Abstract
Stanley and Williamson (The Journal of Philosophy 98(8), 411–444 2001) reject the fundamental distinction between what Ryle once called ‘knowing-how’ and ‘knowing-that’. They claim that knowledge-how is just a species of knowledge-that, i.e. propositional knowledge, and try to establish their claim relying on the standard semantic analysis of ‘knowing-how’ sentences. We will undermine their strategy by arguing that ‘knowing-how’ phrases are under-determined such that there is not only one semantic analysis and by critically discussing and refuting the positive account of knowing-how they offer. Furthermore, we argue for an extension of the classical ‘knowing-how’/‘knowing-that’-dichotomy by presenting a new threefold framework: Using some core-examples of the recent debate, we will show that we can analyze knowledge situations that are not captured by the Rylean dichotomy and argue that, therefore, the latter has to be displaced by a more fine-grained theory of knowledge-formats. We will distinguish three different formats of knowledge we can have of our actions, namely (1) propositional, (2) practical, and (3) image-like formats of knowledge. Furthermore, we will briefly analyze the underlying representations of each of these knowledge-formats.
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Notes
A detailed presentation of the regress-argument is given in Stanley and Williamson (2001) . They argue that Ryle’s argument does not take off from the ground because there is no activity for which the two premises underlying the argument both can be true: They claim that the first premise (‘if someone Fs, then he knows how to F’) is restricted only to intentional actions whereas the second premise (‘manifestations of knowledge-that must be accompanied by distinct actions of contemplating propositions’) does not hold for intentionally performed actions. However, debates concerning the regress-argument are still continuing (see Rosefeldt 2004; Noë 2005).
However, Snowdon does not assume that this simple counter-example is strong enough to refute Ryle’s account. He cites other more sophisticated cases in order to reject Ryle (cf. Snowdon 2003, p. 8-11).
This feature might be identified with what Noë (2005) calls ‘situated’.
The mentioned under-determinacy is also developed by Keith Lehrer (1999, p.5) who speaks of a ‘capacity’- and an ‘informational’-sense of ‘knowledge’-sentences. In the history of epistemology, other forms of knowledge, e.g. immediate knowledge of objects, have been identified that we cannot focus on in this paper. We will only be concerned with knowledge concerning actions; furthermore, we are not going to make a distinction between propositional and conceptual representations in this context although we argued elsewhere that such a distinction is explanatory fruitful (cf. Newen and Bartels 2007).
From a neuroscientific point of view, the most plausible claim is that, at the beginning, she continues to have the practical ability, since the relevant sensorimotor representations in the brain still exist. But without exercise they will soon weaken so that it will be implausible to speak of a possession of the ability anymore. Thus, the ability will vanish gradually. For an argument along the same lines see Noë (2005).
Presupposing a naturalistic theory of mind we accept that new propositional knowledge changes our neural network but this can be distinguished from other transformations of the body (abstracting from the neural system) like increase of muscle strength etc.
The level of proficiency refers to the agent’s success and not to the structure of action in question.
Both terms ‘intention guided behavior’ and ‘learning mechanism’ are in need of a detailed analysis which cannot be given in this paper. In this context, a basic intuitive understanding is sufficient.
In addition to the problems shown in this section, we have different reasons to be unsatisfied with Stanley and Williamsons’ methodology: Their linguistic analysis is restricted to knowledge-ascriptions in only one natural language, namely in English. By discussing knowledge-ascriptions in different natural languages, Rumfitt (2003) has cast doubts on whether data of other languages like French or Russian would support their argument. A detailed criticism on Stanley and Williamsons’ methodology including cross-linguistic data cannot be done here.
The notion of ‘image’ is not restricted to visual imagery, but rather open to imagery of other modalities (especially to what Jeannerod (1994) calls ‘motor imagery’). An exhaustive explication of the ‘image-like knowledge format’ cannot be given here. It is the focus of a paper in progress. In sum, we will characterize the three knowledge formats in terms of their representational structure (non-conceptual sensorimotor vs. propositional representations) and the accessibility to these representations (conscious vs. unconscious).
An open debate we cannot present in detail deals with the question how to define concepts. Should concepts be defined as elements of thoughts expressed by assertions such that conceptual representations involve linguistic competence? We do not presuppose any special theory of concept in this paper but argue elsewhere for the existence of non-propositional representations (Newen and Bartels 2007).
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Aknowledgements
We would like to thank the VW-Foundation, the German National Academic Foundation and the Ruhr-University Research School for financial support. We are also grateful to all members of the research project “knowing how and knowing that” for discussions and valuable comments.
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Jung, EM., Newen, A. Knowledge and abilities: The need for a new understanding of knowing-how. Phenom Cogn Sci 9, 113–131 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11097-009-9129-3
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11097-009-9129-3