as in "the end of inqury", and both senses make sense to me in this case. Jon Awbrey 02:48, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

Hello JA -- Sorry, I didn't mean to suggest that I have a problem with the meaning of the expression "resting on." I meant to express doubt about the grammatical integrity of the sentence. Wouldn't something like the following be more grammatically correct?

It is a fundamental requirement of scientific method that all hypotheses and theories must be tested against observations of the natural world, rather than rest solely on a priori reasoning, intuition, or revelation.

The sentence could also be rewritten to step around this concern:

Scientific method fundamentally requires that all hypotheses and theories be tested against observations of the natural world, and disallows any methodology which would support hypotheses and theories solely by a priori reasoning, intuition, or revelation.

- WikiPedant 03:41, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

JA: Don't see the problem. Consider: "Heroes must be tested in battle, rather than resting on their laurels." Jon Awbrey 04:08, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

I think that sentence is grammatically misconstructed in exactly the same way. I wonder if there are any credentialed Wikipedian English grammar experts who could make a definitive ruling. - WikiPedant 15:00, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

Gadzooks, JA, I found an authoritative write-up (The American Heritage® Book of English Usage, 1996) on precisely this issue at http://www.bartleby.com/64/C002/006.html. It discusses the controversy concerning whether it is acceptable to use "rather than" with a gerund ("resting", in the case of our example) and the verdict is: Yes, in some situations it is, but to avoid controversy you might just want to find an alterate expression. - WikiPedant 18:57, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

do u believe?

im lost i don't know what i want,i dt know who i am i'm totally lost.i can't believe in anything untouchable i'm so tired of reaching nowhere!!!!!!!!!

Here's something to make you think, and perhaps help you out. Do you "remember"? You have memories, right? They play through your mind day and night, images and thoughts of the past brought back to rememberance. But these memories are not physical objects, and yet they exist. They are a part of information stored within your mind. While these memories lack a physical substance, they exist. Secondly, language. Let's say we were standing in a room with no books, no notepads or anything, and we were talking. The words themselves would be of no physical substance. Not all information and means of knowledge demands physical substance.--NWalterstorf 03:07, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

Technically...I don't think you can prove that memories are not physical "objects". It may be that memories are physically encoded structures in the brain. How they are encoded is not known, arguably it is at the quantum level of the neuronic structures but -- most scientists (who happen to be materialists) would assert that memories have a physical existence. SunSw0rd 21:57, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

do u believe?

i don't know who i am anymore i'm tooo lost,i don't know what i want or in what i believe!

Constructivist epistemology

I add something about Constructivist epistemology, an important lack actually for this article, even if the wikipédia article is not developped, there are at least links about the main proponents. Chrisdel 12:46, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

Interesting study, thanks for the inclusion of it. The study seems like a cross between Empiricism and MEMEtics. It says it's a recent development, which explains why I have heard so little about it.--NWalterstorf 14:57, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

Well the name "constructivism" might be recent but some references are old like Giambattista Vico (18th century), Gaston Bachelard "Nothing is given, everything is constructed" (1938, La formation de l'esprit scientifique ISBN 2711611507). For a quick presentation see "Le Moigne's Defense of Constructivism" by Ernst von Glasersfeld (i may create "Le Moigne"'s article soon...). Chrisdel 10:38, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

The Lottery Paradox

"Afterall, there's always one winner." This is mistaken, and depends on the type of lottery. A draw will always have a winner if there is one ticket in the hat for every player, but a lottery where players try to guess a combination of numbers that will later be drawn randomly there is not necessarily a winner.

- Actually, there is. As tongue in cheek as it may be, the organising/managing entity is always a winner in any lottery. --86.139.116.197 18:20, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

Gnoseology

I obtained this from the net "Some European continental philosophers will use the term gnoseology to refer to the theory of knowledge. The use of this term was introduced in the 19th century by German philosophers. Yet, epistemology is sometimes generally used instead to refer to the theory of knowledge as studied in analytic philosophy as such by American and British philosophers". Nonetheless I doubt this is a full explanation on the difference (if any) and equivalence between Gnoseology and Epistemology which deserves its part here as Gnoseology redirects here and some professors (particularly marxists one8-)) tend to define Epistemology as Theory of Science. --GTB 17/10/2006

Episteme in Greek knowledge or science, logos in Greek knowledge or discurse. Knowledge of knowledge, discurse on science or discurse on knowledge. There are 2 questions on knowledge : what is it and how to make (or learn / teach / study / build) it. How is the methodology. Gnoseology, seen as the theory of knowledge, is what, epistemology then is both, plus the study of the knowledge's value or validity. Chrisdel 16:37, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Scepticism

I don't see a reason for including the scepticism section - so I have removed it. Two orphaned headings and a paragraph of unsupported claims will not, I hope, be missed. Banno 21:29, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

Certainty series

I believe that it would be appropriate to use all, or most, of the topics found in the so-called certainty series (which I have suggested be renamed the Epistemology series) as headers in this article, as they are all topics which touch on epistemology.

If they do not get sections of their own, they should in the very least be linked to from the article, and many of them already are. -FrostyBytes 12:04, 27 October 2006 (UTC)