scholarly journals How (not) to be a fallibilist: Lottery paradox and two types of epistemic contextualism

2014 ◽  
Vol 57 (3) ◽  
pp. 93-120
Author(s):  
Nenad Filipovic
Keyword(s):  
The Other ◽  
Epistemic Contextualism ◽  
Lottery Paradox ◽  
The World ◽  
Conversational Contextualism ◽  
Inferential Contextualism ◽  
Knowledge Claims ◽  
Michael Williams ◽  
The Lottery Paradox

There is one common thing among lotteries from all over the world: there is small number of winning tickets and considerably bigger number of losing tickets. Therefore, the probability that a ticket wins a lottery is quite low, usually so low that we think that it is almost sure the ticket loses. But, we would never say that we know that a ticket will lose, until we see results of the lottery in, for example, some newspapers. And the probability of newspapers making a mistake does not seem to affect our knowledge claims. But why is that, since newspapers could make a mistake more often than a ticket wins? This question presents trouble for fallibilism, which claim that S could know that p, even when the probability that p is less than 1. Contextualist theories give their typical brand of solution: we have a change of context between the two cases, and in one case standard for knowledge claims are higher than the standard in the other case. Because of that, one can know that S lost the lottery when she reads it in newspapers. In this paper, I will present analysis of the lottery paradox, and two types of epistemic contexutalism: simple conversational contextualism and inferential contextualism. I will also present two of the most popular solution based on simple conversational contextualism, made by Lewis and Cohen. Finally, I will introduce some problems for such solutions, and show that the problems could solved if we apply strategy and explanation of inferential contextualism, type of contextualism proposed by Michael Williams.

scholarly journals Lewis’s contextual solution to the Lottery paradox and the Gettier problem

2018 ◽  
Vol 61 (4) ◽  
pp. 39-51
Author(s):  
Marija Rekovic
Keyword(s):  
David Lewis ◽  
Main Topic ◽  
Epistemic Contextualism ◽  
Lottery Paradox ◽  
Gettier Problem ◽  
Pros And Cons ◽  
Conversational Contextualism ◽  
Skeptical Paradox ◽  
The Lottery Paradox ◽  
The Gettier Problem

The main topic of this paper is conversational contextualism, one of the most dominant versions of epistemic contextualism, endorsed by David Lewis. Proponents of conversational contextualism, including Lewis, argue that the key advantage of this view lies in its unique way of analyzing and solving the most prominent epistemological problems. Among those problems are the skeptical paradox, the Gettier problem and the Lottery paradox. The first part of the paper is concerned with the general features of conversational contextualism. In the second part of the paper the author highlights the main hypotheses of conversational contextualism, proposed by Lewis, as an attempt to solve the Gettier problem and the Lottery paradox. The last part of the paper analyzes the pros and cons of the Lewisian solutions to the aforementioned problems. The key part in that analysis is the Cohen?s criticism of those solutions.

scholarly journals Williams’ inferential contextualism

2014 ◽  
Vol 57 (3) ◽  
pp. 43-60
Author(s):  
Jelena Pavlicic
Keyword(s):  
Context Sensitivity ◽  
Epistemic Contextualism ◽  
Conversational Context ◽  
Contextual Sensitivity ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Truth Value ◽  
Conversational Contextualism ◽  
Inferential Contextualism ◽  
The Given ◽  
Michael Williams

This paper is concerned with version of epistemic contextualism known as inferential contextualism which cheif proponent is Michael Williams. The general contextualist strategy attempts to interpret the cognitive claims as expressing statements which meaning is sensitive to the context in which they are uttered, which implies that the truth-value of these claims may differ from context to context. Versions of epistemic contextualism that explain context sensitivity of cognitive claims by referring to conversational factors of the participants in the given conversational context are usually called simple conversational contextualism. Williams accepts the basic contextualists assumptions, but, in contrast to simple conversational contextualists, insists that explanation of contextual sensitivity of cognitive statements is to be found in differences (which are mainly the differences in the methodological assumptions and inferential patterns) between the thematic areas which are the subject of knowledge in different contexts. We will try to show that Williams? contextualism, despite some difficulties, does have certain advantages over the simple conversational contextualism.

The Variability of Know(s)-that Judgments

2020 ◽  
pp. 97-130
Author(s):  
Jody Azzouni
Keyword(s):  
Knowledge Claim ◽  
The Other ◽  
Epistemic Reasons ◽  
Epistemic Contextualism ◽  
Subject Sensitive Invariantism ◽  
Knowledge Claims ◽  
Usage Data

The usage evidence—various scenarios that realistically depict where and when we attribute knowledge to ourselves and others—shows that all the alternatives (epistemic contextualism, subject-sensitive invariantism, knowledge relativism) to intellectual invariantism fail. They fail for several reasons: When cases are compared, speaker-hearers tend to retract one or the other conflicting knowledge claim; the intuitions elicited by various cases don’t consistently satisfy any particular position; the situations under which speaker-hearers retract knowledge claims under pressure seem to support an invariantist position. Nevertheless, no standard invariantist position seems supported by the usage data because speaker-hearers do seem to shift because of differences either in the interests of the agents to whom knowledge is attributed, for example, oneself, or because of other apparently non-epistemic reasons. Attempts to use pragmatic tools, such as implicatures, to handle the apparent shifts in knowledge standards are shown to fail as well.

Advanced Topics: Acceptance Rules

1990 ◽  
Author(s):  
John L. Pollock
Keyword(s):  
The Other ◽  
Original Version ◽  
Lottery Paradox ◽  
Acceptance Rule ◽  
The Creation ◽  
The Lottery Paradox ◽  
Probability Theorist ◽  
Made In

There once was a man who wrote a book. He was very careful in his reasoning, and was confident of each claim that he made. With some display of pride, he showed the book to a friend (who happened to be a probability theorist). He was dismayed when the friend observed that any book that long and that interesting was almost certain to contain at least one falsehood. Thus it was not reasonable to believe that all of the claims made in the book were true. If it were reasonable to believe each claim then it would be reasonable to believe that the book contained no falsehoods, so it could not be reasonable to believe each claim. Furthermore, because there was no way to pick out some of the claims as being more problematic than others, there could be no reasonable way of withholding assent to some but not others. “Therefore,” concluded his friend, “you are not justified in believing anything you asserted in the book.” This is the paradox of the preface (so named because in the original version the author confesses in the preface that his book probably contains a falsehood). The paradox of the preface is more than a curiosity. It has been used by some philosophers to argue that the set of one's warranted beliefs need not be deductively consistent, and by others to argue that you should not befriend probability theorists. If (Al) is to be a correct acceptance rule it must be capable of explaining what is involved in the paradox of the preface. The lottery paradox and the paradox of the preface seem superficially similar, so it might be supposed that a resolution of one will automatically generate a resolution of the other in some trivial manner. But in fact, the opposite is true. It is the principle of collective defeat that makes possible the resolution of the lottery paradox, but it is the principle of collective defeat that is responsible for the creation of the paradox of the preface.

scholarly journals Disappearing knowledge

2016 ◽  
Vol 27 (4) ◽  
pp. 869-883
Author(s):  
Ivan Nisavic
Keyword(s):  
David Lewis ◽  
Direct Consequence ◽  
The Other ◽  
Alternative Possibilities ◽  
Lottery Paradox ◽  
On Certainty ◽  
The Lottery Paradox

Following the exposition of the basic standpoints of contextualism in relation to invariantistic position, which takes the concept of knowledge in its rigorous and fixed meaning, the text continues to deal with the analysis of the concept of knowledge offered by David Lewis, with a goal to solve common epistemological problems, one of those being the lottery paradox. Accepting fallibilism as the only plausible option regarding the possibility of acquiring knowledge, Lewis claims that, with the postulated rules that allow us to properly eliminate alternative possibilities, it is possible to resolve the previously mentioned paradox. If we want to base knowledge on probability, and not on certainty, and to directly stipulate it with the context in which it is being imposed or expressed, than it is obvious that knowledge will depend on whether the requirements for knowledge are high or low. Thus, in one case it might occur that we have knowledge, and in the other that we do not, even though nothing is changed except the conversational conditions that are already ?in the game?. Such, elusive knowledge, that gets lost, De Rose labels ?now you know it, now you don?t? and considers it to be a direct consequence of Lewis?s analysis. As such, the analysis should not be accepted.

Indonesian Literature’s Position in World Literature

TEKNOSASTIK ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 14 (2) ◽  
pp. 1
Author(s):  
Dina Amelia
Keyword(s):  
World Literature ◽  
The Other ◽  
National Literature ◽  
Western World ◽  
The World ◽  
The One ◽  
The Voice

There are two most inevitable issues on national literature, in this case Indonesian literature. First is the translation and the second is the standard of world literature. Can one speak for the other as a representative? Why is this representation matter? Does translation embody the voice of the represented? Without translation Indonesian literature cannot gain its recognition in world literature, yet, translation conveys the voice of other. In the case of production, publication, or distribution of Indonesian Literature to the world, translation works can be very beneficial. The position of Indonesian literature is as a part of world literature. The concept that the Western world should be the one who represent the subaltern can be overcome as long as the subaltern performs as the active speaker. If the subaltern remains silent then it means it allows the “representation” by the Western.

Experiment role in the world music (based on the «The Road» album of the Ukrainian «Dakha Brakha» band)

2018 ◽  
pp. 215-227
Author(s):  
Iia Fedorova
Keyword(s):  
Folk Music ◽  
World Music ◽  
The Other ◽  
Modern Music ◽  
Musical Practice ◽  
The Road ◽  
Music Practice ◽  
The World ◽  
Binary Oppositions ◽  
Musical Practices

The main objective of this study is the substantiation of experiment as one of the key features of the world music in Ukraine. Based on the creative works of the brightest world music representatives in Ukraine, «Dakha Brakha» band, the experiment is regarded as a kind of creative setting. Methodology and scientific approaches. The methodology was based on the music practice theory by T. Cherednychenko. The author distinguishes four binary oppositions, which can describe the musical practice. According to one of these oppositions («observance of the canon or violation of the canon»), the musical practices, to which the Ukrainian musicology usually classifies the world music («folk music» and «minstrel music»), are compared with the creative work of «Dakha Brakha» band. Study findings. A lack of the setting to experiment in the musical practices of the «folk music» and «minstrel music» separates the world music musical practice from them. Therefore, the world music is a separate type of musical practice in which the experiment is crucial. The study analyzed several scientific articles of Ukrainian musicologists on the world music; examined the history of the Ukrainian «Dakha Brakha» band; presented a list of the folk songs used in the fifth album «The Road» by «Dakha Brakha» band; and showed the degree of the source transformation by musicians based on the example of the «Monk» song. The study findings can be used to form a comprehensive understanding of the world music musical practice. The further studies may be related to clarification of the other parameters of the world music musical practice, and to determination of the experiment role in creative works of the other world music representatives, both Ukrainian and foreign. The practical study value is the ability to use its key provisions in the course of modern music in higher artistic schools of Ukraine. Originality / value. So far, the Ukrainian musicology did not consider the experiment role as the key one in the world music.

Does Literature Matter Today? Thoughts of the Outside

CounterText ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 98-113
Author(s):  
Shaobo Xie
Keyword(s):  
Aesthetic Education ◽  
The Other ◽  
Human Values ◽  
Literary Texts ◽  
Lost Cause ◽  
Western Tradition ◽  
The World

The paper celebrates the publication of Ranjan Ghosh and J. Hillis Miller's Thinking Literature across Continents as a significant event in the age of neoliberalism. It argues that, in spite of the different premises and the resulting interpretative procedures respectively championed by the two co-authors, both of them anchor their readings of literary texts in a concept of literature that is diametrically opposed to neoliberal rationality, and both impassionedly safeguard human values and experiences that resist the technologisation and marketisation of the humanities and aesthetic education. While Ghosh's readings of literature offer lightning flashes of thought from the outside of the Western tradition, signalling a new culture of reading as well as a new manner of appreciation of the other, Miller dedicatedly speaks and thinks against the hegemony of neoliberal reason, opening our eyes to the kind of change our teaching or reading of literature can trigger in the world, and the role aesthetic education should and can play at a time when the humanities are considered ‘a lost cause’.

Simone de Beauvoir's Philosophy of Individuation

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Laura Hengehold
Keyword(s):  
Lived Experience ◽  
20Th Century ◽  
Sexual Difference ◽  
Gilles Deleuze ◽  
The Other ◽  
Simone De Beauvoir ◽  
Second Sex ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
The World

Most studies of Simone de Beauvoir situate her with respect to Hegel and the tradition of 20th-century phenomenology begun by Husserl, Heidegger, and Merleau-Ponty. This book analyzes The Second Sex in light of the concepts of becoming, problematization, and the Other found in Gilles Deleuze. Reading Beauvoir through a Deleuzian lens allows more emphasis to be placed on Beauvoir's early interest in Bergson and Leibniz, and on the individuation of consciousness, a puzzle of continuing interest to both phenomenologists and Deleuzians. By engaging with the philosophical issues in her novels and student diaries, this book rethinks Beauvoir’s focus on recognition in The Second Sex in terms of women’s struggle to individuate themselves despite sexist forms of representation. It shows how specific forms of women’s “lived experience” can be understood as the result of habits conforming to and resisting this sexist “sense.” Later feminists put forward important criticisms regarding Beauvoir’s claims not to be a philosopher, as well as the value of sexual difference and the supposedly Eurocentric universalism of her thought. Deleuzians, on the other hand, might well object to her ideas about recognition. This book attempts to address those criticisms, while challenging the historicist assumptions behind many efforts to establish Beauvoir’s significance as a philosopher and feminist thinker. As a result, readers can establish a productive relationship between Beauvoir’s “problems” and those of women around the world who read her work under very different circumstances.

Modernism, Empiricism, and Rationalism

2016 ◽  
Vol 46 (1) ◽  
pp. 38-47
Author(s):  
Geoffrey Squires
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
The Other ◽  
Modern Poetry ◽  
Philosophical Perspective ◽  
Irish Poetry ◽  
Dimensional Spectrum ◽  
Culture History ◽  
The World ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Rule Out

Modernism is usually defined historically as the composite movement at the beginning of the twentieth century which led to a radical break with what had gone before in literature and the other arts. Given the problems of the continuing use of the concept to cover subsequent writing, this essay proposes an alternative, philosophical perspective which explores the impact of rationalism (what we bring to the world) on the prevailing empiricism (what we take from the world) of modern poetry, which leads to a concern with consciousness rather than experience. This in turn involves a re-conceptualisation of the lyric or narrative I, of language itself as a phenomenon, and of other poetic themes such as nature, culture, history, and art. Against the background of the dominant empiricism of modern Irish poetry as presented in Crotty's anthology, the essay explores these ideas in terms of a small number of poets who may be considered modernist in various ways. This does not rule out modernist elements in some other poets and the initial distinction between a poetics of experience and one of consciousness is better seen as a multi-dimensional spectrum that requires further, more detailed analysis than is possible here.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document