Basic Knowledge And Conditions On Knowledge

How do we know what we know? In this stimulating and rigorous book, Mark McBride explores two sets of issues in contemporary epistemology: the problems that warrant transmission poses for the category of basic knowledge; and the status of conclusive reasons, sensitivity, and safety as conditions that are necessary for knowledge. To have basic knowledge is to know (have justification for) some proposition immediately, i.e., knowledge (justification) that doesn’t depend on justification for any other proposition. This book considers several puzzles that arise when you take seriously the possibility that we can have basic knowledge. McBride’s analysis draws together two vital strands in contemporary epistemology that are usually treated in isolation from each other. Additionally, its innovative arguments include a new application of the safety condition to the law. This book will be of interest to epistemologists―both professionals and students.

How do we know what we know? In this stimulating and rigorous book, Mark McBride explores two sets of issues in contemporary epistemology: the problems that warrant transmission poses for the category of basic knowledge; and the status of conclusive reasons, sensitivity, and safety as conditions that are necessary for knowledge. To have basic knowledge is to know (have justification for) some proposition immediately, i.e., knowledge (justification) that doesn't depend on justification for any other proposition. This book considers several puzzles that arise when you take seriously the possibility that we can have basic knowledge. McBride's analysis draws together two vital strands in contemporary epistemology that are usually treated in isolation from each other. Additionally, its innovative arguments include a new application of the safety condition to the law. This book will be of interest to epistemologists―both professionals and students.

In this important new text, Keith Lehrer introduces students to the major traditional and contemporary accounts of knowing. Beginning with the accepted definition of knowledge as justified true belief, Lehrer explores the truth, belief and justification conditions on the way to a thorough examination of foundation theories of knowledge, externalism and naturalized epistemologies, internalism and modern coherence theories as well as recent reliabilist and causal theories. Lehrer gives all views careful examination and concludes that external factors must be matched by appropriate internal ones to yield knowledge. Readers of Professor Lehrer's earlier book Knowledge will want to know that this text adopts the framework of that classic text. But Theory of Knowledge is a completely rewritten and updated version of that book that has been simplified throughout for student use.

This open access book – as the title suggests – explores some of the historical roots and epistemological ramifications of perspectivism. Perspectivism has recently emerged in philosophy of science as an interesting new position in the debate between scientific realism and anti-realism. But there is a lot more to perspectivism than discussions in philosophy of science so far have suggested. Perspectivism is a much broader view that emphasizes how our knowledge (in particular our scientific knowledge of nature) is situated; it is always from a human vantage point (as opposed to some Nagelian "view from nowhere"). This edited collection brings together a diverse team of established and early career scholars across a variety of fields (from the history of philosophy to epistemology and philosophy of science). The resulting nine essays trace some of the seminal ideas of perspectivism back to Kant, Nietzsche, the American Pragmatists, and Putnam, while the second part of the book tackles issues concerning the relation between perspectivism, relativism, and standpoint theories, and the implications of perspectivism for epistemological debates about veritism, epistemic normativity and the foundations of human knowledge.

This study aims to introduce the natural resource uses of Dayak Mentebah people of the village Nanga Dua, West Kalimantan. It is part of the project CoLUPSIA that focuses on reinforcing small stakeholder’s rights. Furthermore, ecological data are collected to support the protection of Indonesia’s species rich and vulnerable tropical forests, threatened through high deforestation rates. The local people’s perceptions about their environment and land uses were assessed using participatory survey techniques: focus group discussions, scoring exercises, free lists of species and participatory mapping. To further record the traditional practices a survey was conducted on medicinal plants. The ecological assessment was done through survey plots in different land use units, where tree diversity and diameter at breast height was measured. The inhabitants of Nanga Dua are dependent upon forest products for food, material for construction, basketry, etc. Medicinal plants are integral part of the health-care system. The traditional, shifting cultivation creates a diverse and mosaic-like patchwork of various types of forests, having different successional stages. Tree diversity in the land-use units was generally high, with the primary forest in immediate proximity acting as tree species reservoir.

Over the last two decades foundationalism has been severely criticized. In response, various alternatives have been advanced, notably coherentism. At the same time new versions of foundationalism were crafted, that were claimed to be immune to the earlier criticisms. This volume contains 12 essays in which various aspects of this dialectic are covered. A number of contributions continue the trend to defend foundationalism, and foundationalism's commitment to basic beliefs and basic knowledge, against various attacks. Others aim to show that one important objection against coherentism, viz. that the notion of coherence' is too vague to be useful, can be countered. Next to these more general issues related to foundationalism, a number of articles deal with much more specific topics. First, various ones deal with mathematical knowledge, and with the problems attached to the idea of basic mathematical knowledgeproblems that derive in part from Benacerraf's work. Second, various contributors deal with Plantinga's notion of "properly basic belief," criticizing it and at the same time proposing improvements on it. Finally there are essays that deal with the problems of basicality in moral knowledge, testimony, and proprioperception. Ren van Woudenberg is professor of philosophy at the Vrije University, Amsterdam, The Netherlands. He is the Co-Editor of the he "Cambridge Companion to Thomas Reid" (2004). Sabine Roeser is an assistant professor at the Technical University of Delft, The Netherlands. Ron Rood is adjunct professor of philosophy at the Vrije University of Amsterdam.