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 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 Cohen’s and Lewis’ solutions to the lottery paradox

2014 ◽  
Vol 57 (3) ◽  
pp. 121-137
Author(s):  
Milan Jovanovic
Keyword(s):  
Critical Analysis ◽  
David Lewis ◽  
Final Part ◽  
Lottery Paradox ◽  
Modal Interpretation ◽  
Relevant Alternatives ◽  
Epistemological Problem ◽  
Significant Difference ◽  
Contemporary Epistemology ◽  
The Lottery Paradox

The lottery paradox is considered to be one of the biggest problems concerning fallibilism in epistemology. This paper offers a presentation and critical analysis of two different contextualistic solutions to that paradox. The first part of the paper deals with the lottery paradox and Stewart Cohen?s proposed solution. The second part is a presentation of David Lewis? solution to that epistemological problem. The two analyses offered serve to show that Cohen is (while Lewis is not) committed to the claim that the same solution can be used for both: the lottery paradox and for the problem of skepticism. In the final part of the paper the main focus is on the question whether the same explanation of how conversational mechanisms work can really serve to explain these two problems of contemporary epistemology. It is argued, mainly on the basis of modal interpretation of the relevant alternatives approach, that there is a significant difference in structure between these two problems, and that they, therefore, deserve different treatment.

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.

scholarly journals Elusive luck: Contextualist approach to the Gettier problem

2021 ◽  
Vol 64 (4) ◽  
pp. 83-97
Author(s):  
Ema Brajkovic
Keyword(s):  
Driving Force ◽  
Epistemic Luck ◽  
Gettier Cases ◽  
Gettier Problem ◽  
Essential Component ◽  
Contextualist Approach ◽  
Conversational Contextualism ◽  
The Gettier Problem

Lewis' philosophical ambition to eradicate the skeptical threat towards infallibilism was the driving force behind his contextualist approach to knowledge. One of the discerning characteristics of his conversational contextualism is the claim that it can solve the Gettier problem. The first part of this paper will be directed towards explicating the arguments Lewis employed in reaching said solution. The second part will be concerned with Cohen?s critique of the proposed explanation. Cohen?s considerations result in an insight that contextualism does not have the adequate means to answer the Gettier challenge. Finally, I shall make an attempt at further motivating Cohen?s claim by investigating the essential component of Gettier cases - epistemic luck. This will be done by appealing to Pritchard?s concept of veritic epistemic luck. The author?s goal is to suggest that contextualist resources are neither suitable to solve nor exhaustively articulate the Gettier problem.

Knowledge, Benign Falsehoods, and the Gettier Problem

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Claudio de Almeida
Keyword(s):  
Theory Of Knowledge ◽  
False Beliefs ◽  
Gettier Problem ◽  
Inferential Knowledge ◽  
The Gettier Problem

Contrary to millennial thought, inferential knowledge does seem to arise in certain cases of reasoning to which false premises are evidentially essential. The phenomenon refutes all of the well-known epistemologies that account for inferential knowledge. I offer an explanation of the phenomenon based on a fairly conservative revision to the defeasibility theory of knowledge, and explain why Peter Klein’s proposed solution fails. The explanation put forward here aims at giving us these two highly desirable results: (a) something we have never had and may not have noticed we needed, a defeasibility theory that is compatible with epistemological fallibilism, and, (b) within this revised, fallibilistic version of the defeasibility theory, an explanation of the benign/malignant distinction for false beliefs that completes the defeasibilist resolution of the Gettier Problem.

Sed ubi Socrates currit? On the Gettier Problem before Gettier

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Risto Hilpinen
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
True Belief ◽  
Belief System ◽  
Gettier Problem ◽  
Current Belief ◽  
The Future ◽  
Late Nineteenth ◽  
The Gettier Problem ◽  
The Way ◽  
Forward Looking

Medieval philosophers presented Gettier-type objections to the commonly accepted view of knowledge as firmly held true belief, and formulated additional conditions that meet the objections or analyzed knowledge in a way that is immune to the Gettier-type objections. The proposed conditions can be divided into two kinds: backward-looking conditions and forward-looking conditions. The former concern an inquirer’s current belief system and the way the inquirer acquired her beliefs, the latter refer to what the inquirer may come to learn in the future and how she can respond to objections. Some conditions of knowledge proposed in late nineteenth- and twentieth-century epistemology can be regarded as variants of the conditions put forward by medieval authors.

Explaining Knowledge

2017 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
State Of The Art ◽  
The State ◽  
Methodological Aspect ◽  
Gettier Problem ◽  
Contemporary Epistemology ◽  
The Gettier Problem

This is an edited collection of twenty-three new papers on the Gettier Problem and the issues connected with it. The set of authors includes many of the major figures in contemporary epistemology who have developed some of the well-known responses to the problem, and it also contains some younger epistemologists who bring new perspectives to the issues raised in the literature. Together, they cover the state of the art on virtually every epistemological and methodological aspect of the Gettier Problem. The volume also includes some skeptical voices according to which the Gettier Problem is not deeply problematic or some of the problems it raises are not genuine philosophical problems.

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