Abstract
Propositionalism explains the nature of knowledge-how as follows:
P: To know how to ϕ is to stand in a special propositional attitude relation to propositions about how to ϕ. To know how to ride a bike is to have the required propositional attitude to propositions about how to do so. Dispositionalism offers an alternative view.
D: To know how to ϕ is to stand in a behavioral-dispositional relation, a being-able-to relation, to ϕ-ing. To know how to ride a bike is to have an ability to do so in the form of a complex disposition to behave in ways that constitute bike riding. Objectualism presents a third option.
O: To know how to ϕ is to stand in a non-propositional, non-behavioral-dispositional objective attitude relation to a way of j-ing.
To know how to ride a bike is to have an objectual attitude, perhaps a form of knowledge of, to a way of doing so.
Dispositionalism is often dismissed on the basis of two criticisms designed to show its shortcomings relative to Propositionalism and Objectualism. According to the Epistemic Improvement Objection, Dispositionalism cannot account for the fact that gaining knowledge-how is an improvement in our epistemic state. According to the Modified Ability Objection, it cannot account for the fact that being able to do something is neither necessary nor sufficient for knowing how to do it. I develop a form of Dispositionalism, the Special Ability View, that avoids both objections.
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Notes
This specification of Propositionalism and the subsequent ones of Dispositionalism and Objectualism are taken from Bengson and Moffett (Bengson and Moffett 2011b, 163–164).
2011Dispositionalism can also be attacked indirectly, by arguing that one of its competitors is true. If, for example, the semantic arguments presented by Stanley and Williamson (2001) and Stanley (2011) for their version of the Propositionalism were sound, then Dispositionalism would false. I will not defend Dispositionalism against such indirect attacks. See Noë (2005) and Abbott (2013) for critiques of the Stanley and Williamson arguments, in particular.
Accounts of knowledge-how are often classified as intellectualist or anti-intellectualist; to which category do Dispositionalism and the Special Ability View, in particular, belong? It depends on how we define the options. Propositionalism, Dispositionalism and Objectualism concern the nature of knowledge-how. Suppose, following Bengson and Moffett (2011b), we take intellectualism and anti-intellectualism as views, not about the nature of knowledge-how, but about the conditions required for knowledge-how. Suppose too that we take anti-intellectualism to be the denial of intellectualism, where intellectualism claims that having knowledge how to ϕ does not require having an ability to ϕ. As Bengson and Moffett (2011b, 167) observe, “what is distinctive of anti-intellectualism is its commitment to the thesis that knowing how requires the corresponding ability or disposition” (their emphasis). Dispositionalism and the Special Ability View are then forms of anti-intellectualism. Suppose though that we take anti-intellectualism to be the rejection of intellectualism, where intellectualism is the claim that having knowledge-how requires having some propositional attitudes. Dispositionalism, at least in the form of the Special Ability View, is now a form of intellectualism. As we shall see, the behavioral dispositions that constitute knowledge-how include dispositions to act in certain ways to achieve certain results, and such dispositions to intentional behavior plausibly require the formation, if only unconsciously, of some propositional attitudes, e.g., conceiving of a way of acting as a way to ϕ.
Thus, Reliabilists, who explain justified belief as reliably formed belief, take themselves to be explaining “in nonepistemic terms when a belief is justified” (Goldman 1976, 2; my emphasis).
Knowing how to do one thing, e.g., sort apples by variety, often involves knowing how to do others, e.g., perceptually identify various characteristics of apples. I set aside this issue of the dependence relation between forms of knowledge-how.
Critics may object that relativizing knowledge-how to circumstances makes for too generous an account of such knowledge: I don’t know how to fly in my current environment, but I do know how to fly in circumstances in which the laws of gravity are very different: I jump and flap my arms around a bit. Yet, if I know how to fly in those circumstances, then I know how to fly, period, and that’s clearly not the case. The objection misses two points. First, I don’t know how to fly in the contemplated circumstances, where the laws of gravity are different. I have not developed a behavioral disposition to behave in ways intended to fly in those circumstances. Second, it doesn’t follow from my knowing how to fly in those extraordinary circumstances that I know how to fly, period. That inference depends on our conception of what it is to know how to fly and the circumstances we take to be authoritative. Just as knowing how to ride a bike with training wheels doesn’t imply knowing how to ride a bike, period, knowing how to fly under radically changed gravitational circumstances doesn’t imply knowing how to fly, period.
Brogaard (2011, 150) writes of abilities as carrying information: “When one has the ability to A, and that ability intuitively suffices for knowledge of how to A, then one is in an ability state that carries information about the procedure that will lead one to A.” How she thinks an ability “carries” information is unclear to me. She may, or may not, have in mind something along the lines of what I propose.
As explained by Bergmann (2006, 4): “Propositional justification… is a property that is had by a proposition relative to a person. A proposition can have such justification for a person even if the person doesn’t believe it or even if she believes it but not for the right reasons. Very roughly, a proposition p is justified for a person S just in case S has reasons or evidence for p such that if S were to believe p and base her belief that p on those reasons or that evidence, her belief that p would be doxastically justified.” See too Conee and Feldman (2004, 201).
The details of how our introspections, perceptions and memories epistemically support these first-person propositions are properly left for another time. The important point here is that they clearly do so. The learning process by which we develop behavioral dispositions involves our having experiences that are evidence for us of the truth of the associated propositions.
If the role accorded to propositional attitudes in SAV2 were enough to make it a form of Propositionalism, the same would be true of Objectualism, as developed by Bengson and Moffett. As we shall see, they take knowledge-how to be a form of objectual understanding, where that objectual understanding is, as they put it, “grounded” on certain propositional attitudes. For that matter, Propositionalism, as developed by Stanley (2011, 126–127) might then be just as well taken to be a version of Dispositionalism, since it accords some role to behavioral dispositions, acknowledging that knowledge-how requires that the subject be able to ϕ in some contextually determined range of circumstances.
SAV2 limits the creatures that can have knowledge-how to those for whom claims can be propositionally justified. Since a claim is propositionally justified for us just when we have evidence for it that would make belief in it doxastically justified if we were to base the belief on that evidence, claims can be propositionally justified only for those capable of having doxastically justified beliefs. Creatures incapable of knowledge-how may still have various sorts of abilities.
Supporters of Objectualism may well be able to clarify their account of the epistemic dimension and even do so in a way that yields a more robust account of the epistemic dimension of knowledge-how than is offered by the Special Ability View. They will still need to pull another nail from Objectualism’s coffin, however. As Bengson and Moffett point out, we “often say that one really knows how, knows quite well how, knows well enough how, only kind (sort) of knows how, and so forth” (183). Knowledge-how is gradable. Consider then Dick and Jane, each of whom knows how to ϕ, but one of whom, Jane, knows how to ϕ better than the other. According to Objectualism, each has objectual knowledge of a way to ϕ and each has a reasonable mastery of the concepts in a correct and complete conception of that way of ϕ-ing. How then is Jane’s knowledge-how superior to Dick’s? Even assuming that there are degrees of acquaintance, Dick and Jane may be equally well acquainted with a way to ϕ. The difference between them also need not lie in their mastery of the concepts in their conceptions of how to ϕ. They may have the same degree of conceptual mastery of the very same concepts. It is just that Jane, through extensive practice, has better developed the required behavior dispositions, an essential aspect of knowledge-how that Objectualism rejects.
Other factors may help determine when behaviors are effective enough for knowledge-how. Perhaps, the greater the stakes, the more reliable the behaviors must be for us to have the requisite ability and knowledge-how. Knowledge-how may have a contextualist dimension similar to that of knowledge-that.
They credit the case to King by way of Stanley and Williamson (2001, 416).
Pat and Albert can differ in their teaching ability even when their knowledge of how the stunts are generally done has the same propositional content. The difference in their teaching ability can then be explained in terms of other differences between them, e.g., in their communication skills.
Bengson and Moffett (Bengson and Moffett 2011b, 168) cite a study, described in Bengson et al. (2009), in which a vast majority of respondents take Pat to know how to do the stunts. It is not clear that the study lends any significant support to their position, however. Perhaps the respondents are confused in their conception of knowledge-how, just as critics of the Special Ability View who appeal to cases of marathon runners who know how to run but cannot do so due to asthma overlook the fact that knowledge-how is relative to the circumstances.
The case of Pat and Albert actually illustrates the lack of clarity in Bengson and Moffett’s form of Objectualism. If Pat has knowledge-how but Albert does not, what makes for the difference? They each grasp a correct and complete conception of how the stunts are done, so the difference between them on Bengson and Moffett’s view must be that only Pat has objectual knowledge of—is acquainted with—ways to do the stunts. What is the nature of this acquaintance and how is it gained? Pat’s acquaintance with ways to do the stunts does not take the form of his doing them, for he cannot do them. He is acquainted with ways to the stunts in that he witnesses others do them, but Albert has this sort of acquaintance as well.
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Acknowledgments
My thanks to several commentators and referees and especially to Justin McBrayer, Matt McGrath, and Andrew Moon for helpful comments and criticisms of earlier drafts of this paper.
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Markie, P.J. The Special Ability View of knowledge-how. Philos Stud 172, 3191–3209 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11098-015-0464-7
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11098-015-0464-7