Call these, for short, the relation question and the object question. DePaul, M. Ugly Analysis and Value in A. Haddock, A. Millar and D. Pritchard (eds. 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. Carter, J. Disputes the popular claim that understanding is more epistemically valuable than knowledge. Epistemologically, a single-right-answer is believed to underlie each phenomenon, even though experts may not yet have developed a full understanding of the systemic causes that provide an accurate interpretation of some situations. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009. And, thirdly, two questions about what is involved in grasping can easily be run together, but should be kept separate. Outlines and evaluates the anti-intellectualist and intellectualist views of know-how. Utilize at least 2 credible sources to support your position presented in the paper. There is little work focusing exclusively on the prospects of a non-factive construal of understanding-why; most authors, with a few exceptions, take it that understanding-why is obviously factive in a way that is broadly analogous to propositional knowledge. Lipton, P. Understanding Without Explanation in H. de Regt, S. Leonelli, and K. Eigner (eds. This skeptical argument is worth engaging with, presumably with the goal of showing that understanding does not turn out to be internally indistinguishable from mere intelligibility. To this end, the first section offers an overview of the different types of understanding discussed in the literature, though their features are gradually explored in more depth throughout later sections. ), The Nature and Limits of Human Understanding. The medical epistemology we propose conforms to the epistemological responsibility of doctors, which involves a specific professional attitude and epistemological skills. It also allows attributions of understanding in the presence of peripheral false beliefs, without going so far as to grant that understanding is present in cases of internally consistent delusionsas such delusions will feature at least some false central beliefs. Grimm puts the template formulation as follows: A Comanche-style case is one in which we form true beliefs on the basis of trusting some source, and either (a) the source is unreliable, or (b) the source is reliable, but in the current environment one might easily have chosen an unreliable source. After analysing variations of the Comanche case so conceived, Grimm argues that in neither (a)- or (b)-style Comanche cases do knowledge and understanding come apart. To complicate matters further, some of the philosophers who appear to endorse one approach over the other can elsewhere be seen considering a more mixed view (for example, Khalifa 2013b). Pritchard, D. Knowing the Answer, Understanding and Epistemic Value. Grazer Philosophische Studien 77 (2008): 325-39. The Case of Richard Rorty A Newer Argument Pro: Hales's Defense o. Intervening epistemic luck is the sort present in the Gettiers original cases (1963) which convinced most epistemologists to abandon the traditional account of knowledge as justified true belief. It should be noted that Hills 2009: 7 is also sympathetic to a similar thought, suggesting that the threshold for understanding might be contextually determined. 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. In such a parallel case, we simply modify Lackeys original case and suppose that Stella, a creationist teacher, who does not believe in evolution, nonetheless teaches it reliably and in accordance with the highest professional standards. For example, we might suppose that a system of beliefs contains only beliefs about a particular subject matter, and that these beliefs will ordinarily be sufficient for a rational believer who possesses them to answer questions about that subject matter reliably. The underlying idea in play here is that, in short, thinking about how things would be if it were true is an efficacious way to get to further truths; an insight has attracted endorsement in the philosophy of science (for example, Batterman 2009). Rohwer argues that counterexamples like Pritchards intervening luck cases only appear plausible because the beliefs that make up the agents understanding come exclusively from a bad source. Greco, J. For that reason, these will be addressed before moving on to the more explicitly epistemological concerns. This holds regardless of whether we are Platonists or nominalists about such entities. ), Virtue Epistemology Naturalized: Bridges Between Virtue Epistemology and Philosophy of Science. With each step in the sequence, we understand the motion of the planets better than we did before. These retractions do not t seem to make sense on the weak view. This broader interpretation seems well positioned to handle abstract object cases, for example, mathematical understanding, when the kind of understanding at issue is understanding-why. His modal model of understanding fits with the intuition that we understand not propositions but relations between parts to wholes or systems of various thoughts.. As such, Khalifa is not attempting to provide an analysis of grasping. He suggests that manipulating the system allows the understander to see the way in which the manipulation influences (or fails to influence) other parts of the system (2011: 11). Contains the paradigmatic case of environmental epistemic luck (that is, the fake barn case). It is the idea that one has shifted, or changed, the way he or she takes in knowledge (Rayner, 2011).The fact that taking in knowledge has altered is evident in learning institutions today. On this basis Pritchard insists that Grimms analogy breaks down. Grimm, S. Understanding In S. Bernecker and D. Pritchard (eds. He argues that we can gain some traction on the nature of grasping significant to understanding if we view it along such manipulationist lines. Hence, he argues that any propositional knowledge is derivative. However, Elgin takes this line further and insists thatwith some qualificationsfalse central beliefs, and not merely false peripheral beliefs, are compatible with understanding a subject matter to some degree. Ginet, C. Knowledge, Perception and Memory. More generally, though, it is important to note that Khalifa, via his grasping argument, is defending reliable explanatory evaluation as merely a necessarythough not sufficientcomponent of grasping. ), Epistemology (Royal Institute of Philosophy Lectures). iwi galil ace rs regulate; pedestrian killed in london today; holly woodlawn biography; how to change icon size in samsung s21; houston marriott westchase Khalifa, K. Understanding, Grasping and Luck. Episteme 10 (1) (2013b): 1-17. epistemological shift pros and cons. Another seemingly promising lineone that engages with the relation question discussed aboveviews grasping as intimately connected with a certain set of abilities. Builds an account of understanding according to which understanding a subject matter involves possessing a representation that could be manipulated in a useful way. (For example, is it a kind of knowledge, another kind of propositional attitude, an ability, and so on? Pritchard, D. Knowledge and Understanding in A. Fairweather (ed. According to Grimm, cases like Kvanvig admit of a more general characterisation, depending on how the details are filled in. Hetherington, S. There Can be Lucky Knowledge in M. Steup, J. Turri and E. Sosa (eds. On such a view, grasping talk could simply be jettisoned altogether. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1989. Her line is that understanding-why involves (i) knowing what something is, and (ii) making reasonable sense of it. Whitcomb also cites Alston (2005) as endorsing a stronger view, according to which true belief or knowledge gets at least some of its epistemic value from its connection to, and satisfaction of, curiosity. 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. If the latterthat is, if we are to understand grasping literally, then, also unfortunately, we are rarely given concrete details of its nature. As Kvanvig sees it, knowing requires non-accidental links between (internal) mental states and external events in just the right way. Unsurprisingly, the comparison between the nature of understanding as opposed to knowledge has coincided with comparisons of their respective epistemic value, particularly since Kvanvig (2003) first defended the epistemic value of the latter to the former. Make sure you cite them appropriately within your paper, and list them in APA format on your Reference page. This entry surveys the varieties of cognitive success, and some recent efforts to understand some of those varieties. Includes further discussion of the role of acceptance and belief in her view of understanding. It is moreover of interest to note that Khalifa (2013b) also sees a potential place for the notion of grasping in an account of understanding, though in a qualified sense. Nevertheless, distinguishing between the two in this manner raises some problems for her view of objectual understanding, which should be unsurprising given the aforementioned counterexamples that can be constructed against a non-factive reading of Bakers construal of understanding-why. Introduces intelligibility as an epistemic state similar to understanding but less valuable. 121-132. Utilize at least 2 credible sources to support the arguments presented in the paper. Therefore, the need to adopt a weak factivity constraint on objectual understandingat least on the basis of cases that feature idealizationslooks at least initially to be unmotivated in the absence of a more sophisticated view about the relationship between factivity, belief and acceptance (however, see Elgin 2004). The Value of Knowledge and the Pursuit of Understanding. This aside, can we consider extending Grimms conception of understanding as non-propositional knowledge of causes to the domain of objectual understanding? This in part for three principal reasons. This point aligns with the datum that we often attribute understanding by degrees. This view, embraced by DePaul and Grimm (2009), implies that to the extent that understanding and knowledge come apart, it is not with respect to a difference in susceptibility to being undermined by epistemic luck. Morris suggests that the writer of the Comanche book might lack understanding due to failing to endorse the relevant propositions, while the reader might have understanding because she does endorse the relevant proposition. New York: Free Press, 1965. Criticizes Grimms view of understanding as knowledge of causes. Facebook Instagram Email. One reason a manipulationist will be inclined to escape the result in this fashion (by denying that all-knowing entails all-understanding) is precisely because one already (qua manipulationist) is not convinced that understanding can be attained simply through knowledge of propositions. He argues that what is grasped or seen when one attains a priori knowledge is not a proposition but a certain modal relationship between properties, objects or identities. He says that knowledge about a phenomenon (P) is maximally well-connected when the basing relations that obtain between the agents beliefs about P reflect the agents knowledge about the explanatory and support relations that obtain between the members of the full account of P (2015: 12). Kelps account, then, explains our attributions of degrees of understanding in terms of approximations to such well-connected knowledge. 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. 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. 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. He concedes, though, that sometimes curiosity on a smaller scale can be sated by epistemic justification, and that what seems like understanding, but is actually just intelligibility, can sate the appetite when one is deceived. (iv) an ability to draw from the information q the conclusion that p (or probably p), (v) an ability to give q (the right explanation) when given the information that p, and. Dordrecht: Reidel, 1975. Kvanvig, J. What kind of historical enterprise is historical epistemology? Thirdly, even if one accepts something like a moderate factivity requirement on objectual understandingand thus demand of at least a certain class of beliefs one has of a subject matter that they be trueone can also ask further and more nuanced questions about the epistemic status of these true beliefs. Endorses the idea that when we consider how things would be if something was true, we increase our access to further truths. A central component of Kvanvigs argument is negative; he regards knowledge as ill-suited to play the role of satisfying curiosity, and in particular, by rejecting three arguments from Whitcomb to this effect. 13. Consider how some people think they grasp the ways in which their zodiac sign has an influence on their life path, yet their sense of understanding is at odds with the facts of the matter. For example, you read many of your books on screens and e-readers today. Know How. (For example, propositions, systems, bodies of information, the relationships thereof, and so on?). His central claim in his recent work is that understanding can be viewed as knowledge of causes, though appreciating how he is thinking of this takes some situating, given that the knowledge central to understanding is non-propositional. If we sometimes attribute understanding to two people even when they differ only in terms of who has more false beliefs about a subject, this difference in degrees indicates that one can have understanding that includes some false beliefs. On the weakest view, one can understand a subject matter even if none of ones beliefs about that subject matter are true. ), Knowledge, Virtue and Action. Although, many commentators suggest that understanding requires something further, that is something in additional to merely knowing a proposition or propositions, Grimm thinks we can update the knowledge of causes view so that this intuition is accommodated and explained. He considers that grasping might be a modal sense or ability that allows the understander to, over and above registering how things are. Dordrecht: Springer, 2014. If so, why, and if not why not? Boston: Routledge, 2013. A more charitable interpretation of Bakers position would be to read making reasonable sense more strongly. One natural place to start will be to examine the relationship between understanding and epistemic luck. Elgin, C. Understanding and the Facts. Philosophical Studies 132 (2007): 33-42. Sliwa 2015, however, defends a stronger view, according to which propositional knowledge is necessary and sufficient for understanding. In this Gettier-style case, she has good reason to believe her true beliefs, but the source of these beliefs (for example, the rumor mill) is highly unreliable and this makes her beliefs only luckily true, in the sense of intervening epistemic luck. Firstly, Kvanvig introduces propositional understanding as what is attributed in sentences that take the form I understand that X (for example, John understands that he needs to meet Harold at 2pm). Argues that we should replace the main developed accounts of understanding with earlier accounts of scientific explanation. An overview of wisdom, including its potential relationship to understanding. However, Baker (2003) has offered an account on which at least some instances of understanding-why are non-factive. ), Scientific Understanding: Philosophical Perspectives. Fifthly, to what extent might active externalist approaches (for example, extended mind and extended cognition) in epistemology, the ramifications of which have recently been brought to bear on the theory of knowledge (see Carter, et. So the kind of knowledge that it provides is metaknowledgeknowledge about knowledge. He gives the name grasping* to the purely psychological component that would continue to be satisfied even if, say, an evil demon made it the case at the moment of your grasping that there was only an appearance of the thing that appears to you to be the case. His conception of mental representations defines these representations as computational structures with content that are susceptible to mental transformations. Wilkenfeld constructs a necessary condition on objectual understanding around this definition. However, it is not entirely clear that extant views on understanding fall so squarely into these two camps. This is a change from the past. Trout, J.D. Pittsburgh, PA: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2009. Gordon, E. C. Is There Propositional Understanding? Logos & Episteme 3 (2012): 181-192. 1. CA: Wadsworth, 2009. ), Intellectual Virtue: Perspectives from Ethics and Epistemology. Carter, J. Early defence of explanations key role in understanding. Running head: SHIFT IN EPISTEMOLOGY 1 Shift in Epistemology Student's Name Professor's Name Institution Since, for instance, the ideal gas law (for example, Elgin 2007) is recognized as a helpful fiction and is named and taught as such, as is, nave Copernicanism or the simple view that humans evolved from apes. If Kelps thought experiment works, manipulation of representations cannot be a necessary condition of understanding after all. 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. This is because we dont learn about causes a priori. Grimm, S. Understanding as Knowledge of Causes in A. Fairweather (ed. However, Strevens nonetheless offers a rough outline of a parallel, non-factive account of grasping, what he calls grasping*. al 2014), have for understanding? I side with positivism; which states knowledge can be found via empirical observations (obtained through the senses). Many of these questions have gone largely unexplored in the literature. 1. Van Camp, W. Explaining Understanding (or Understanding Explanation. European Journal for Philosophy of Science 4(1) (2014): 95-114. Working hypotheses and idealizations need not, on this line, be viewed as representative of realityidealizations can be taken as useful fictions, and working hypotheses are recognized as the most parsimonious theories on the table without thereby being dubbed as wholly accurate. Keplers theory is a further advance in understanding, and the current theory is yet a further advance. It is controversial just which epistemological issues concerning understanding should be central or primarygiven that understanding is a relative newcomer in the mainstream epistemological literature. Morris (2012), like Rohwer, also defends lucky understandingin particular, understanding-why, or what he calls explanatory understanding). 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). So, understanding is compatible with a kind of epistemic luck that knowledge excludes. A good example here is what Riggs (2003) calls intelligibility, a close cousin of understanding that also implies a grasp of order, pattern and connection, but does not seem to require a substantial connection to truth. But more deeply, atemporal phenomena such as mathematical truths have, in one clear sense, never come to be at all, but have always been, to the extent that they are the case at all. Hills, A. ), Epistemic Value. Knowledge in a Social World. Section 4 examines the relationship between understanding and types of epistemic luck that are typically thought to undermine knowledge. An overview of the object, psychology, and normativity of understanding. sustainability scholarship 2021; lost vape centaurus replacement panels; Looks at the increasing dissatisfaction with ever-more complicated attempts to generate a theory of knowledge immune to counterexamples. Kvanvig identifies the main opponent to his view, that the scope of curiosity is enough to support the unrestricted value of understanding, to be one on which knowledge is what is fundamental to curiosity. 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. . Our culture is shifting, Dede argues, not just from valuing the opinions of experts to the participatory culture of YouTube or Facebook, but from understanding knowledge as fixed and linear to a . Should we say that the use of the term understanding that applies to such cases should be of no interest to epistemology? Grimm (2011) also advocates for a fairly straightforward manipulationist approach in earlier work. Grimm thinks the metaphor involves something like apprehending how things stand in modal space (that is, that there are no possible worlds in which the necessary truth is false). Much of the philosophical tradition has viewed the central epistemological problems concerning perception largely and sometimes exclusively in terms of the metaphysical responses to skepticism. The topic of epistemic value has only relatively recently received sustained attention in mainstream epistemology. ), Object question: What kinds of things are grasped? But is understanding factive? At the other end of the spectrum, we might consider an extremely strong view of understandings factivity, according to which understanding a subject matter requires that all of ones beliefs about the subject matter in question are true. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009. It is also becoming an increasingly popular position to hold that understanding is more epistemically valuable than knowledge (see Kvanvig 2003; Pritchard 2010). Section 2 explores the connection between understanding and truth, with an eye to assessing in virtue of what understanding might be defended as factive. For example, Kvanvig (2003) holds that understanding is particularly valuable in part because it requires a special grasp of explanatory and other coherence-making relationships. Riggs (2003: 20) agrees, stating that understanding of a subject matter requires a deep appreciation, grasp or awareness of how its parts fit together, what role each one plays in the context of the whole, and of the role it plays in the larger scheme of things (italics added). A potential worry then is that the achievement one attains when one understands chemistry need not involve the subject working the subject matterin this case, chemistryscause. The root of the recent resurgence of interest in understanding in epistemology. Pritchard, D. Recent Work on Epistemic Value. American Philosophical Quarterly 44 (2007): 85-110. ), Knowledge, Truth and Obligation. Sliwa, P. IVUnderstanding and Knowing. In other words, S knows that p only if p is true. 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. Essentially, this view traditionally holds that understanding why X is the case is equivalent to knowing why X is the case (which is in turn supposed to be equivalent to knowing that X is the case because of Y). Such discussions, though they can be initially helpful, raise a nest of further questions. Though her work on understanding is not limited to scientific understanding (for example, Elgin 2004), one notable argument she has made is framed to show that a factive conception cannot do justice to the cognitive contributions of science and that a more flexible conception can (2007: 32). As such, his commentary here is particularly relevant to the question of whether gasping is factive. In addition, it is important to make explicit differences in terminology that can sometimes confuse discussions of some types of understanding. Strong cognitive achievement: Cognitive success that is because of ones cognitive ability where the success in question either involves the overcoming of a significant obstacle or the exercise of a significant level of cognitive ability. Elgin (2007), like Zagzebski, is sympathetic to a weak factivity constraint on objectual understanding, where the object of understanding is construed as a fairly comprehensive, coherent body of information (2007: 35). Pritchard maintains that it is intuitive that in the case just described understanding is attainedyou have consulted a genuine fire officer and have received all the true beliefs required for understanding why your house burned down, and acquire this understanding in the right way. For example, he attempts to explain the intuitions in Pritchards intervening luck spin on Kvanvigs Comanche case by noting that some of the temptation to deny understanding here relates to the writer of the luckily-true book himself lacking the relevant understanding. Thus, given that understanding that p and knowing that p can in ordinary contexts be used synonymously (for example, understanding that it will rain is just to know that it will rain) we can paraphrase Zagzebskis point with no loss as: understanding X entails knowing that one understands X. epistemological shift pros and cons. This is the idea that one has shifted, or changed, the way he or she takes in knowledge. A novel interpretation of the traditional view according to which understanding-why can be explained in terms of knowledge of causes. Proponents of weak factivity must address both of these potentially problematic results. It is clearly cognitively better than the belief that humans did not evolve. by | Jun 9, 2022 | prayers of dedication presbyterian | advance australia national director | Jun 9, 2022 | prayers of dedication presbyterian | advance australia national director Make sure you cite them appropriately within your paper and list them in APA format on your Reference page. We regularly claim that people can understand everything from theories to pieces of technology, accounts of historical events and the psychology of other individuals. See answer source: Epistemology in an Hour Caleb Beers According to Zagzebski (2001), the epistemic value of understanding is tied not to elements of its factivity, but rather to its transparency. In this respect, then, Kvanvigs view achieves the result of a middle ground. Elgin, C. Exemplification, Idealization, and Understanding in M. Surez (ed. The ambiguity between assenting to a necessary proposition and the grasping or seeing of certain properties and their necessary relatedness mirrors the ambiguity between assenting to a casual proposition and grasping or seeing of the terms of the causal relata: their modal relatedness. For example, and problematically for any account of objectual understanding that relaxes a factivity constraint, people frequently retract previous attributions of understanding. 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. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011. But in this version of the case, suppose that, although the book is entirely authoritative, genuine and reliable, it is the only trustworthy book on the Comanche on the shelvesevery book on the shelves nearby, which she easily could have grabbed rather than the genuine authoritative book, was filled with rumors and ungrounded suppositions.
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