30 Mar

epistemological shift pros and cons

However, such a strong view would also make understanding nearly unobtainable and surely very rarefor example, on the extremely strong proposal under consideration, recognized experts in a field would be denied understanding if they had a single false belief about some very minor aspect of the subject matter. True enough. Philosophical issues, 14(1) (2004): 113-131. For that reason, these will be addressed before moving on to the more explicitly epistemological concerns. Divides recent views of understanding according to whether they are manipulationist or explanationst; argues for a different view according to which understanding is maximally well-connected knowledge. New York: Free Press, 1965. In terms of parallels with the understanding debate, it is important to note that the knowledge of causes formula is not limited to the traditional propositional reading. The Varieties of Cognitive Success 1.1 What Kinds of Things Enjoy Cognitive Success? The modern epistemology deals with the debate between rationalism and empiricism. Early defence of explanations key role in understanding. Orand this is a point that has received little attentioneven more weakly, can the true beliefs be themselves unreliably formed or held on the basis of bad reasons. But is understanding 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. Take first the object question. Section 4 examines the relationship between understanding and types of epistemic luck that are typically thought to undermine knowledge. It is plausible that a factivity constraint would also be an important necessary condition on objectual understanding, but there is more nuanced debate about the precise sense in which this might be the case. 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. What are the advantages and disadvantages of epistemology as - Quora Grimm, S. Is Understanding a Species of Knowledge? British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 57 (2006): 515-535. ), Scientific Understanding: Philosophical Perspectives. Hills herself does not believe that understanding-why is some kind of propositional knowledge, but she points out that even if it is there is nonetheless good cause to think that understanding-why is very unlike ordinary propositional knowledge. Curiosity and a Response-Dependent Account of the Value of Understanding. In T. Henning and D. Schweikard (eds. Some (for example, Gordon 2012) suggest that attributions of propositional understanding typically involve attributes of propositional knowledge or a more comprehensive type of understandingunderstanding-why, or objectual understanding (these types are examined more closely below). 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. While the matter of how to think about the incompatibility of knowledge with epistemic luck remains a contentious pointfor instance, here modal accounts (for example, Pritchard 2005) are at odds with lack-of-control accounts (for example, Riggs 2007), few contemporary epistemologists dissent from the comparatively less controversial claim that knowledge excludes luck in a way that true beliefs and sometimes even justified true beliefs do not (see Hetherington (2013) for a dissenting position). That said, the question of whether, and if so to what extent, understanding is compatible with epistemic luck, lacks any contemporary consensus, though this is an aspect of understanding that is receiving increased attention. 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. Discuss the pros and cons of the epistemological - Course Hero For example, you read many of your books on screens and e-readers today. Pittsburgh, PA: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2009. Contains the paradigmatic case of environmental epistemic luck (that is, the fake barn case). Objectual understanding is equivalent to what Pritchard has at some points termed holistic understanding (2009: 12). In the first version, we are to imagine that the agent gets her beliefs from a faux-academic book filled with mere rumors that turn out to be luckily true. He considers that grasping might be a modal sense or ability that allows the understander to, over and above registering how things are. This leaves us, however, with an interesting question about the point at which there is no understanding at all, rather than merely weaker or poorer understanding. Are the prospects of extending understanding via active externalism on a par with the prospects for extending knowledge, or is understanding essentially internal in a way that knowledge need not be? 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). That said, Hills adds some qualifications. Despite the fact that Copernicuss central claim was strictly false, the theory it belongs to constitutes a major advance in understanding over the Ptolemaic theory it replaced. Riggs (2003: 21-22) asks whether an explanation has to be true to provide understanding, and Strevens thinks that it is implied that grasping is factive. Kvanvig (2003; 2009) offers such a view, according to which understanding of some subject matter is incompatible with false central beliefs about the subject matter. Contains the famous counterexamples to the Justified True Belief account of knowledge. 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. Consider, for instance, the felicity of the question: Am I understanding this correctly? and I do not know if I understand my own defense mechanisms; I think I understand them, but I am not sure. The other side of the coin is that one often can think that one understands things that one does not (for example, Trout 2007). Perhaps the strongest of these is his suggestion that while the faculty of rational insight is indispensable to the grasping account of a priori, it is actually essential to knowledge of causes that it not be grasped through rational insight. If so, then the internally consistent delusion objection typically leveled against weakly nonfactive views raises its head. Some of Pritchards (for example, 2009) earlier work on understanding uses the terminology atomistic understanding as synonymous with understanding-why and indeed his more recent work shifts to using the latter term. Finally, Section 6 proposes various potential avenues for future research, with an eye towards anticipating how considerations relating to understanding might shed light on a range of live debates elsewhere in epistemology and in philosophy more generally. epistemological shift pros and cons - singhaniatabletting.in The Value of Knowledge and the Pursuit of Understanding. It is just dumb luck the genuine sheep happened to be in the field. Kelp, C. Understanding Phenomena. Synthese (2015). Running head: SHIFT IN EPISTEMOLOGY 1 Shift in Epistemology Student's Name Professor's Name Institution Section 2 explores the connection between understanding and truth, with an eye to assessing in virtue of what understanding might be defended as factive. in barn faade cases, where environmental luck is incompatible with knowledge but compatible with cognitive achievement) and the absence of cognitive achievement in the presence of knowledge (e.g. 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. epistemological shift pros and cons. It is also becoming an increasingly popular position to hold that understanding is more epistemically valuable than knowledge (see Kvanvig 2003; Pritchard 2010). Zagzebski does not mean to say that to understand X, one must also understand ones own understanding of X (as this threatens a psychologically implausible regress), but rather, that to understand X one must also understand that one understands X. Owing to Kvanvigs use of the words perceived achievement, Grimm thinks that the curiosity account of understandings value suggests that subjective understanding (or what is referred to as intelligibility above) can satisfy the desire to make sense of the world or really marks the legitimate end of inquiry.. ), The Stanford Enclopedia of Philosophy. Explores understanding as the proper goal of inquiry, in addition to discussing understandings distinctive value. Morris (2012), like Rohwer, also defends lucky understandingin particular, understanding-why, or what he calls explanatory understanding). 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). Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011. Knowledge is almost universally taken to be to be factive (compare, Hazlett 2010). Disputes the popular claim that understanding is more epistemically valuable than knowledge. Carter, J. 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. The Pros And Cons Of Epistemology. 57-74, 2015. Would this impede ones understanding? ), The Nature and Limits of Human Understanding. Offers an account of understanding that requires having a theory of the relevant phenomenon. ), Epistemic Value. This allows the agent to produce a slightly different mental representation of the subject matter that enables efficacious inferences pertaining to (or manipulations of) the subject matter. The Pros And Cons Of Epistemology - Internet Public Library Elgin, C. Z. It will accordingly be helpful to narrow our focus to the varieties of understanding that feature most prominently in the epistemological literature. Though in light of this fact, it is not obvious that understanding is the appropriate term for this state. The Psychology of Scientific Explanation. Philosophy Compass 2(3) (2007): 564-591. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009. Secondly, even subject matters that traffic in empirical rather than abstract atemporal phenomena (for example, pure mathematics), are not clearly such that understanding them should involve any appreciation for their coming to be, or their being caused to exist. As Zagzebski (2009: 141) remarks, different uses of understanding seem to mean so many different things that it is hard to identify the state that has been ignored (italics added). In short, then, Kvanvig wants to insist that the true beliefs that one attains in acquiring ones understanding can all be Gettiered, even though the Gettier-style luck which prevents these beliefs from qualifying as knowledge does not undermine the understanding this individual acquires. Solicitar ms informacin: 310-2409701 | administracion@consultoresayc.co. As such, Khalifa is not attempting to provide an analysis of grasping. 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 One can split views on this question into roughly three positions that advocate varying strengths of a factivity constraint on objectual understanding. He suggests that the primary object of a priori knowledge is the modal reality itself that is grasped by the mind and that on this basis we go on to assent to the proposition that describes these relationships. ), Object question: What kinds of things are grasped? 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. Kim, J. Thirdly, Kelp (2015) has an objection that he thinks all who favor a manipulationist line should find worrying. See Elgin (2004) for some further discussion of the role of acceptance and belief in her account. 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. Grasping also allows the understander to anticipate what would happen if things were relevantly differentnamely, to make correct inferences about the ways in which relevant differences to the truth-values of the involved propositions would influence the inferences that obtain in the actual world. Discuss the pros and cons of the epistemological shift in an essay. Toon (2015) has recently suggested, with reference to the hypothesis of extended cognition, that understanding can be located partly outside the head. Given that the result is the same (that is, the patients heart muscle blood supply is improved) regardless of whether he successfully completes the operation by luck or by skill, the instrumental value of the action is the same. A. and Pritchard, D. Knowledge-How and Epistemic Luck. Nos (2013). In looking at moral understanding-why, outlines some key abilities that may be necessary to the grasping component of understanding. Here, and unlike in the case of intervening epistemic luck, nothing actually goes awry, and the fact that the belief could easily have been false is owed entirely to the agents being in a bad environment, one with faades nearby. 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. In addition, Zagzebski supports the provocative line that understanding can perhaps sometimes be more desirable when the epistemic agent does not have the relevant true beliefs. Grimm does not make the further claim that understanding is a kind of know-howhe merely says that there is similarity regarding the object, which does not guarantee that the activity of understanding and know-how are so closely related. Uses the concept of understanding to underwrite a theory of explanation. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001. 1pt1): pp. For example, you read many of your books on screens and e-readers today. However, the core explanationist insight also offers the resources to supplement a grasping account. A second reason that adverting to grasping-talk in the service of characterizing understanding raises further question is that it is often not clarified just what relationships or connections are being grasped, when they are grasped in a way that is distinctive of understanding. 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? Criticizes Grimms view of understanding as knowledge of causes. As such, his commentary here is particularly relevant to the question of whether gasping is factive. 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. Emma C. Gordon For example: Although a moderate view of understandings factivity may look promising in comparison with competitor accounts, many important details remain left to be spelled out. Scotland, U.K. A Weak Factivity Constraint on Objectual Understanding, Moderate Views of Objectual Understandings Factivity, Understanding as Representation Manipulability, Understanding as Well-Connected Knowledge, Understanding as (Partially) Compatible with Epistemic Luck, Newer Defenses of Understandings Compatibility with Epistemic Luck. If so, why, and if not why not? But, the chief requirement of understanding, for him, is instead that there be the right coherence-making relations in some agents collection of information (that is, that the agent has a grasp of how all this related information fits together. Further, suppose that the self-proclaimed psychic even has reason to believe he is right to think he is psychic, as his friends and family deem that it is safer or kinder to buy into his delusions outwardly. An important question is whether there are philosophical considerations beyond simply intuition to adjudicate in a principled way why we should think about unifying understanding cases in one way rather than the other. ), The Routledge Companion to Epistemology. With these three types of understanding in mindpropositional understanding, understanding-why and objectual understandingthe next section considers some of the key questions that arise when one attempts to think about when, and under what conditions, understanding should be ascribed to epistemic agents. Your paper should be 3-4 pages in length, not counting the Title page and Reference . Secondly, one might wonder if Wilkenfelds account of understanding as representation manipulation is too inclusivethat it rules in, as cases of bona fide understanding, representations that are based on inaccurate but internally consistent beliefs. For Meanwhile, when discussing outright (as opposed to ideal) understanding, Kelp suggests that we adopt a contextualist perspective. Understanding in Epistemology | Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy epistemological shift - porosity.ca Epistemological Relativism: Arguments Pro and Con Philosophers concern on epistemological shift - Eddusaver Consider, on this point, that a conspiracy theorist might very well grasp* the connection between (false) propositions so as to achieve a coherent, intelligible, though wildly off-base, picture. 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). 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. Nonetheless, Zagzebski thinks that believing this actually allows us more understanding for most purposes than the vastly more complicated truth owing to our cognitive limitations. 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. London: Routledge, 2009. While his view fits well with understanding-why, it is less obvious that objectual understanding involves grasping how things came to be. According to Zagzebski (2001), the epistemic value of understanding is tied not to elements of its factivity, but rather to its transparency. Pros and Cons of Epistemological Shift. Social Sciences - EssayZoo The conspiracy theorist possesses something which one who grasps (rather than grasps*) a correct theory also possesses, and yet one who fails to grasp* even the conspiracy theory (for example, a would-be conspiracy theorist who has yet to form a coherent picture of how the false propositions fit together) lacks. The thought is that, in cases of achievement, the relevant success must be primarily creditable to the exercise of the agents abilities, rather than to some other factor (for example, luck). If Pritchard is right to claim that understanding is always a strong cognitive achievement, then understanding is always finally valuable if cognitive achievement is also always finally valuable, and moreover, valuable in a way that knowledge is not. A view on which the psychics epistemic position in this case qualifies as understanding-why would be unsatisfactorily inclusive. 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. To the extent that these worries with transparency are apt, a potential obstacle emerges for the prospects of accounting for the value of understanding in terms of its transparency. This aside, can we consider extending Grimms conception of understanding as non-propositional knowledge of causes to the domain of objectual understanding? Grimm (2011) suggests that what we should regard as being understood in cases of objectual understandingnamely, the object of the objectual attitude relationcan be helpfully thought of as akin to a system or structure [that has] parts or elements that depend upon one another in various ways.. Boston: Routledge, 2013. The Epistemology Shift, Essay Example More specifically, Kvanvig aims to support the contention that objectual understanding has a special value knowledge lacks by arguing that the nature of curiositythe motivational element that drives cognitive machinery (2013: 152)underwrites a way of vindicating understandings final value. 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). 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. Hills (2009) is an advocate of such a view of understanding-why in particular. For example, you read many of your books on screens and e-readers today. This is a change from the past. Secondly, there is plenty of scope for understanding to play a more significant role in social epistemology. security guard 12 hour shifts aubrey pearsons oaks husband epistemological shift pros and cons. butterfly pea flower vodka cocktail Anasayfa; aware super theatre parking. What (Good) is Historical Epistemology? | MPIWG This is the idea that one has shifted, or changed, the way he or she takes in knowledge. (vi) an ability to give q (the right explanation) when given the information p. For a less concessionary critique of Kvanvigs Comanche case, however, see Grimm (2006). Kelps account, then, explains our attributions of degrees of understanding in terms of approximations to such well-connected knowledge. On the one hand, there is the increasing support for virtue epistemology that began in the 1980s, and on the other there is growing dissatisfaction with the ever-complicated attempt to generate an account of knowledge that is appropriately immune to Gettier-style counterexamples (see, for example, DePaul 2009). . Khalifa, K. Understanding, Grasping and Luck. Episteme 10 (1) (2013b): 1-17. Grimm, S. Understanding as Knowledge of Causes in A. Fairweather (ed. Pritchard, D. Knowledge, Understanding and Epistemic Value In A. OHear (ed. Stanley, J and Williamson, T. Knowing How. Journal of Philosophy 98(8) (2001): 411-444. Understanding entails that such beliefs must be the result of exercising reliable cognitive abilities. The Pros And Cons Of Epistemology And Theory Of Knowledge Goldman, A. ), The Continuum Companion to Epistemology. Since it is central to her take on human evolution, factivists like Kvanvig must conclude that her take on human evolution does not qualify as understanding. There are three potential worries with this general style of approach. 4 Pages. 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. Must they be known or can they be Gettiered true beliefs? One point that could potentially invite criticism is the move from (1) and (2) to (3). Likewise, just as all understanding will presumably involve achieving intelligibility even though intelligibility does not entail understanding, so too will all grasping involve grasping* even though grasping* does not entail grasping. manage list views salesforce. Morris challenges the assumption that hearers cannot gain understanding through the testimony of those who lack understanding, and accordingly, embraces a kind of understanding transmission principle that parallels the kind of knowledge transmission principle that is presently a topic of controversy in the epistemology of testimony. So the kind of knowledge that it provides is metaknowledgeknowledge about knowledge. Wilkenfeld suggests that this ability consists at least partly in being able to correct minor mistakes in ones mental representation and use it to make assessments in similar cases. On such a view, grasping talk could simply be jettisoned altogether. Elgin, C. Exemplification, Idealization, and Understanding in M. Surez (ed. Riggs, W. Why Epistemologists Are So Down on Their Luck. Synthese 158 (3) (2007): 329-344. One issue worth bringing into sharper focus is whether knowing a good and correct explanation is really the ideal form of understanding-why. ), Knowledge, Truth and Obligation. Dordrecht: Reidel, 1975. epistemological shift pros and cons Due to the possibility of overly simple or passive successes qualifying as cognitive achievements (for example, coming to truly believe that it is dark just by looking out of the window in normal conditions after 10pm), Pritchard cautions that we should distinguish between two classes of cognitive achievementstrong and weak: Weak cognitive achievement: Cognitive success that is because of ones cognitive ability. However, Baker (2003) has offered an account on which at least some instances of understanding-why are non-factive. facebook android official. 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. Alston, W. Beyond Justification: Dimensions of Epistemic Evaluation. Contains a discussion of the fact that we often take ourselves to understand things we do not. London: Continuum, 2012. 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.