bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Knowledge by acquaintance and description
Authors: Fumerton Richard 
Published: September 2018

The attempt to distinguish knowledge by acquaintance from knowledge by description is most closely associated with Bertrand Russell. The distinction is also crucial to one way of trying to develop a plausible foundationalist theory of justification and knowledge. According to Russell one can distinguish the two kinds of knowledge in terms of their respective objects. Put crudely, one has knowledge by acquaintance of things, and one has knowledge by description of propositions (representations of reality that are either true or false). But this crude characterization of the two kinds of knowledge is misleading. Russell also seemed to believe that one can have knowledge by acquaintance of properties and even facts (where a fact is a complex consisting of a thing’s exemplifying a quality or standing in a relation to another thing). The distinction, then, might be better put in terms of a kind of knowledge which has as its object something that is neither true nor false (knowledge by acquaintance) and a kind of knowledge which has as its object a bearer of truth value (knowledge by description).
According to Russell, all knowledge of truths ultimately rests on knowledge by acquaintance. The traditional foundationalist in epistemology holds that although I can know one truth by inferring it from something else I know, not everything I know can be inferred in this way. We can avoid a regress of knowledge by holding that at least some truths are known as a result of direct awareness of or acquaintance with those aspects of the world that make the corresponding propositions true.
Certainty
Authors: Klein Peter D. 
Published: September 2018

‘Certainty’ is not a univocal term. It is predicated of people, and it is predicated of propositions. When certainty is predicated of a person, as in ‘Sally is certain that she parked her car in lot 359’, we are ascribing an attitude to Sally. We can say that a person, S, is psychologically certain of a proposition, p, just in case S believes p without any doubts. In general, psychological certainty has not been a topic which philosophers have found problematic.
On the other hand, certainty as a property of propositions, as in ‘The proposition that Sally parked her car in lot 359 is certain for Sally’, has been discussed widely by philosophers. Roughly, we can say that a proposition, p, is propositionally certain for a person, S, just in case S is fully warranted in believing that p and there are no legitimate grounds whatsoever to doubt that p. The philosophical issue, of course, is whether there are any such propositions and, if so, what makes them certain.
Epistemology, history of
Authors: Pappas George S. 
Published: September 2018

Epistemology has always been concerned with issues such as the nature, extent, sources and legitimacy of knowledge. Over the course of western philosophy, philosophers have concentrated sometimes on one or two of these issues to the exclusion of the others; rarely has a philosopher addressed all of them. Some central questions are: What is knowledge – what is the correct analysis or definition of the concept of knowledge? What is the extent of our knowledge – about what sorts of things is knowledge actually held? What are the sources of knowledge – how is knowledge acquired? Is there any genuine knowledge?
Concern with the first question has predominated in philosophy since the mid-twentieth century, but it was also discussed at some length in antiquity. Attention to the second question seems to have begun with Plato, and it has continued with few interruptions to the present day. The third question was also important in antiquity, but has also been a central focus of epistemological discussion through the medieval and early modern periods. The fourth question raises the issue of scepticism, a topic which has generated interest and discussion from antiquity to the present day, though there were some periods in which sceptical worries were largely ignored.
Various attempts to answer these questions throughout the history of philosophy have invariably served to raise additional questions which are more narrow in focus. The principal one which will be treated below can be stated as: (5) What is a justified belief – under which conditions is a belief justified?
There has been but occasional interest in this last question in the history of philosophy; however, it has been a crucial question for many philosophers in the twentieth century.
Internalism and externalism in epistemology
Authors: Alston William P. 
Published: September 2018

The internalism–externalism distinction is usually applied to the epistemic justification of belief. The most common form of internalism (accessibility internalism) holds that only what the subject can easily become aware of (by reflection, for example) can have a bearing on justification. We may think of externalism as simply the denial of this constraint.
The strong intuitive appeal of internalism is due to the sense that we should be able to determine whether we are justified in believing something just by carefully considering the question, without the need for any further investigation. Then there is the idea that we can successfully reply to sceptical doubts about the possibility of knowledge or justified beliefs only if we can determine the epistemic status of our beliefs without presupposing anything about which sceptical doubts could be raised – the external world for example.
The main objections to internalism are: (1) It assumes an unrealistic confidence in the efficacy of armchair reflection, which is often not up to surveying our entire repertoire of beliefs and other possible grounds of belief and determining the extent to which they support a given belief. (2) If we confine ourselves to what we can ascertain on reflection, there is no guarantee that the beliefs that are thus approved as justified are likely to be true. And the truth-promoting character of justification is the main source of its value.
Externalism lifts this accessibility constraint, but in its most general sense it embodies no particular positive view. The most common way of further specifying externalism is reliabilism, the view that a belief is justified if and only if it was produced and/or sustained by a reliable process, one that would produce mostly true beliefs in the long run. This is a form of externalism because whether a particular belief-forming process is reliable is not something we can ascertain just on reflection. The main objections to externalism draw on internalist intuitions: (1) If the world were governed by an evil demon who sees to it that our beliefs are generally false, even though we have the kind of bases for them we do in fact have, then our beliefs would still be justified, even though formed unreliably. (2) If a reliable clairvoyant (ones who ‘sees’ things at a great distance) forms beliefs on this basis without having any reason for thinking that they are reliably formed, those beliefs would not be justified, even though they pass the reliability test.
Perception, epistemic issues in
Authors: McLaughlin Brian P. 
Published: September 2018

We learn about the world through our five senses: by seeing, hearing, smelling, tasting and feeling. Sense perception is a primary means by which we acquire knowledge of contingent matters of fact. We can also acquire such knowledge by, for instance, conscious reasoning and through the written and spoken testimony of others; but knowledge so acquired is derivative, in that it must be based, ultimately, on knowledge arrived at in more primary ways, such as by sense perception.
We can perceive something without acquiring any knowledge about it; for knowledge requires belief, and we can perceive something without having any beliefs about it. Viewing any but the most simple visual scenes we see many things we form no beliefs about. However, when we perceive something, we are acquainted with it by its sensorially appearing (looking, sounding, smelling and so on) some way to us. For we see something if and only if it looks some way to us, hear something if and only if it sounds some way to us, and so on. When, based on how they appear, we form true beliefs about things we perceive, the beliefs sometimes count as knowledge.
Often the way something appears is the way it is. The red, round tomato looks red and round; the sour milk tastes sour. But the senses are fallible. Sometimes the way something appears is different from the way it is. Appearances can fail to match reality, as happens to various extents in cases of illusion. There are, for instance, optical illusions (straight sticks look bent at the water line) and psychological ones (despite being exactly the same length, the Müller-Lyer arrows drawings look different in length). In such cases, looks are misleading.
The ever-present logical possibility of illusion makes beliefs acquired by perception fallible: there is no absolute guarantee that they are true. But that does not prevent them from sometimes counting as knowledge – albeit fallible knowledge. Recognitional abilities enable us to obtain knowledge about things from how they perceptually appear. Sense perception thus acquaints us with things in a way that contributes to positioning us to acquire knowledge about them. The central epistemic issues about sense perception concern its role in so positioning us.
Phenomenology, epistemic issues in
Authors: Howarth Jane 
Published: September 2018

Phenomenology is not a unified doctrine. Its main proponents – Husserl, Heidegger, Sartre and Merleau-Ponty – interpret it differently. However, it is possible to present a broad characterization of what they share. Phenomenology is a method of philosophical investigation which results in a radical ontological revision of Cartesian Dualism. It has implications for epistemology: the claim is that, when the foundations of empirical knowledge in perception and action are properly characterized, traditional forms of scepticism and standard attempts to justify knowledge are undermined.
Phenomenological method purports to be descriptive and presuppositionless. First one adopts a reflective attitude towards one’s experience of the world by putting aside assumptions about the world’s existence and character. Second, one seeks to describe particular, concrete phenomena. Phenomena are not contents of the mind; they all involve an experiencing subject and an experienced object. Phenomenological description aims to make explicit essential features implicit in the ‘lived-world’ – the world as we act in it prior to any theorizing about it. The phenomenological method reveals that practical knowledge is prior to propositional knowledge – knowing that arises from knowing how.
The key thesis of phenomenology, drawn from Brentano, is that consciousness is intentional, that is, directed onto objects. Phenomenologists interpret this to mean that subjects and objects are essentially interrelated, a fact which any adequate account of subjects and objects must preserve. Phenomenological accounts of subjects emphasize action and the body; accounts of objects emphasize the significance they have for us.
The aim to be presuppositionless involves scrutinizing scientific and philosophical theories (Galileo, Locke and Kant are especially challenged). Phenomenology launches a radical critique of modern philosophy as overinfluenced by the findings of the natural sciences. In particular, epistemology has adopted from science its characterization of the basic data of experience.
The influence of phenomenology on the analytic tradition has been negligible. The influence on the Continental tradition has been greater. The phenomenological critique of modern science and philosophy has influenced postmodern thought which interprets the modernist worldview as having the status of master narrative rather than truth. Postmodern thought also criticizes the positive phenomenological claim that there are essential features of the lived-world.
Rational beliefs
Authors: Cherniak Christopher 
Published: September 2018

To the extent that a belief is rational, it ought to be held, other things being equal; irrational beliefs should not be held. From traditional epistemological perspectives, the obligation here is narrow, concerning only good reasons for acceptance that constitute sufficient justification or warrant. Recent epistemological trends broaden the viewpoint to include also practical considerations that enter into other rational decisions, such as best use of the agent’s limited resources.
A related but weaker conception of rationality appears in philosophy of mind as a necessary coherence requirement on personal identity – roughly, ‘No rationality, no agent’. Such agent-constitutive rationality standards are more lenient than normative epistemic standards, since agents’ belief sets can and often do fall short of epistemically uncriticizable rationality without the agents thereby ceasing to qualify as having minds.
Finally, at the widest perspective, long-standing sceptical lines of challenge to rationality of the entire structure of human belief-forming procedures conclude that we can never have the slightest good reason to accept even our most central beliefs. Recent approaches that ‘naturalize’ epistemology into a branch of science tend to exclude such general doubts as insignificant or meaningless; but if distinctively philosophical questions in fact do not fully reduce to regular scientific ones, sceptical-type rationality challenges may instead remain a permanent part of the human condition.
Scepticism
Authors: Cohen Stewart 
Published: September 2018

Simply put, scepticism is the view that we fail to know anything. More generally, the term ‘scepticism’ refers to a family of views, each of which denies that some term of positive epistemic appraisal applies to our beliefs. Thus, sceptical doctrines might hold that none of our beliefs is certain, that none of our beliefs is justified, that none of our beliefs is reasonable, that none of our beliefs is more reasonable than its denial, and so on. Sceptical doctrines can also vary with respect to the kind of belief they target. Scepticism can be restricted to beliefs produced in certain ways: for example, scepticism concerning beliefs based on memory, on inductive reasoning or even on any reasoning whatsoever. And sceptical views can be restricted to beliefs about certain subjects: for example, scepticism concerning beliefs about the external world, beliefs about other minds, beliefs about value and so on. Solipsism – the view that all that exists is the self and its states – can be seen as a form of scepticism based on the claim that there are no convincing arguments for the existence of anything beyond the self.
The philosophical problem of scepticism derives from what appear to be very strong arguments for sceptical conclusions. Since most philosophers are unwilling to accept those conclusions, there is a problem concerning how to respond to the arguments. For example, one kind of sceptical argument attempts to show that we have no knowledge of the world around us. The argument hinges on the claim that we are not in a position to rule out the possibility that we are brains-in-a-vat being artificially stimulated to have just the sensory experience we are actually having. We have no basis for ruling out this possibility since if it were actual, our experience would not change in any way. The sceptic then claims that if we cannot rule out the possibility that we are brains-in-a-vat, then we cannot know anything about the world around us.
Responses to this argument often fall into one of two categories. Some philosophers argue that we can rule out the possibility that we are brains-in-a-vat. Others argue that we do not need to be able to rule out this possibility in order to have knowledge of the world around us.
Belief and knowledge
Authors: Luper Steven 
Published: September 2018

It is often said that for people to know that such and such is the case, they must have something like a belief that such and such is the case. Call this the ‘entailment thesis’. It is usually added that the converse (call it the ‘converse entailment thesis’) is false: it is false that my belief-like attitude that such and such is the case always counts as knowledge. This standard view, combining the entailment thesis with the denial of the converse thesis, has been challenged in a number of ways.
The ‘identity thesis’ would retain the entailment thesis but would also endorse the converse entailment thesis. Knowledge and belief entail each other. (While no one has defended precisely this claim, Donald Davidson has come close.) The ‘incompatibility thesis’ rejects the entailment thesis as well as the converse entailment thesis, and says that knowledge and belief are mutually incompatible. Similarly, the ‘separability thesis’ also rejects the entailment thesis and the converse entailment thesis, but adds that knowledge and belief are mutually compatible. Those who defend the ‘eliminativism thesis’ hold that belief, like other elements of ‘folk’ or popular psychology, is an outmoded notion, and what is ‘in our heads’ when we know about the world is something other than beliefs.
Virtue epistemology
Authors: Zagzebski Linda 
Published: September 2018

‘Virtue epistemology’ is the name of a class of theories that analyse fundamental epistemic concepts such as justification or knowledge in terms of properties of persons rather than properties of beliefs. Some of these theories make the basic concept constitutive of justification or knowledge that of a reliable belief-forming process, or a reliable belief-forming faculty or, alternatively, a properly functioning faculty. Others make the fundamental concept that of an epistemic or intellectual virtue in the sense of virtue used in ethics. In all these theories, epistemic evaluation rests on some virtuous quality of the person that enables them to act in a cognitively effective and commendable way, although not all use the term ‘virtue’. The early, simple forms of process reliabilism are best treated as precursors to virtue epistemology since the latter arose out of the former and has added requirements for knowledge intended to capture the idea of epistemic behaviour that is subjectively responsible as well as objectively reliable.
Proponents of virtue epistemology claim a number of advantages. It is said to bypass disputes between foundationalists and coherentists on proper cognitive structure, to avoid sceptical worries, to avoid the impasse between internalism and externalism, and to broaden the range of epistemological inquiry in a way that permits the recovering of such neglected epistemic values as understanding and wisdom.
Constructivism
Authors: Downes Stephen M. 
Published: September 2018

Originally proposed by sociologists of science, constructivism or social constructivism is a view about the nature of scientific knowledge held by many philosophers of science. Constructivists maintain that scientific knowledge is made by scientists and not determined by the world. This makes constructivists antirealists. Constructivism here should not be confused with constructivism in mathematics or logic, although there are some similarities. Constructivism is more aptly compared with Berkeley’s idealism.
Most constructivist research involves empirical study of a historical or a contemporary episode in science, with the aim of learning how scientists experiment and theorize. Constructivists try not to bias their case studies with presuppositions about how scientific research is directed. Thus their approach contrasts with approaches in philosophy of science that assume scientists are guided by a particular method. From their case studies, constructivists have concluded that scientific practice is not guided by any one set of methods. Thus constructivism is relativist or antirationalist.
There are two familiar (and related) criticisms of constructivism. First, since constructivists are self-avowed relativists, some philosophers argue that constructivism fails for the same reasons that relativism fails. But many philosophers of science note that relativism can be characterized in various ways and that versions of relativism can be useful in the interpretation of science. Therefore, constructivism’s relativism does not by itself render it unacceptable. Second, constructivists are accused of believing that scientists literally ‘make the world’, in the way some make houses or cars. This is probably not the best way to understand constructivism. Rather, constructivism requires only the weaker thesis that scientific knowledge is ‘produced’ primarily by scientists and only to a lesser extent determined by fixed structures in the world. This interprets constructivism as a thesis about our access to the world via scientific representations. For example, constructivists claim that the way we represent the structure of DNA is a result of many interrelated scientific practices and is not dictated by some ultimate underlying structure of reality. Constructivist research provides important tools for epistemologists specializing in the study of scientific knowledge.
Darwin, Charles Robert (1809–82)
Authors: Bowler Peter J. 
Published: September 2018

Darwin’s On the Origin of Species (1859) popularized the theory that all living things have evolved by natural processes from preexisting forms. This displaced the traditional belief that species were designed by a wise and benevolent God. Darwin showed how many biological phenomena could be explained on the assumption that related species are descended from a common ancestor. Furthermore, he proposed a radical mechanism to explain how the transformations came about, namely, natural selection. This harsh and apparently purposeless mechanism was seen as a major threat to the claim that the universe has a transcendent goal.
Because Darwin openly extended his evolutionism to include the human race, it was necessary to re-examine the foundations of psychology, ethics and social theory. Moral values might be merely the rationalization of instinctive behaviour patterns. Since the process which produced these patterns was driven by struggle, it could be argued that society must inevitably reflect the harshness of nature (‘social Darwinism’). Darwin’s book has been seen as the trigger for a ’scientific revolution’. It took many decades for both science and Western culture to assimilate the more radical aspects of Darwin’s theory. But since the mid-twentieth century Darwin’s selection mechanism has become the basis for a highly successful theory of evolution, the human consequences of which are still being debated.
Paranormal phenomena
Authors: Braude Stephen E. 
Published: September 2018

The term ‘paranormal phenomena’ refers to the class of anomalous events studied within the field of parapsychology. Parapsychology’s principal areas of investigation are extrasensory perception (ESP), psychokinesis (PK), and cases suggesting that personal consciousness survives the death of one’s body. ESP phenomena are apparent instances of anomalous transfer of information. They divide into telepathy, clairvoyance and precognition. PK phenomena are forms, roughly speaking, of apparent mind-over-matter. Survival research deals primarily with cases of ostensible reincarnation and mediumship (or ‘channelling’).
The data of parapsychology raise a number of deep philosophical issues. Cases suggesting survival challenge materialist theories of the mind, and (according to some) provide good evidence for Cartesian dualism. ESP and PK challenge assumptions about the nature and temporal direction of causal relations, and also suggest the intimidating possibility that we have direct access to and influence on the thoughts and bodily states of others.