To What Extent Is The True-Justified-Belief Theory Of Knowledge

Marisa Moreno

Professor Sennet

Philosophy 001

31 Oct 2017

First Paper Topic When someone thinks of the word knowledge, the first thing that tends to pop into their head is that they know something. The question is, do they really know something to the fullest or do they only know a part of it? There is really no correct answer to this because we do not know how much one person knows, and what information they have. In fact, there is much more to knowledge than someone would assume. There are necessary and sufficient conditions for a person to know something, and the three things that embody the concept of knowledge are truth, belief, and justification. It is important to understand how crucial truth, belief, and justification are for any

That is where the justification part comes into play. Justification is where the person has valid reason/s in believing that the something is true. A clear coat is by using the variables m and n where m is the person and n is the something. Through the concept of knowledge, m believes that n is true, and m has justification to believe that n is indeed true. Yet, the True-justified-belief theory of knowledge does not work alone, it includes necessary and sufficient conditions. A necessary condition is important because it is an essential condition in any case. A clear example is that Y is a necessary condition for Z, and Z needs to have Y at all times. An example without variables is, having three sides is necessary in order to be a triangle. Sometimes, necessary conditions can get a little tricky because Y may not be a necessary condition of Z. It is not necessary for a person to be American to live in the United States of America, since many people from around the world come to live here. Looking into sufficient conditions, Y guarantees the presence of Z because if Y is present than Z is present. Going back to the triangle example used previously, one could state that being a triangle is sufficient for having three sides. There are in fact counter examples that show that Y may not

Although, an American philosopher named Edmund Gettier challenged the TBJ theory. Gettier used two counterexamples where people has a justified true belief for a certain claim, but they still failed to know it. For example, a person is a huge fan of Niall Horan, a famous singer, who is from Ireland. That person goes to his hometown in Ireland thinking they will run into him. A blonde haired, young, Irish man walks out of a pub in the near distance, and the person suddenly assumes the man is Niall Horan since they are in his hometown, and he looks like him. The belief that instantly occurs is that the person just saw Niall in his hometown. Yet, the man gets into somebody’s car and drives off. However, the person is not close enough to see that the man who walked out of the pub was not Niall, but the car he goes into was Niall’s car and Niall was indeed driving concluding he was in his hometown. Therefore, there is no evidence to prove Niall is in his hometown, and what has been see by the human eye is a person who looked like Niall, but was in fact not him. There is true-justified-belief that Niall is in Ireland, but that belief is not knowledge. This proves that sometimes people believe they know something and have justification to believe something, but then something so small can alter what they think they know and end up being