User:Dominic Mayers/sandbox/work in progress

The pages User:Dominic_Mayers/sandbox/Notes on epistemology and User:Dominic_Mayers/sandbox/Historical context, especially the Notes on epistemology (which I wrote first),  are a kind of brainstorming for the content of the article Epistemology. I do not expect that many, if any, editors will read them. What follows is also a brainstorming, but hopefully it will get closer to a concrete plan for the article. It is about one section, but the idea is to list the key attributable views on epistemology or aspects of epistemology and see how to present them in a well organized manner. I tried to make this brainstorming useful as a way to modify the article.

The first paragraph
The problem with that first paragraph is that it presents one very limited interpretation of Plato's philosophy as if it was the truth. There is a need to find the notorious main views on the different aspects of epistemology and not present them as truth. The use of Plato's philosophy to motivate the analysis of knowledge as justified true belief is one of these aspects. There is clearly plenty of notorious sources that say this is a legend or a myth. For example, Dutant called this the "legend of the justified true belief analysis". The article presents these biases as truth. Yes, superficially, it seems to make sense that Plato considered the definition of knowledge as justified true belief, but actually many say that Plato has a completely different perspective on knowledge. For example, Jessica Moss wrote

Similarly, Maria Rosa Antognazza wrote

There is not even a need to have the views of Jessica Moss and Maria Rosa Antognazza to see that the view presented is biased. It should be obvious that it makes no sense to try to see the modern justified true belief analysis in the ancient Plato's theory of knowledge. These guys were speaking of recollection of eternal knowledge from previous existence.

Adding Aristotle
The entry Epistemology in Britannica online has a nice section on Aristotle. Stephen Hetherington's chapter EPISTEMOLOGY’S PAST HERE AND NOW in Epistemology: The Key Thinkers edited by himself is a good example of a source that says Aristotle was doing philosophy just like in contemporary epistemology. In this chapter, Hetherington says nothing about fundamental differences that might have existed.

The second paragraph
The first sentence is: It says implicitly that Hellenistic skepticism is a part of what we consider epistemology today. Given that knowledge in ancient Greek was not the same as it is in the contemporary "traditional" analysis of knowledge, this says that the scope is very large and covers all kinds of views on knowledge. In itself, this is fine, but, it does not help for the purpose of the section, which is to provide reference view points that help present other view points in the article. It should help us understand the actual scope of the article. Instead of suggesting an uniformity in epistemology from Plato to contemporary philosophy, the section should bring out the different views nowadays and in the history of philosophy and situate contemporary epistemology as covered in the article in that context. I am not defending at all any restriction on the scope. It's fine to suggest that the scope is very large (as long as the scope is actually very large, because otherwise it is a misrepresentation), but what this section needs to provide are specific views that constitute a context for the remainder of the article, not generalities.

Making the second paragraph more useful
One key view point that needs to be placed in a larger context is that knowledge is justified true belief. This view needs to be usefully related to Hellenistic skepticism. Perhaps there exists a contemporary view on ancient Greece skepticism that suggests that the purpose of skepticism is not to say that knowledge is impossible, but only that an epistemic warrant cannot always be required and therefore knowledge must some times be obtained differently. This would be consistent with Plato's recollection. I In his 2020 thesis dissertation, Charles Anthony Neil mentions that van Cleve consider that some belief can be self-justified:   In my view, the language is misleading, because it suggests that knowledge is a belief that somehow does not need justification, but a belief is normally not knowledge. It might be a starting point for a learning or recollection process, but when we get to knowledge, we are not in a belief state anymore. It is related to Pure Coherentism as described by Todd R. Long: John Hawthorne and Dani Rabinowitz say that Timothy Williamson also uses the self-justified idea: Strangely, it is applied to a belief even though Williamson say that knowledge is first, i.e., if P is known, it is not to be analysed in terms of constituents such as a belief, etc. Anthony Brueckner describes Williamson's view more accurately: Williamson notion of knowledge first is well known, but I don't know if Williamson has made the link with the fact that it is an answer to ancient Greek skepticism. It would be very surprising if he did not. Yep, as I expected, Alvin I. Goldman is very clear on this point:

Role of skepticism
There is another way to make skepticism more related to justified true belief or other central concepts in modern epistemology. Skepticism even in contemporary epistemology is central in making philosophers such as Williamson change fundamentally their view on knowledge. That is different than the (in my opinion strange) view that these ancient philosophers had only for purpose to claim that knowledge is not possible. In particular, Socrates's statement that he knew nothing is described as the inspiration for Pyrrhonian skepticism by philosophers, but Socrates valued people who knew how to do good things in the society. Katja Vogt wrote in the entry Ancient Skepticism of the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy:

A similar view is maintained by Paul L. Heck: In, it is said that Socrates's skeptical stance influenced Plato. Daniel Massey says: Gareth B. Matthews discusses Benson's view on Socrates's skepticism:

I need to understand this view of Kvanvig: Timothy Chappell wrote: Gail Fine wrote: Indeed Taylor wrote: Nicholas D. Smith wrote:

The third paragraph
Here is the paragraph: Even if that is the truth, points of view on ancient philosophy must be attributed. Again, this is a problem in the section. It presents points of view as truths. It also seems to be very selective in the views point that it presents. Moreover, no sources are provided. I just read the Epistemology in Classical Indian Philosophy entry in the Stanford Encyclopedia of philosophy. It is a very natural source to start with. I would never say that it gives the truth, but it gives an academic view. The section on Epistemology does not say at all that Indian skepticism rejects the possibility of knowledge. It rejects the possibility of inference from perception. It says "Inference depends upon generalizations which outstrip perceptual evidence". It also says "The Cārvāka argument identifying the problem of induction is turned by both Buddhist and Nyāya philosophers into an argument for fallibilism about inference." However, skepticism does not reject valid inference. The entry says "But to accept that sometimes we reason in ways that mimic but fail to instantiate right forms is not to be a skeptic. Indeed, the very concept of a fallacy (hetv-ābhāsa) presupposes that of the veritable reason or sign (hetu), a veritable prover making us have new knowledge." This makes much more sense than what the current paragraph says. What I find most interesting is what the next section in the entry says. It is about "Knowing That You Know" and it begins with the following: This is exactly the point raised at the end of the previous subsection about the second paragraph. The idea that an infinite regress or other skeptical arguments are raised to infer that knowledge does not exist is nonsensical in comparison with the idea that these arguments are used to remove obstacles to the notion that knowledge is self-certifying.

The fourth paragraph
Here is the paragraph:

The two first sentences are more about Al-Ghazali than about Islamic epistemology. The third sentence only says that one of his book was important in Islamic epistemology. That is not useful as a context to describe contemporary view points on epistemology. The last sentence could be useful, but what it says is not clear and it is sourced in a 11th century primary source (recently translated).

Making the fourth paragraph more useful
The following is the view point of Charles Bolyard in Epistemology: The Key Thinkers (2019) : John Turri, Mark Alfano and  John Greco in the entry Virtue Epistemology of SEP wrote: The entry Ancient Skepticism in SEP says:

The entry Medieval Skepticism in SEP says: Henrik Lagerlund in Rethinking the History of Skepticism writes:

In the same book, Taneli Kukkonen writes: Heck in Skepticism in Classical Islam: Moments of confusion writes: and later in the same book continues:

The fifth paragraph
Here is the paragraph:

My view about this paragraph is similar as in the case of the second paragraph: It suggests an uniformity in the concept of epistemology from Plato to contemporary philosophy, but that is not useful. It needs to be more specific so that it can serve as a point of comparison to describe contemporary views on epistemology.

Making the fifth paragraph more useful
Ayers and Antognazza say that for the great medieval philosopher Thomas Aquinas, as it was the case for the ancient Greeks,  knowledge and belief are of different kinds. Presenting Aquinas's view regarding a need for justification, Ayers and Antognazza wrote:

In a footnote to that sentence they add:

The sixth and seventh paragraphs
Here are the paragraphs: I just read again the source given to verify the first sentence: the introduction by Jan Woleński to the Handbook of Epistemology edited by I. Niiniluoto, Matti Sintonen and  himself. It is not sufficient to attribute the second sentence. The first sentence would have to be modified so that the view point is not expressed as a truth, but also attributed to Woleński. But this can easily be taken care of. There is a more fundamental issue. I don't see the point of mentioning this. Wolenski had a very specific purpose: he says clearly that he is giving a rational for the scope of his introduction: why he does not cover before Descartes. But, this is entirely the opposite of what the fifth previous paragraphs do in our case. So, that is not a valid purpose in our case. What could be useful is why Woleński thinks epistemology "came to the fore" with Descartes. That would be something more concrete than only "came to the fore". Perhaps the goal is to suggest that there is a continuity from the early modern period to contemporary epistemology. Indeed, it does suggest that epistemology (implicitly as we know it today) was there (and received a lot of attention) in the early modern period. In other words, the problem is that, as in the previous paragraphs, this paragraph and the next one contain nothing specific that can be used as a point of comparison to present contemporary views on epistemology, but instead only say a generality, which suggests, on the contrary, an uniformity in epistemology from the given period to contemporary philosophy.

The overall seventh paragraph indeed provides a basic background. The opposition between rationalism and empiricism is indeed important in the understanding of contemporary epistemology, but suggesting that it was resolved by Kant (without sources) is wrong. Also, Kant's distinction between "begins" and "arises out" is not well explained. These two paragraphs are not that helpful.

Epistemology came to the fore during the early modern period
A recent modification contributed to the creation of these paragraphs. It emphasized the importance of the early modern period for epistemology. It used Wolensky's entry The History of Epistemology in the Handbook of Epistemology of which he is one of the editor. Wolenski says that epistemology came to the fore with Descartes, Berkeley, etc. It is important to characterize more precisely what it is exactly that Wolensky appreciates about these philosophers that make them epistemologically oriented. This needs to be expressed more concretely so that the readers have useful information. Wolensky gives us some clues when he writes The key point seems to be a distinction between a cognition in one's mind (a thought, a perception) and a reality (the existence of a subject, the perceived object, etc.) But, this kind of distinctions has always been central in philosophy. For example, Aristotle distinguished between the intellect (nous) and matter (hulê). Aristotle was aware of the role of  perception and that the intellect, not matter, was responsible for logical inference and induction. So, what is so special about the distinction seen by Wolensky? Perhaps, the nature of the intellect in Aristotle is different from its counterpart in contemporary epistemology. This is discussed in the entry Cartesianism of Britannica, section Mechanism versus Aristotelianism, and would be useful information for the readers.

The subsection Contemporary historiography
Before reading the two sources provided, this subsection seemed well sourced and pertinent. After reading the sources, it seemed a different subject, concerned by things that traditional English books on epistemology ignore. The two sources provided are about historical epistemology, history of epistemology, and how they relate. Traditional books on epistemology discuss the history of epistemology in the traditional sense, for example, they will discuss Descartes's historical approach to obtain certainty. The key point that was made in the above discussion of the six paragraphs is that the history of epistemology must be presented carefully, by giving all view points that can be useful to discuss contemporary epistemology. For example, this is why Dutant's view, Antognazza's view and Ayer's view must be presented. Naively, there is not much more to say: the history must be presented carefully and that's it. However. that subsection and the sources provided suggest that there is much more to say.

I went to see what was written about "historical epistemology" in the hope to see what more can be said. It seems to be a concern within "Social Epistemology" or within the French philosophical tradition introduced by Rey, Bachelelard and Canguilhem. For example, there are 78 different articles in The Routledge Companion To Epistemology edited by Sven Bernecker and Duncan Pritchard and "historical epistemology" is mentioned only in the 77th article, Social Epistemology, by Martin Kusch. The expression also appears in the 2017 book When Historiography Met Epistemology by Stefano Bordoni, a book that "deals with the emergence of a sophisticated history and philosophy of science in French-speaking countries in the second half of the nineteenth century." Jean-François Braunstein in the chapter Historical Epistemology, Old And New of Epistemology and History: From Bachelard and Canguilhem to Today’s History of Science says that the expression “historical epistemology” first appeared [in French] in the writings of [...] Abel Rey [... who] articulated ideas in a very clear way that would be later be taken up and developed in a more complex fashion by more original and important writers – in this instance Bachelard and Canguilhem." The expression is also mentioned once in A Companion to Epistemology (2010) edited by Jonathan Dancy, Ernest Sosa, and Matthias Steup, in the entry Genetic Epistemology by Richard F. Kitchener who only mentions it to point out that genetic epistemology is hard to distinguish from historical epistemology and other related fields:

Moreover, this sentence refers to a particular meaning of "historical epistemology": the source provided,, explains that "historical" has been used to qualify "epistemology" in different manners.

A plan to rewrite the history section with a view on the organisation of the entire article
A useful and easy to read article requires a clear focus and thus a scope that is well defined. The scope of epistemology is well defined by the key books and encyclopedia articles written by contemporary epistemologists. This includes the view of these contemporary epistemologists on its history. There is still a challenge, because the scope is nevertheless very large and it is very difficult to extract the key concepts and to organize them properly. History should help to obtain that global organization. For example, some history is provided by Floridi in The renaissance of Epistemology. That does not mean that the scope is restricted to the content of Floridi's article. It means that we organize content with the help of that historical perspective and other related historical perspectives. Of course, the expression "renaissance of epistemology" must be understood to mean "the birth of contemporary epistemology" or the beginning of this birth. Again, contemporary epistemology is what we cover and this includes its historical perspective. However, one must not confuse the perspective taken by contemporary epistemologists on past philosophies and the perspective taken by Floridi on the birth of contemporary epistemology. Both have an historical flavour, but the latter does not try to locate contemporary epistemological concepts inside ancient philosophies. It is very important to understand this distinction, because we could not reasonably organize the article in terms of perspectives taken by some contemporary epistemologists on ancient philosophies. These perspectives are view points, which are part of the content that needs to be organized, but are not necessarily central view points. They are views on ancient philosophies that are obtained from the standpoint of specific contemporary epistemological perspectives, some of them even criticized by other philosophers. Floridi's perspective is different. It is a view on (the birth of) contemporary epistemology from the perspective of the general history of philosophy, which is less polemic. This kind of distinction has been noted by others. For example, three historians, in a book about Ernst Mach who, they say, played a real but unnoticed role in contemporary epistemology, wrote: An epistemological perspective and the questions raised under that perspective require a shared contextual background. The above mentioned distinction can be seen in the way that background is considered: When philosophers write about history they  use that background without explaining how it emerged in its historical context. In contrast, historians focus more on that background, how it emerged, etc.  For example, consider the first two sentences of the history section: These two sentences ignore the complex debates that always existed around the nature of knowledge, but there is a more fundamental problem with them: they are written from the standpoint of a specific contemporary epistemological perspective without providing its historical background. A discussion of these complex debates, though useful and eventually necessary, is not in itself the solution to that problem, because they could be done under the same specific contemporary epistemological perspective in a similar way. In contrast, Floridi's analysis and related analyses try to fill that gap by explaining the new naturalistic attitude that emerged in the mid twentieth century and that hold stronger than ever in contemporary epistemology and is the foundation or background on the basis of which contemporary epistemology asks its questions.

The historical perspective on epistemology
Again, here we do not attempt to see any contemporary epistemological perspective in ancient philosophies. Instead, we look at how the current approach or angle of attack in epistemology emerged in the history of philosophy. Not surprisingly the response of Floridi can be summarized in one word: science. As Pierre Wagner also explains, the angle taken in epistemology is tightly connected to the role given to science in philosophy or to the kind of relation that exists between science and philosophy. One might say that it depends more generally upon the relation between philosophy and existing traditions of knowledge, but it seems inappropriate to refer to science as a tradition of knowledge among others. Besides, when we refer to the relation between philosophy and science, it includes indirectly its relation to metaphysical views from older traditions as well, but in a negative manner.

Until late in the 19th century, scientists were called philosophers. Before the twentieth century, the story of science versus philosophy is about how science came to exist independently from philosophy. The story starting from the early twentieth century goes as follows. In the early 20th century, the foundation of mathematics and logic received a lot of attention and philosophers such as Russell hoped that the totality of mathematics could be reduced to logic. There was even hope that the totality of science could be reduced to logic given basic observation statements, that is, that there is an inductive logic, that induction, unlike what Einstein said, would not be a creative process without any fixed path. Russell even said that there is no philosophical truth that is not scientific truth: there are not two kinds of knowledge, philosophical knowledge and scientific knowledge, but only scientific knowledge. However, no inductive logic was found. Given observations and a law, there is no method to accept or reject the law. The Duhem-Quine thesis says that one cannot even reject a law that contradicts observations without making assumptions on the apparatus (and our senses) and the laws behind them.

The internal/external connection
Nevertheless, science continued to provide the metaphysical view behind philosophy and epistemology: knowledge exists in the mind of individuals, itself produced by brains. Even Popper's World 3 of objective knowledge emerges from a World 2 of such subjective knowledge (including what he describes as expectations and predispositions in addition to individual propositional knowledge) that has itself emerged from Popper's World 1, which is the (physical) reality. For most philosophers, the value of internal propositional knowledge in brains depends on its correspondence with the reality. In this correspondence theory of truth, a statement is true if it is the case in the reality. The brain is a physical reality that interacts with the reality, including itself, and so is the knowledge within it, but that interaction excludes metaphysical processes such as divine revelations, because science does not work under that kind of conjectures. As previously mentioned, philosophers even searched for an inductive logic to remove the need for creativity and intuition in science. That failed, but this does not mean that some forms of revelations is involved in the inductive process. This failure is explained by the complexity of the human brain and of its inner interaction.

Even with the acceptance of the role of creativity and intuition in the generation of knowledge, the metaphysical view on the created epistemological content is that it is separated from the reality and the value of the propositional knowledge within it depends on how it is connected with that reality. For example, one philosopher, Robert Nozick, required a very strong connection with the reality as a condition for propositional knowledge. His four conditions for S's knowing that P were (S=Subject / P=Proposition): The last two counterfactual conditions are very strong requirement on the connection with the reality.
 * 1) P is true
 * 2) S believes that P
 * 3) If it were the case that (not-P), S would not believe that P
 * 4) If it were the case that P, S would believe that P

Relation with contemporary epistemological concepts
This is where I test the idea that a historical perspective will help organize the contemporary epistemological concepts and place them into a larger context. The internalism/externalism opposition is clearly introduced and that is an important one. What about the "belief" concept. In the section Belief of the article Epistemology, the relation "S believes that P" between a subject S and a proposition P is given different meanings, but this section fails to explain the notion of belief itself in a more general context. Its first sentence sets the tone: "One of the core concepts in epistemology is belief. " I just started to review the notion of belief in epistemology and clearly there are philosophers who think, at the least historically, that on the contrary the concept of belief should play no rôle in epistemology. For example, Wolfgang Stegmüller wrote that for Carnap: