Online research in philosophy

The paper introduces cultural studies of science as an alternative to the "legitimation project" in philosophy and sociology of science. The legitimation project stems from belief that the epistemic standing and cultural authority of the sciences need general justification, and that such justification (or its impossibility) arises from the nature or characteristic aim of the sciences. The paper considers three central themes of cultural studies apart from its rejection of these commitments to the legitimation project: first, focus upon the sciences as ongoing and dynamic practices; second, a deflationary and non-representationalist approach to understanding scientific knowledge; and third, foregrounding questions about the significance of scientific practices, statements, and the objects they engage, and how that significance changes within ongoing practices.

Several justification logics have been created, starting with the logic LP, [1]. These can be thought of as explicit versions of modal logics, or of logics of knowledge or belief, in which the unanalyzed necessity (knowledge, belief) operator has been replaced with a family of explicit justification terms. We begin by sketching the basics of justification logics and their relations with modal logics. Then we move to new material. Modal logics come in various strengths. For their corresponding justification logics, differing strength is reflected in different vocabularies. What we show here is that for justification logics corresponding to modal logics extending T, various familiar extensions are actually conservative with respect to each other. Our method of proof is very simple, and general enough to handle several justification logics not directly corresponding to distinct modal logics. Our methods do not, however, allow us to prove comparable results for justification logics corresponding to modal logics that do not extend T. That is, we are able to handle explicit logics of knowledge, but not explicit logics of belief. This remains open.

The subject of this book is epistemology. Epistemology is the theory of knowledge, the study of the nature, sources, and limitations of knowledge and justification. In studying the nature of knowledge and justification, theorists typically try to delineate the conditions that must be met for a given person to know, or justifiably believe, that a given proposition is true. That is, they offer analyses of knowledge and justification. In this introduction, we will briefly describe the task of analysis, and review some of the ways people have understood epistemic concepts. We will also outline some of the difficulties theorists have confronted while working out what may be known.

Internalism and externalism are both false. What is needed to convert true belief into knowledge is the appropriate blend of subjective and objective factors to yield the appropriate sort of connection between mind and the world. The sort of knowledge explicated is calledmetaknowledge and is knowledge that involves the evaluation of incoming information in terms of a background system. It is proposed that knowledge is equivalent to undefeated justification which is justification on the basis of every system that eliminates or corrects any error in what a person accepts. The system of such system is called the ultrasystem of the person. This account appeals both to internal factors and external factors and involves appeal to both normative requirements and empirical constraints. Justification is defined in terms of a comparative notion of rationality adapted from Chisholm.

General introduction -- What is knowledge? -- What is the value of knowledge? -- What evidence do we have? -- How should we distribute our confidence? -- What is it to be justified in believing something? -- What is the structure of justification and knowledge? -- What is the nature of the epistemic 'ought'? -- What are the sources of knowledge? -- What can we know? -- Is knowledge in the eye of the beholder?

Analytic epistemologists agree that, whatever else is true of epistemic justification, it is distinct from knowledge. However, if recent work by Jonathan Sutton is correct, this view is deeply mistaken, for according to Sutton justification is knowledge. That is, a subject is justified in believing that p iff he knows that p. Sutton further claims that there is no concept of epistemic justification distinct from knowledge. Since knowledge is factive, a consequence of Sutton’s view is that there are no false justified beliefs. <br> Following Sutton, I will begin by outlining kinds of beliefs that do not constitute knowledge but that seem to be justified. I will then be in a position to critically evaluate Sutton’s arguments for his position that justification is knowledge, concluding that he fails to establish his bold thesis. In the course of so doing, I will defend the following rule of assertion: (The JBK-rule) One must: assert p only if one has justification to believe that one knows that p.<br>.

Introduction As the title indicates, the chief focus of this book is epistemic justification. But just what is epistemic justification and what is its place ...

Adequate epistemic justification is best conceived as the appearance, over time, of knowledge to the subject. ‘Appearance’ is intended literally, not as a synonym for belief. It is argued through consideration of examples that this account gets the extension of ‘adequately justified belief’ at least roughly correct. A more theoretical reason is then offered to regard justification as the appearance of knowledge: If we have a knowledge norm for assertion, we do our best to comply with this norm when we express as assertions only beliefs that appear to us to be knowledge. If we are doing our best, there is little point in further sanctions. So a norm of knowledge for assertion would lead to a secondary norm of justified belief as the appearance of knowledge, marking a point at which our assertions may be corrected but should not be blamed.

Some time ago, F. P. Ramsey (1960) suggested that knowledge is true belief obtained by a reliable process. This suggestion has only recently begun to attract serious attention. In 'Discrimination and Perceptual Knowledge', Alvin Goldman (1976) argues that a person has knowl- edge only if that person's belief has been formed as a result of a reliable cognitive mechanism. In Belief, Truth, and Knowledge, David Arm- strong (1973) argues that one has knowledge only if one's belief is a comPletely reliable sign of the truth of the proposition believed. On both of these theories, the reliability of one's belief is a necessary condition of that belief's being an instance of knowledge. These reliability theories have another interesting feature in common, namely, that neither of them explicitly requires or includes the traditional justification requirement for knowledge. Reliability has taken over the role of justification. This naturally leads to the question whether reliability and justification are related in some philosophically interes- ting fashion. In this paper I shall investigate this question. The result will be a positive proposal to the effect that justified belief is reliable belief. This result, in turn, explains why reliability can take over the role of justification in an account of knowledge. Moreover, the identification of justification with reliability constitutes a step toward the naturalization of normative epistemological concepts.