Gettier spent the whole paper trying to get us to accept that the premises are not falsifed. Gettier is not resting anything on 'false premises.'

Thats what I thought you were saying, but I can't reconcile that with your earlier statement:

Look at it this way: I can be justified even if I am wrong.

A lawyer may make an argument with a false conclusion, but it's not that being false makes the lawyer's justification vanish. It's not as if all the evidence just disappears. It's still evidence for something. It's evidence for a false conclusion. It doesn't cease to be evidence.

Like with valid arguments. You can have a valid argument even if it has false premises. Having false premises alone does not make the argument invalid.

---------- Post added at 04:01 PM ---------- Previous post was at 03:59 PM ----------

As Gettier claims, you can be justified in believing something is false. If we narrow our scope to just talking about justification, the justification condition in this particular problem does hold. So 2 is true, though 1 is irrelevant (he believed--past tense) and 3 is false. If (d) were the issue, Smith would simply not know. It wouldn't be a case of knowledge by the definition thus given.

I agree with you that it is impossible to truly believe such propositions as 2+2=5. But what about propositions that are logically impossible but not obviously so? I am thinking particularly of mathematics. Take the following statement, for example:

"There exists a set of three whole numbers - x, y and z - such that x cubed + y cubed = z cubed."

This is actually a mathematical (and hence logical) impossibility, but that fact is far from obvious, and was not discovered until quite recently. Since the proposition is logically impossible, must we say that anyone in the past who claimed to believe it did not really do so?

It seems if we do not have knowledge a contradiction exists, we can still believe a contradictory proposition. How could we say they didn't really believe, only because we now have new knowledge? That seems absurd.

The fact is that two persons, A and B, may have exactly the same justification for p, and if it happens that p is true, then A knows that p, and if it happens that p is false, then B does not know that p. That is the consequence of justification being non-deductive.

Gettier argument



You say "he believed - past tense". But surely he still believes it?

To argue that all that matters is that he now believes "the man who will get the job has ten coins in his pocket" sounds dubious to me.

What he actually believes is "the man who will get the job, Jones, has ten coins in his pocket".

His belief that the man in question is Jones still forms an essential part of his overall belief

if he were now informed that the man was not Jones, he would abandon it entirely.

He holds his belief holistically, and it is misleading to try to cast off part of it. The concept of 'Jones' is still vital to his reasoning. So (d) is still very much the issue.

I agree with you that it is impossible to truly believe such propositions as 2+2=5. But what about propositions that are logically impossible but not obviously so? I am thinking particularly of mathematics. Take the following statement, for example:

"There exists a set of three whole numbers - x, y and z - such that x cubed + y cubed = z cubed."

This is actually a mathematical (and hence logical) impossibility, but that fact is far from obvious, and was not discovered until quite recently. Since the proposition is logically impossible, must we say that anyone in the past who claimed to believe it did not really do so?

nameless wrote:

Knowledge is just a poor and obsolete term. All 'knowledge' is tentative and contextual. Public or otherwise.

What term would you recommend in its stead, if any?

Clearly, there is a consensus factor based on many objective methods of rationalization (science, logic, etc.)

I don't think our perception is as nonsensical and detached as you make it sound.

Clearly, there is universal consensus on some matters.

Why does the theory regarding that we cannot speak "truth" have more weight than a theory regarding that we can speak "truth", if we are to agree with this claim?

Claiming knowledge of objective understanding would obviously be much different than a claim about your nose itching or what kind of ice cream you like.

Yes, some propositions do hold more weight, even though you seemingly think they do not (based upon your aforementioned statements).

So, while I agree concerning the subjectivity factor, for communication and understanding sake, a distinction must be allowed. Do you disagree?

...Again, I said he might be false, or have made absurd arguments. I think his entire conception of mind is absurd, but I cannot say that he has not spent a lot of time on his topic on basis of his dogmatic outbursts at a conference.

Do you understand what I am saying?

]He believes that ∃x(Mx & Jx & Tx); there is some x such that, x is a man, x is going to get the job, and x has ten coins in his pocket... Is "I believe that God exists" a non-obvious belief that a contradiction is true?

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The term 'knowledge' seems to invite belief, which is, to me, sufficient reason to decomission the notion.

I don't think x is a man. x is x. x is not y (the actual, whatever that may be). x points to an unknown y (an unknown reality).

If you think otherwise, maybe this example will help me clarify...

"The man is wearing a bright orange overcoat." This statement is a true statement. But truth is a property of language. "bright orange overcoat" is referencing some unknown y - whatever this actual thing is. It's merely a finger pointing to an enigma. It's a convention. Specificity is only necessary to the degree which the conditions present themselves.

Isn't truth just something that sentences have?

I have been trying to figure out what you mean by knowledge seems to invite belief, and why you think that "sufficient reason to decomission the notion". Which notion? knowledge or belief? And why do you think that what you wrote, "decommissions" whichever notion you meant?

There is no problem with calling some injected mental content a belief, it can still be held and referred to as a belief (although I think we may be dealing with a nonsensical concept).

I do not follow.

Are you a Tractatus W., or an Investigations W.?

How is that relevant? Do you have a particular passage from either that makes your point clear rather than murky and nondescript?

It is the proposition, whose sentence it is, which can be true or false. A string of characters or letters or markings is not the same thing as a proposition. Propositions are not materially constituted; sentences are.

Some beliefs cannot be justified.

ok. Just by writing this, you are implying that you knew exactly what I meant even though my formal vocabulary wasn't on the mark.

Which fork do I eat this course with, again?

And which beliefs would fall under this category of "unjustifiable"?

we're talking about propositional belief.

There's a lot more to life than propositionally compatible things.