ipl-logo

Gettier's Arguments Against The Justified True Belief

1241 Words5 Pages

Prior to presenting his first case, Gettier makes two explicit assumptions. First, he assumes that it is possible to be justified in believing a proposition that is in fact false. Second, he assumes that if a person is justified in believing a proposition, and recognizes that the proposition entails a second proposition, then the person is justified in believing the second proposition. What role do these two assumptions play in Gettier’s argument against the justified true belief analysis of knowledge? What do you think of these two assumptions? Would it be possible to respond to Gettier’s argument by rejecting one of the two assumptions? If so, what form might the response take? If both of the assumptions are acceptable, does Gettier’s conclusion follow? Once you have completed …show more content…

Belief - a person must believe that p.
2. Truth - the person’s belief that p must be true; if it is not true, it is not knowledge. Even in the case when a belief is mistaken, the believer could feel as if it’s true, but even then, the belief is not knowledge, as it is not true.
3. Justification - the person’s belief that p needs to be supported with any form of rational justification. Without justification, the belief is not knowledge even if it is true.

If all these statements are met, then a person has JTB. JTB says that anytime anyone has a justified true belief that “p”, then he knows that “p”, and that if any one of these statements are not met, then one cannot know that “p”.

Gettier states that it is possible to be justified in believing a false proposition. He then explains that if a person is justified in believing a proposition, even if it is false, and that first proposition entails a second proposition, then the person is consequently justified in believing the second proposition

Show More
Related
1347 Words | 6 Pages

In Lara Buchak’s essay, Can It Be Rational to Have Faith? , she asserts that everyday faith statements and religious faith statements share the same attributes. She later states that in order to truly have faith, a person ceases to search for more evidence for their claim, and that having faith can be rational. Although she makes compelling arguments in favor of faith in God, this essay is more hearsay and assumption than actual fact. In this paper, you will see that looking for further evidence would constitute not having faith, but that having faith, at least in the religious sense, is irrational.

Read More
932 Words | 4 Pages

There is much belief to suggest that we can depend on our senses unless there is just cause or evidence suggested to question their reliability. Therefore, the belief of reality may be subjected to interpretation or skepticism, but without solid evidence to discard what we believe to be true, we should be confident in what we hold to be true. Skepticism or Justified True Belief

Read More
2247 Words | 9 Pages

Infact, the foundationalist argument goes as follows, There are justified basic beliefs, all non-basic justified beliefs are justified by some relation to basic justified beliefs. (Class Notes) The former two premises of the foundationalist argument both deal with basic beliefs, of which the Sellarsian Argument shows a challenges to the foundationalist argument. While the Foundationalist argument is trying to prove that there are basic beliefs, the Sellarsian Argument is completely doing away with them in the above paragraph. Bringing in the idea of assertive propositional content makes a huge impact on the Serllersian Arguments idea of there being no basic beliefs because whether or not a belief is an assertive propositional content makes no difference because it still needs some sort of justification, whether further or from the given states.

Read More
1703 Words | 7 Pages

“The Scythian soldier drinks the blood of the first man he overthrows in battle. […] he cuts off all their heads, and carries them to the king; […] thus entitled to a share of the booty.” This account of the people of southern Russia is observed and recorded by Herodotus of Halicarnassus, a Greek philosopher and a “Father of History” who set out to document the Persian War.

Read More
955 Words | 4 Pages

The reason for believing

Read More
1680 Words | 7 Pages

Clifford argues that all beliefs must be justified. In his writing, The Ethics of Belief, Clifford states that “it is wrong always, everywhere, and for anyone, to believe in anything upon insufficient evidence” (Clifford 5). Clifford means that it is morally wrong to believe something without sufficient evidence. This can be a problem when one examines the very definition of belief. A belief is a thought, which may have a foundation in reality, but does not require it.

Read More
771 Words | 4 Pages

In this essay, Elbow leans towards the believing game and tries to persuade the reader to leave the doubting game behind. Elbow states rules for each game that are used to form a plausible conclusion. The

Read More
255 Words | 2 Pages

Dretske v. Skepticism In The Pragmatic Dimensions to Knowledge, Dretske challenges the skeptical arguments to knowledge. Specifically, that knowledge is an ideal thing that we never truly have, but think we do. Our justifications can not be certain because they could or could not be true. Knowing implies an irrefutable degree of justification that qualifies your beliefs as knowledge.

Read More
1261 Words | 6 Pages

In the 1963 philosophy paper titled “Is Justified True Belief Knowledge?”, Edmund Gettier attempts to deconstruct and disprove the philosophical argument that justified true belief is knowledge. Justified true belief, also commonly referred to as JTB, is used as a certain set of conditions that are used to explain someone s knowing some sort of proposition p. More specifically, JTB is used to say that s has knowledge of p if and only if p is true, s believes that p is true, and s is justified in believing that p is true. Gettier offers main points as the conclusion of his argument against this claim. First, he states that s can be justified in believing that p is true while p is actually false.

Read More
630 Words | 3 Pages

Belief is not Decision Pascal’s Wager, the argument that an individual who believes in God’s existence is entitled to infinite gains. There are three objections against Pascal article, including “the wrong motivation”, “too many options” and “Belief not a decision”. Among these three reasonable objections, I believe that the strongest one is “Belief not a decision”, because everything needs a reason as people are born as rational creatures. Otherwise, people believe in the existence of God because they trust that God could bring benefits to them. For me, although the objection is reasonable, I still think the Pascal’s response is stronger.

Read More
112 Words | 1 Pages

Edmund Gettier is quite confusing in his story “Is Justified True Belief Knowledge”. He says that there are many cases where you have a story and it gives you the run around with the facts. Saying that this is true only if this certain thing is true and if that is not true the second or third thing down that list is true. He has good examples in his paper but is that always the case will there always be adequate evidence for the explanation for the reasoning to be wrong and move on to the next possible explanation. So he is able to justify if his other reasoning’s are proved wrong.

Read More
865 Words | 4 Pages

Belief is accepting a given position or proposition as true even when one does not have enough evidence to back up his or her belief. While having doubt is a feeling of uncertainty or lack of conviction. In “The Fixation of Belief”, Charles Sanders Peirce discusses logic, reason, knowledge, and how one believes. Peirce explains what does it mean to believe or to doubt something and how one can distinguish between what is true and what is not. Peirce also explains four methods of establishing belief, which are the method of tenacity, authority, priori and science.

Read More
608 Words | 3 Pages

3. Moral Inferentialism: Minimal Moral Inferentialism and Moral Bridge Inferentialism We’ve seen what McGrath’s perceptual account of moral knowledge consists of. At this point, I want to introduce both general moral inferentialism and the specific moral inferentialist view McGrath targets with her dilemma, moral bridge inferentialism. Broadly speaking, moral inferentialists deny the truth of P3. Most moral inferentialists argue that all of our moral knowledge of particular cases comes from legitimate inferences from known non-moral facts and potentially knowledge of other things to knowledge of a moral fact.

Read More
752 Words | 4 Pages

William K. Clifford’s “The Ethics of Belief” is an essay about justification and how we are morally required to prove our beliefs. Clifford’s theory throughout the essay was “It is wrong always, everywhere, and for anyone, to believe anything upon insufficient evidence.” Clifford thinks that it is a moral obligation for you to confirm each of your beliefs with sufficient proof, no matter how questionable or insignificant the beliefs may be. I believe he thinks this because beliefs have serious effects and consequences on others.

Read More
805 Words | 4 Pages

In some situations, true beliefs are vital, especially if they are shared. In others, belief does not have to be true for everyone, but need only be true for an individual. A belief that needs to be true is usually a belief pertaining to shared knowledge. If physicists are examining electric field strength using Coulomb’s law, the belief that the charge on an electron is -1.6 x 10-19 Coulombs, must be true, or the results will not pan out.

Read More

More about Gettier's Arguments Against The Justified True Belief

Related Topics

Open Document