February 15th, 2013
by Max Andrews
So, I gave a pop quiz to my class today because I asked them if they had any questions about any of the material we’ve been recently going over (logic) and no one had any questions. Because of their confidence I gave them a quiz, which resulted in very interesting answers. One of the questions was to describe some possible world. Simple enough, right? If they knew what a possible world they could write something simple down like “there are pink elephants” or “my shirt is red instead of blue.” However, I got this very interesting one that made me think. Think about it and let me know how you would respond to this scenario. It assumes a lot about knowledge, minds, God, etc.
In a possible world there is no predictability. Nothing that happens once happens again a second time. There is no way to know what is going to happen but there is also no such thing as knowing because there is nobody to know anything since a being would require repeated processes to function and remain functioning.
read more »
Posted in Logic | 16 Comments »
January 4th, 2013
by Max Andrews
I consider myself a moderate evidentialist when it comes to epistemology. There is a sense of deontology to it in that one ought to base their beliefs corresponding to the evidence; however, there is a sense in which one may hold a belief without sufficient evidence and still be rational. The source of truth is the objective prime reality and our knowledge should correspond to the truth of reality. My epistemology yields my theology in the sense of scientific theology. What I know about reality is what I know about God.[1]
Everything that we know is intuitive or experiential. Intuition will be discussed later but the knowledge gained is from sensory apparatus’. The characters read on paper are only the result of photons reflecting off of the paper and the photoreceptors in the eye receiving that information. All knowledge cannot be deemed sensory only since it seems feasible that a person with a sensory handicap or no functioning sensory apparatus’ may still be justified in believing in his own existence by intuition (as well as moral truths). The task of justification, or determining the truth of p, must meet the criteria of an inference to the best explanation (IBE).
Consider the following definition for justification:
S is justified in believing p = S possesses sufficient evidence for p to be true.
read more »
Posted in Epistemology, Ethics, Philosophy | No Comments »
October 18th, 2012
by Max Andrews
Posted in Epistemology | No Comments »
October 5th, 2012
by Max Andrews
In this post I’ll be responding to R.A. Fumerton’s “Inferential Justification and Empiricism” in The Journal of Philosophy 73/17 (1976).
In this paper Fumerton argues for the empiricist’s version of foundationalism. He draws important distinctions between senses of how one may be inferentially justified. His argument is matched against another argument, which proceeds from observations about what we do and do not infer. His primary contention is that is that one can never have a noninfterentially justified belief in a physical-object proposition. One must always justify one’s beliefs in propositions about the physical world by appealing to other beliefs or basic beliefs; a thesis I disagree with.
I will be faithful to knowledge being defined as a justified true belief. The task that is of concern in this paper is to examine the coherence of inferential reasoning in a foundationalist’s system. A problem with inference to the best explanation (IBE) is that it has the potential to create an infinite regress. With inferential reasoning, in an attempt to justify a belief in proposition P there may be an appeal to another proposition (or set of propositions) E, and by either explicitly or implicitly appeal to a third proposition, that E confirms or makes P probable. The challenge of inferential justification challenges one of two propositions:
read more »
Posted in Epistemology | 1 Comment »
October 2nd, 2012
by Max Andrews
Alvin Plantinga’s notion of warrant (justification) is a form of externalism (reliablism).
[A] belief has warrant only if it is produced by cognitive faculties that are functioning properly in an appropriate environment. Plantinga’s notion of proper function, moreover, implies the existence of a design plan, and a belief’s having warrant requires that the segment of the design plan governing the production of the belief is aimed at truth. In addition, the design plan must be a good one in the sense that the objective probability of the belief’s being true (given that it’s produced in accordance with the design plan) must be high.
However, Plantinga does not avoid the Gettier problem. The Gettier problem challenges the notion that knowledge is a justified true belief. In short, the problem is about accidental knowledge ([K], if there is such a thing) and having a belief that is true while your reason for justification is false.
read more »
Posted in Uncategorized | 2 Comments »
October 1st, 2012
by Max Andrews
The Gettier problem challenges the notion that knowledge is a justified true belief. In short, the problem is about accidental knowledge (if there is such a thing) and having a belief that is true while your reason for justification is false. For example, I leave my keys in my jacket pocket hanging over the back of the kitchen chair. While I’m away, my wife comes around and picks up my jacket to throw it in the wash. Noticing that my keys are in my jacket pocket she thinks I’ll probably be heading out to soon since I didn’t hang up my jacket and put my keys in their respective places. She then places my keys back in my jacket and my jacket back over the chair where they were before. When I return do I have knowledge that my keys are in my jacket? That’s the issue. Do I believe my keys are in my jacket? Yes. Is it true my keys are in my jacket? Yes. Am I justified in believing this? Well… probably not since the reason why the keys are actually there are not the reason why I believe they’re there. Thus, I have no justification for believing this even though I do believe it and it happens to be true.
read more »
Posted in Epistemology, Philosophy | 3 Comments »
May 9th, 2012
by Max Andrews
The greatest joy of education is that it never ends. There is an enlightening splendor in the discovery of knowledge. A yearn that is never quenched. When we think we are satisfied and we’ve learned enough we’ve only demonstrated our finitude. The virtue of knowledge is completely underappreciated. The youth go to university to earn a degree for success or a high paying job without understanding that what they have attained is priceless. The virtue of knowledge and the joy of discovery is widely ignored and set in the periphery. Why is knowledge not delighted in for its own sake?
read more »
Posted in Personal, Philosophy | No Comments »
May 1st, 2012
by Max Andrews
I would consider my epistemic position to be a moderate evidentialist. (This is just a brief outline). There is a sense of deontology to it in that one ought to base their beliefs corresponding to the evidence; however, there is a sense in which one may hold a belief without sufficient evidence and still be rational. The source of truth is the objective prime reality and our knowledge should correspond to the truth of reality. My epistemology yields my theology in the sense of scientific theology. What I know about reality is what I know about God.[1]
Everything that we know is intuitive or experiential. Intuition will be discussed later but the knowledge gained is from sensory apparatus’. The characters read on paper are only the result of photons reflecting off of the paper and the photoreceptors in the eye receiving that information. All knowledge cannot be deemed sensory only since it seems feasible that a person with a sensory handicap or no functioning sensory apparatus’ may still be justified in believing in his own existence by intuition (as well as moral truths). The task of justification, or determining the truth of p, must meet the criteria of an inference to the best explanation (IBE).
Consider the following definition for justification:
S is justified in believing p = S possesses sufficient evidence for p to be true.
read more »
Posted in Epistemology | 4 Comments »
April 28th, 2012
by Max Andrews
There seem to be good objections raised against empiricism and inferentially justified beliefs:
(A) That we seldom if ever consciously infer propositions about objects from propositions about experiences.
(B) That most people, if challenged as to their justification for believing propositions about the external world, would seldom if ever offer as their reasons or evidence propositions about experiences.
(C) That it is quite meaningless, that it makes no sense to search for evidence justifying a belief in the existence of a physical object that is before one under optimum conditions of perception.
Certainly, (A) may be true but is agreeably not critical to the empiricist’s defense. Both (B) and (C) may be true or false to a certain degree but is hardly relevant to the validity of an empiricist’s foundationalism. The concern is the logical order of justification rather than psychological or historical order.
read more »
Posted in Epistemology, Uncategorized | No Comments »
April 13th, 2012
by Max Andrews
Original story by Julian Friedland.
The intellectual culture of scientism clouds alternative ways of knowing that can actually yield greater certainty than science.
For roughly 98 percent of the last 2,500 years of Western intellectual history, philosophy was considered the mother of all knowledge. It generated most of the fields of research still with us today. This is why we continue to call our highest degrees Ph.D.’s, namely, philosophy doctorates. At the same time, we live an age in which many seem no longer sure what philosophy is or is good for anymore. Most seem to see it as a highly abstracted discipline with little if any bearing on objective reality — something more akin to art, literature or religion. All have plenty to say about reality. But the overarching assumption is that none of it actually qualifies as knowledge until proven scientifically.
Yet philosophy differs in a fundamental way from art, literature or religion, as its etymological meaning is “the love of wisdom,” which implies a significant degree of objective knowledge. And this knowledge must be attained on its own terms. Or else it would be but another branch of science.
read more »
Posted in Philosophy, Science | No Comments »
Below is a collection of all my blog posts specifically related to epistemology.