What Philosophy Is

Reliabilism

As you read the material for the next class, keep the questions below in mind. To answer these questions you will have to reflect critically on what you have read and possibly re-read important passages. Keep in mind that there are two basic kinds of information that you need to look for in the readings.

  1. What are the main points or conclusions that an author accepts with respect to a particular issue?
  2. What are the reasons or important considerations that lead the author to accept that conclusion?

For our purposes, it is information of the latter sort (2) that will be our primary concern since our most basic task is to evaluate the reasons that are offered to support accepting one possible conclusion about an issue, rather than another.

Although I strongly suggest that you write out brief answers to these questions, you do not have to turn in written responses. You do, however, need to be prepared to speak intelligently to these issues in the next class meeting. Also, it is reasonable to assume that the final exam’s questions will be drawn from these questions—particularly those in bold.

Readings:

  • Alvin I. Goldman, “Discrimination and Perceptual Knowledge” from Stephen M. Cahn (ed.), Philosophy for the 21st Century, pp. 163-175.

Questions:

This is a more difficult reading. To make things easier, primarily focus on the examples Goldman gives, understanding what these examples are supposed to show.

  1. What is the example of Henry and his son? Under what conditions does he know “that’s a barn”? Under what conditions does he not know “that’s a barn”, despite the fact what he sees is, in fact, a barn. Why is the theory of knowledge as justified-true-belief no good here? What condition on knowledge does Goldman posit to explain why Henry does not know that what he sees is a barn? This condition involves the use of “relevant”; why is that problematic?
  2. What is the example of Sam, Judy, and Trudy? Under what conditions does Sam know “that is Judy”? Under what conditions does he not know “that is Judy”, despite the fact that what he sees is, in fact, Judy? What analysis of “noninferentially perceptual knowledge”—Goldman just means by this knowledge that comes directly from our senses—does this yield (this should be very similar to that concerning the Henry example)?
  3. What is the example of Oscar, Dack, and Wiley? What problem does this pose for the preceding analysis? Why does Goldman resolve it by specifying (a) the object in question, (b) the maximal set of properties of that object, and (c) the DOE relation? What is “perceptual equivalence”? Putting this all together, what is the ultimate analysis of “noninferential perceptual knowledge”? How does it apply to the case of the barn, the twins, and dachshund?

 

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