epistemological shift pros and consepistemological shift pros and cons
4 Pages. NY: Cambridge University Press, 2003. Description Recall that epistemology is the branch of philosophy concerned with knowledge. Furthermore, Section 3 considers whether characterizations of understanding that focus on explanation provide a better alternative to views that capitalize on the idea of manipulating representations, also giving due consideration to views that appear to stand outside this divide. It is also becoming an increasingly popular position to hold that understanding is more epistemically valuable than knowledge (see Kvanvig 2003; Pritchard 2010). However, Strevens nonetheless offers a rough outline of a parallel, non-factive account of grasping, what he calls grasping*. Contrast thiscall it the intervening reading of the casewith Pritchards corresponding environmental reading of the case, where we are to imagine that the agent is reading a reliable academic book which is the source of many true beliefs she acquires about the Comanche. Should we say that the use of the term understanding that applies to such cases should be of no interest to epistemology? This is of course an unpalatable result, as we regularly attribute understanding in the presence of not just one, but often many, false beliefs. According to Elgin, a factive conception of understanding neither reflects our practices in ascribing understanding nor does justice to contemporary science. Goldman, A. Toon, A. As such, his commentary here is particularly relevant to the question of whether gasping is factive. Hempel, C. Aspects of Scientific Explanation and Other Essays in the Philosophy of Science. This broader interpretation seems well positioned to handle abstract object cases, for example, mathematical understanding, when the kind of understanding at issue is understanding-why. For example, when the issue is understanding mathematics, as opposed to understanding why 22=4, it is perhaps less obvious that dependence has a central role to play. Includes Alstons view of curiosity, according to which the epistemic value of true belief and knowledge partially comes from a link to curiosity. For example, you read many of your books on screens and e-readers today. While Pritchards point here is revealed in his diagnosis of Kvanvigs reading of the Comanche case, he in several places prefers to illustrate the idea with reference to the case in which an agent asks a real (that is, genuine, authoritative) fire officer about the cause of a house fire and receives a correct explanation. body positive tiktok accounts; tough guise 2 summary sparknotes; tracking polls quizlet Cases of intervening luck taketo use a simple examplethe familiar pattern of Chisholms sheep in a field case, where an agent sees a sheep-shaped rock which looks just like a sheep, and forms the belief There is a sheep. Consider here an analogy: a false belief can be subjectively indistinguishable from knowledge. Firstly, achievement is often defined as success that is because of ability (see, for example, Greco 2007), where the most sensible interpretation of this claim is to see the because as signifying a casual-explanatory relationshipthis is, at least, the dominant view. An overview of the background, development and recent issues in epistemology, including a chapter on understanding as an epistemic good. For the purposes of thinking about understanding, some of the most important will include: (i) what makes a system of beliefs coherent? On the one hand, we have manipulationists, who think understanding involves an ability (or abilities) to manipulate certain representations or concepts. Argues that understanding (unlike knowledge) is a type of cognitive achievement and therefore of distinctive value. On the basis of considerations Pritchard argues for in various places (2010; 2012; 2013; 2014), relating to cognitive achievements presence in the absence of knowledge (for example. Specifically, a very weak view of understandings factivity does not fit with the plausible and often expressed intuition that understanding is something especially epistemically valuable. Proponents of weak factivity must address both of these potentially problematic results. Facebook Instagram Email. As Wilkenfeld sees it, understanding should be construed as representational manipulability, which is to say that understanding is, essentially, the possessing of some representation that can be manipulated in useful ways. If we consider some goalsuch as the successful completion of a coronary bypassit is obvious that our attitude towards the successful coronary bypass is different when the completion is a matter of ability as opposed to luck. Epistemology is the study of sources of knowledge. Strevens, however, holds that than an explanation is only correct if its constitutive propositions are true, and therefore the reformulation of grasping that he provides is not intended by Strevens to be used in an actual account of understanding. This line merits discussion not least because the idea that understanding-why comes by degrees is often ignored in favor of discussing the more obvious point that understanding a subject matter clearly comes by degrees. Zagzebskis weak approach to a factivity constraint aligns with her broadly internalist thinking about what understanding actually does involvenamely, on her view, internal consistency and what she calls transparency. A theoretical advantage to a weak factivity constraint is that it neatly separates propositional knowledge and objectual understanding as interestingly different. Having abandoned the commitment to absolute space, current astronomers can no longer say that the Earth travels around the sun simpliciter, but must talk about how the Earth and the sun move relative to each other. Though the demandingness of this ability need not be held fixed across practical circumstances. Autor de la entrada: Publicacin de la entrada: junio 16, 2022 Categora de la entrada: rivian executive vice president Comentarios de la entrada: most touchdowns in california high school football most touchdowns in california high school football and claims that this goes along with a shift away from studying the cognitive subject's conceptual grasp of objects towards a "reflection on the . Secondly, she concedes that it is possible that in some cases additional abilities must be added before the set of abilities will be jointly sufficient. A. and Gordon, E. C. On Pritchard, Objectual Understanding and the Value Problem. American Philosophical Quarterly 51 (2014): 1-14. ), Epistemology (Royal Institute of Philosophy Lectures). For example, in Whitcomb (2010: 8), we find the observation that understanding is widely taken to be a higher epistemic good: a state that is like knowledge and true belief, but even better, epistemically speaking. Meanwhile, Pritchard (2009: 11) notes as we might be tempted to put the point, we would surely rather understand than merely know. A helpful clarification here comes from Grimm (2012: 105), who in surveying the literature on the value of understanding points out that the suggestion seems to be that understanding (of a complex of some kind) is better than the corresponding item of propositional knowledge. The advances are clearly cognitive advances. This is not so obvious, and at least, not as obvious as it is in the case of knowledge. We can acknowledge this simply by regarding Bs understanding as, even if only marginally, relatively impoverished, rather than by claiming, implausibly, that no understanding persists in such cases. Although a range of epistemologists highlighting some of the important features of understanding-why and objectual understanding have been discussed, there are many interesting topics that warrant further research. Since, for instance, the ideal gas law (for example, Elgin 2007) is recognized as a helpful fiction and is named and taught as such, as is, nave Copernicanism or the simple view that humans evolved from apes. Hills thinks that moral understanding, if it were any kind of propositional knowledge at all, would be knowing a proposition under a practical mode and not necessarily under a theoretical mode.. In order to make this point clear, Pritchard suggests that we first consider two versions of a case analogous with Kvanvigs. In such a case, Kvanvig says, this individual acquires an historical understanding of the Comanche dominance of the Southern plains of North America from the late 17th until the late 19th century (2003: 197). Keplers theory is a further advance in understanding, and the current theory is yet a further advance. Pittsburgh, PA: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2009. Boston: Routledge, 2013. Sullivan, E. Understanding: Not Know-How. Philosohpical Studies (2017). To the extent that this is correct, there is some cause for reservation about measuring degrees of understanding according to how well they approximate the benefits provided by knowing a good and correct explanation. A proponent of Khalifas position might, however, view the preceding response as question-begging. In fact, he claims, the two come apart in both directions: yielding knowledge without strong cognitive achievement andas in the case of understanding that lacks corresponding knowledgestrong cognitive achievement without knowledge. Proposes an account of understandings value that is related to its connection with curiosity. Though in light of this fact, it is not obvious that understanding is the appropriate term for this state. Of course, though, just as Lackey (2007) raises creationist teacher style cases against knowledge transmission principles, one might as well raise a parallel kind of creationist teacher case against the thesis that one cannot attain understanding from a source who herself lacks it. This aside, can we consider extending Grimms conception of understanding as non-propositional knowledge of causes to the domain of objectual understanding? Given the extent to which grasping is highly associated with understanding and left substantively unspecified, it is perhaps unsurprising that the matter of how to articulate grasping-related conditions on understanding has proven to be rather divisive. Morris, K. A Defense of Lucky Understanding. The British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 63 (2012): 357-371. This is because we dont learn about causes a priori. According to his positive proposal, objectual understanding is the goal and what typically sates the appetite associated with curiosity. Pritchard, D. Knowledge, Understanding and Epistemic Value In A. OHear (ed. Discusses whether intellectualist arguments for reducing know-how to propositional knowledge might also apply to understanding-why (if it is a type of knowing how). Discuss the pros and cons of the epistemological shift in an essay. On this basis Pritchard insists that Grimms analogy breaks down. Decent Essays. Assuming that we need an account of degrees of understanding if we are going to give an account of outright understanding (as opposed to working the other way around, as he thinks many others are inclined to do), Kelp (2015) suggests we adopt a knowledge based account of objectual understanding according to which maximal understanding of a given phenomenon is to be cashed out in terms of fully comprehensive and maximally well-connected knowledge of that phenomenon. Morris (2012), like Rohwer, also defends lucky understandingin particular, understanding-why, or what he calls explanatory understanding). If the former, then this is unfortunate given the theoretical work the term is supposed to be doing in characterizing understanding. Your paper should be 3-4 pages in length, not counting the Title page and Reference page. 2015 Jun;21(3):433-9. doi: 10.1111/jep.12282. Of course, many interrelated questions then emerge regarding coherence. Dordrecht: Springer, 2014. Although many chapters take as their starting point an analysis of how dominant political, educational, and musical ideologies serve to construct and sustain inequities and undemocratic practices, authors also identify practices that seek to promote socially just pedagogy and approaches to music education. An overview of issues relating to epistemic value, including discussion of understanding as a higher epistemic state. This is the idea that one has shifted, or changed, the way he or she takes in knowledge. ), Epistemic Value. Rohwer argues that counterexamples like Pritchards intervening luck cases only appear plausible because the beliefs that make up the agents understanding come exclusively from a bad source. Relatedly, if framed in terms of credence, what credence threshold must be met, with respect to propositions in some set, for the agent to understand that subject matter? New York: Free Press, 1965. What is Justified Belief? In G. S. Pappas (ed. . Zagzebski (2001) and Kvanvig (2003), have suggested that understandings immunity to being undermined by the kinds of epistemic luck which undermine knowledge is one of the most important ways in which understanding differs from knowledge. Section 2 explores the connection between understanding and truth, with an eye to assessing in virtue of what understanding might be defended as factive. Her key thought here is that grasping the truth can actually impede the chances of ones attaining understanding because such a grasp might come at too high a cognitive cost. The guiding task was to clarify what versions of historical epistemology exist and the pros and cons each of them presents. Gettier, E. Is Justified True Belief Knowledge? Analysis 23 (6) (1963). One issue worth bringing into sharper focus is whether knowing a good and correct explanation is really the ideal form of understanding-why. Olsson, E. Coherentist Theories of Epistemic Justification in E. Zalta (ed. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009. Sliwa, P. IVUnderstanding and Knowing. Examines reasons to suppose that attributions of understanding are typically attributions of knowledge, understanding-why or objectual understanding. View Shift in Epistemology.docx from SOCIOLOGY 1010 at Columbia Southern University. One point that could potentially invite criticism is the move from (1) and (2) to (3). In short: understanding is causal propositional knowledge. As it were, from the inside, these can be indistinguishable much as, from the first-person perspective, mere true belief and knowledge can be indistinguishable. In Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society (Hardback) (Vol. Usually philosophical problems are overcome not by their resolution but rather by redefinition. al 2014), have for understanding? Rohwer, Y. There is arguably a further principled reason that an overly weak view of the factivity of understanding will not easily be squared with pretheoretical intuitions about understanding. That said, this article nonetheless attempts to outline a selection of topics that have generated the most discussion and highlights what is at issue in each case and what some of the available positions are. There are three potential worries with this general style of approach. While his view fits well with understanding-why, it is less obvious that objectual understanding involves grasping how things came to be. Contains the paradigmatic case of environmental epistemic luck (that is, the fake barn case). Intervening epistemic luck is the sort present in the Gettiers original cases (1963) which convinced most epistemologists to abandon the traditional account of knowledge as justified true belief. The underlying idea in play here is that, in short, thinking about how things would be if it were true is an efficacious way to get to further truths; an insight has attracted endorsement in the philosophy of science (for example, Batterman 2009). For example, you read many of your books on screens and e-readers today. Armed with this distinction, Pritchard criticizes Kvanvigs assessment of the Comanche case by suggesting that just how we should regard understanding as being compatible or incompatible with epistemic luck depends on how we fill out the details of Kvanvigs case, which is potentially ambiguous between two kinds of readings. To the extent that this is right, Zagzebski is endorsing a kind of KU principle (compare: KK). Since what Grimm is calling subjective understanding (that is, Riggss intelligibility) is by stipulation essentially not factive, the question of the factivity of subjective understanding simply does not arise. Even so, and especially over the past decade, there has been agreement amongst most epistemologists working on epistemic value that that understanding is particularly valuable (though see Janvid 2012 for a rare dissenting voice). Unlike de Regt and Dieks (2005), Wilkenfeld aims to propose an inclusive manipulation-based view that allows agents to have objectual understanding even if they do not have a theory of the phenomenon in question. If we sometimes attribute understanding to two people even when they differ only in terms of who has more false beliefs about a subject, this difference in degrees indicates that one can have understanding that includes some false beliefs. We regularly claim that people can understand everything from theories to pieces of technology, accounts of historical events and the psychology of other individuals. As Elgin (2007) notes, it is normal practice to attribute scientific understanding to individuals even when parts of the bodies of information that they endorse diverge somewhat from the truth. ), The Routledge Companion to Epistemology. Pritchards assessment then of whether understanding is compatible with epistemic luck that is incompatible with knowledge depends on which kind of epistemic luck incompatible with knowledge one is discussing. Riaz (2015), Rohwer (2014) and Morris (2012) have continued to uphold this line on understandings compatibility with epistemic luck and defend this line against some of the objections that are examined below. 121-132. If a grasping condition is necessary for understanding, does one satisfy this condition only when one exercises a grasping ability to reflect how things are in the world? Such a theory raises questions of its own, such as precisely what answering reliably, in the relevant sense, demands. Strevens (2013) focuses on scientific understanding in his discussion of grasping. Pragmatism as an epistemological approach accentuates the reasoning of theories and concepts by studying their consequences and goals, values and interests they support. The Problem of the External World 2. This is a change from the past. It will accordingly be helpful to narrow our focus to the varieties of understanding that feature most prominently in the epistemological literature. Thirdly, even if one accepts something like a moderate factivity requirement on objectual understandingand thus demand of at least a certain class of beliefs one has of a subject matter that they be trueone can also ask further and more nuanced questions about the epistemic status of these true beliefs. Displacements of power in the realm of concepts accompany these new orientations. Whitcomb also cites Alston (2005) as endorsing a stronger view, according to which true belief or knowledge gets at least some of its epistemic value from its connection to, and satisfaction of, curiosity. Since Kvanvig claims that the coherence-making relationships that are traditionally construed as necessary for justification on a coherentist picture are the very relations that one grasps (for example, the objects of grasping) when one understands, the justification literature may be a promising place to begin. This type of understanding is ascribed in sentences that take the form I understand why X (for example, I understand why the house burnt down). Discuss the pros and cons of the epistemological shift in an essay. Whitcomb, D. Epistemic Value In A. Cullison (ed. He concedes, though, that sometimes curiosity on a smaller scale can be sated by epistemic justification, and that what seems like understanding, but is actually just intelligibility, can sate the appetite when one is deceived. Solicitar ms informacin: 310-2409701 | administracion@consultoresayc.co. We could, for convenience, use the honorific term subjective knowledge for false belief, though in doing so, we are no longer talking about knowledge in the sense that epistemologists are interested in, any more than we are when, as Allan Hazlett (2010) has drawn attention to, we say things like Trapped in the forest, I knew I was going to die; Im so lucky I was saved. Perhaps the same should be said about alleged subjective understanding: to the extent that it is convenient to refer to non-factive states of intelligibility as states of understanding, we are no longer talking about the kind of valuable cognitive achievement of interest to epistemologists. Contains Kims classic discussion of species of dependence (for example, mereological dependence). Baker, L. R. Third Person Understanding in A. Sanford (ed. Consequently, engaging with the project of clarifying and exploring the epistemic states or states attributed when we attribute understanding is a complex matter. Elgin, C. Exemplification, Idealization, and Understanding in M. Surez (ed. According to Goldman (1991) curiosity is a desire for true belief; by contrast, Williamson views curiosity as a desire for knowledge. Her line is that understanding-why involves (i) knowing what something is, and (ii) making reasonable sense of it. This objection is worth holding in mind when considering any further positions that incorporate representation manipulability as necessary. Zagzebski, L. On Epistemology. ), Virtue Epistemology Naturalized: Bridges Between Virtue Epistemology and Philosophy of Science. security guard 12 hour shifts aubrey pearsons oaks husband epistemological shift pros and cons. Epistemology is often defined as the theory of knowledge, and talk of propositional knowledge (that is, "S knows that p") has dominated the bulk of modern literature in epistemology. Most notably here is what we can call linguistic understandingnamely, the kind of understanding that is of particular interest to philosophers of language in connection with our competence with words and their meanings (see, for example, Longworth 2008). In this Gettier-style case, she has good reason to believe her true beliefs, but the source of these beliefs (for example, the rumor mill) is highly unreliable and this makes her beliefs only luckily true, in the sense of intervening epistemic luck. endangered species in the boreal forest; etown high school basketball roster. For example, you read many of your books on screens and e-readers today. In looking at moral understanding-why, outlines some key abilities that may be necessary to the grasping component of understanding. Philosophy of Science, 79(1) (2012): 15-37. Consider how some people think they grasp the ways in which their zodiac sign has an influence on their life path, yet their sense of understanding is at odds with the facts of the matter. That is, there is something defective about a scientists would-be understanding of gas behavior were that scientist, unlike all other competent scientists, to reject that the ideal gas law is an idealization and instead embraced it as a fact. His central claim is that curiosity provides hope for a response-dependent or behaviour-centred explanation of the value of whatever curiosity involves or aims at. Establishes a pro position, supporting that the shift in how people take in knowledge is good. Just as we draw a distinction between this epistemic state (that is, intelligibility, or what Grimm calls subjective understanding) and understanding (which has a much stricter factivity requirement), it makes sense to draw a line between grasping* and grasping where one is factive and the other is not. In his article "A Seismic Shift in Epistemology" (2008), Chris Dede draws a distinction between classical perceptions of knowledge and the approach to knowledge underpinning Web 2.0 activity. Much of the philosophical tradition has viewed the central epistemological problems concerning perception largely and sometimes exclusively in terms of the metaphysical responses to skepticism. Relation question: What is the grasping relationship? In other words, they claim that one cannot always tell that one understands. ), Epistemic Value. Meanwhile, he suggests that were you to ask a fake fire officer who appeared to you to be a real officer and just happened to give the correct answer, it is no longer plausible (by Pritchards lights) that you have understanding-why. Pritchards verdict is that we should deny understanding in the intervening case and attribute it in the environmental case. Elgin, C. Z. ), The Nature and Limits of Human Understanding. Epistemological assumptions are those that focus on what can be known and how knowledge can be acquired (Bell, 8). Know How. Email: emma.gordon@ed.ac.uk If this is right, then at least one prominent case used to illustrate a luck-based difference between knowledge and understanding does not hold up to scrutiny. For if the view is correct, then an explanation for why ones understanding why the painting is beautiful is richer, when it is, will simply be in terms of ones possession of a correct answer to the question of why it is beautiful. In addition, it is important to make explicit differences in terminology that can sometimes confuse discussions of some types of understanding. It seems as though understanding would possibly be undermined in a case where someone relying on the ideal gas law failed to appreciate it as an idealization. He gives the name grasping* to the purely psychological component that would continue to be satisfied even if, say, an evil demon made it the case at the moment of your grasping that there was only an appearance of the thing that appears to you to be the case. So too does the fact that one would rather have a success involving an achievement than a mere success, even when this difference has no pragmatic consequences. Longworth, G. Linguistic Understanding and Knowledge. Nous 42 (2008): 50-79. For example, you read many of your books on screens and e-readers today. Lucky Understanding Without Knowledge. Synthese 191 (2014): 945-959. For example, while it is easy to imagine a person who knows a lot yet seems to understand very little, think of the student who merely memorizes a stack of facts from a textbook; it is considerably harder to imagine someone who understands plenty yet knows hardly anything at all. Drawing from Stanley and Williamson, she makes the distinction between knowing a proposition under a practical mode of presentation and knowing it under a theoretical mode of presentation. Stanley and Williamson admit that the former is especially tough to spell out (see Glick 2014 for a recent discussion), but it must surely involve having complex dispositions, and so it is perhaps possible to know some proposition under only one of these modes of presentation (that is, by lacking the relevant dispositions, or something else). Rohwers inventive move involves a contrast case featuring unifying understanding, that is, understanding that is furnished from multiple sources, some good and some bad.