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Knowledge and the justification criterium

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Knowledge and the justification criterium

jaoman
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Posted 05/25/05 - 06:07 PM:	#31
I meant, about external truths. To say we have no access to external truths equals that we cannot know anything right or wrong in ragards. But, just as I said about body shapes, some things consistently remain true regardless of conventions of society. The wheel, for instance, has always been preferable to a square shape for propelling vehicles - it is a foundamental fact about the external workings of reality. To say we do not have access to them is an over simplification. We obviously have some access. The debatable issue is to what extent.
"With no relation to class or social background, whether it suits them or not, people yearn for a dream. Sustained by a dream, hurt by a dream, revived by a dream, killed by a dream. And even after being abandoned by a dream, it continues to smolder from the bottom of one's heart... probably until the verge of death. A man should envision such a lifetime once. A life spent as a martyr to the god named "dream." - Kentaro Miura

Reformed Nihilist
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Posted 05/25/05 - 06:46 PM:	#32
jaoman wrote: I meant, about external truths. We can have knowledge about them, just not certain knowledge. To say we have no access to external truths equals that we cannot know anything right or wrong in ragards. No it doesn't. Not if look at what knowledge really is (which is what we are doing here). But, just as I said about body shapes, some things consistently remain true regardless of conventions of society. The wheel, for instance, has always been preferable to a square shape for propelling vehicles - it is a foundamental fact about the external workings of reality. What is preferable is an intentional truth. To say we do not have access to them is an over simplification. We obviously have some access. The debatable issue is to what extent. Why is it obvious? It may be unpleasant to think otherwise, but that doesn't make it obvious.
Nobody ever became a famous philosopher by being a champion of ecumenical hybridism Daniel Dennett Freedom Evolves

AKG
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Posted 05/25/05 - 08:27 PM:	#33
Reformed Nihilist wrote: Could you describe this 'actual justification'? What are the criteria for it? and why? You misread me. By "actual justifications" I mean the justifications that were actually given by the person. By your redefinition of "justified," it doesn't matter so much what actual justifications a person gives, simply what the community is willing to consider justified. It seems your definition has nothing to do with justification, but rather with what a community considers justified. You seem to make "justified" an arbitrary label. But what does it mean when a community says that something seems justified to them? It means that they think that whatever belief has been adequately shown to be correct. Now your redefinition makes it impossible for the community to be wrong. However, if a belief is false, then it can never be adequately shown to be correct, since it can never even be correct. If I'm hungry, and the community believes that you've adequately demonstrated to them that I'm not hungry, that doesn't make you justified. Because justified isn't "the community believes it's been shown correct", it means, "it really has been shown correct," and you can't demonstrate a falsehood to be correct. We can say it, but we are judging it so by a set of criteria. Where did this criteria come from? So you're saying that we can only say that those people were wrong according to our criteria, and can't say that they're simply wrong? Sorry, but that is wrong. They believed that the belief in a flat earth was a justified belief. They believed that certain reasons for believing in a flat earth were good reasons. They were wrong. All you can say is that they thought that those reasons were good, but the truth is, they weren't good, since they led to false results. Reasoning that leads to false results is bad reasoning. It's not bad just according to my standard, it's bad, period. Sure, other people can say and believe that certain bad reasoning is good reasoning, but unless you're willing to admit that there's nothing inherently wrong about reasoning that leads to false results (that it's only wrong according to some, and nothing more), but it would remain that it really is bad reasoning. I can see no alternative. Why are we discussing this? Shouldn't we simply take a poll? It seems that you're trying to justify your position to me, but doesn't justification mean to be in accord with community standards? So if you're trying to justify your position to me, shouldn't you show that the community agrees that your reasoning is sound? Rather than appeal to my sense of what is reasonable and justified, shouldn't you be appealing to what the community thinks is rational and justified? Also, assume that everyone else disagreed with you. Then despite all your reasoning, would you admit that your position is unjustified? You can mean one of two things by "justified." Either you can mean what it normally means, in which case your argument is simply an ad populam fallacy which says that enough people believe something, then it must be right, or you redefine "justified" to mean nothing more than "that which people feel is justified," in which case justification is a minor concern. We belive so. It is a justified belief. Is that all? There's more to it. They believed that flat-earth beliefs were justified, and they were simply wrong about that. Such beliefs were not justified. If enough people believe a rumour or a myth, that doesn't make it justified, it means that people think it's justified and have accepted bad justification for it. I believe there is a difference between bad justification and good justification. You seem to argue that we can only speak of whether justification happens to coincide with current popular beliefs about justification or not. Whether a justification consistently leads to false results or true results is merely coincidental. Justification has nothing to do with demonstrating truth (contrary to standard definition), but simply tells us if many other people would agree. When did you gain the power to supervene you own beliefs? You believe they were wrong. I agree. Most everyone I know does too. Is "wrong" just a subjective thing. All I can say about chocolate is whether I like it or not. We can agree on whether we like it or not too. But it makes no sense for me to tell someone else that they're preference for vanilla is wrong. On the other hand, those people back then weren't just wrong according to my beliefs, they were wrong. Or is it impossible to be wrong about anything, and only be possible to be wrong according to another's beliefs? If so, why would anyone care about others' beliefs? What is the difference between a taste for chocolate, and the belief that the earth is round? No one tells you the you like chocolate or not (I hope), but people tell you that the earth is round. They also tell you what the appropriate way of experimenting, so you can find out yourself. They teach you the formulas, build you the telescopes, tell you that logic is to be relied on as opposed to fancy. You couldn't do this youself. If you could, then we would have no need for the concept of knowledge. Belief would be good enough. This doesn't address the point. When we change criteria of justification (personal criteria), it's not like changing our prefence for chocolate. The preference for chocolate is not a rational choice we make. Moreover, we don't look back on previous tastes and see them as wrong. On the other hand, when deciding on what counts as justified, we make a reasoned choice. We consider which criteria really are better than others. And we look at previous criteria as wrong criteria. If our personal preferences were different in the past, we don't look at them as being wrong. If our standard of criteria were different in the past, we do look at them as wrong, since justification is more than just what enough people at the time agree with, justification is about how to demonstrate and be certain of truths (certainty coming in varying degrees). Given your redefinition of justification, the only reason to believe in something that's justified is if you want to be in agreement with other people. If justified beliefs by your definition coincidentally happened to have pragmatic value, then this is just coincidence. If different beliefs happen to have more pragmatic value (believing that certain medicines cure sickness as opposed to the popular belief that maybe leeches cure the sickness) then we would just choose them, so justification is really an empty label. The real reason we want to believe in justified things is because they are true, and there are reasons that allow us to be certain of this truth.
"The only reason we die... is because we accept it as an inevitability." -- Stewie "To enslave nuance to dogma is folly." -- Lord Hillyer

Cuthbert
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Posted 05/26/05 - 12:11 AM:	#34
I agree with most of AKG's last post. Suppose what a community generally believes to be true, is true. If community A generally believes that p and community B generally believes that ~p, then it follows that p.~p. And anything follows from that. I do however think you can be justified in holding a false belief, because you can have reasonable grounds for holding it. It's just that your belief will never be vindicated, because it isn't true. There are ambiguities in the concept 'justified', and these are exploited by Gettier. 'Justified belief' can be used to mean that (a) there are reasonable grounds for holding a belief, that may or may not be true, or (b) someone has cited some grounds, reasonable or not, for holding it, or (c) the belief is true. We have the concept 'vindication' for (c), and that's enough to dispose of Gettier, but it would be good to have a word to distinguish (a) from (b). Perhaps there are justifications, attempted justifications, and vindications. In moral and legal reasoning, it is important that I can be justified (in sense (a)) in holding a false belief. This kind of justification can form the basis of excuses for actions that would otherwise be blameworthy. E.g. I ran over a pedestrian, because although I had every reason to believe he would continue walking on the pavement, he stepped without warning in front of my car. The distinction between (a) and (b) here is the difference between a decent excuse and any old excuse. I think people were justified in sense (a) in believing the earth was flat, because it certainly seems flat and there was no reason to suppose it was any other shape. When people sailed round the globe, some continued to justify the belief in sense (b) - they asserted it as dogma, but didn't have reasonable grounds to continue holding the belief. At no stage was the belief justified in sense (c), that is, it can't be vindicated because it isn't true. The aesthetic question is interesting. I think we do sometimes look back on previous preferences and say they were wrong. When I was thirteen I loved certain kinds of music, but now I am ashamed to think I ever enjoyed such rubbish. I think my preferences were wrong, and I am glad that I fell in with a crowd who helped to show me the error of my ways and helped me develop superior preferences. So we can intelligibly talk about 'error', 'wrong', 'superior' etc. in the context of personal preferences. We don't just have to shrug and say, 'Well, I like it that way,' and that's the end of the matter. Edited by Cuthbert on 05/26/05 - 12:49 AM

Morrandir
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Posted 05/26/05 - 03:51 AM:	#35
Okay, boys, been a way for a while, but I will now try to give some sort of, probably rather long, response to the concerns and ideas expressed here. (And indeed, it is rather long. If you don't want to read the whole of it, just read the part that is directed at you, as expressed by the names (except one part where I note that jaoman says something in between of my explanation to Machiveli. My thoughts to jaoman are in the end.) First and foremost, Let's try to keep the discussion within the bounds of Knowledge as Justified True Belief (Thank you, Reformed Nihilist ). The only chance we have at ever working out something functional is to keep some variables fixed and see how changing one affects the whole picture. Changing them all at once will only result in disaster. There are threads about truth, and I suppose there are some about the nature of belief too. To some extent of course we will have to take these things into account, but I should think it proper to assume that truth is something that expresses how things are, and belief is something that a person has. If I go on to define things even a bit more profoundly, then there will just be a hundred people disagreeing with my definitions. Secondly, we must consider justification. There seems to be some variation in the way justification is understood to begin with. That is, of course, a problem when trying to define what the justification in JTB stands for. If someone takes justification to be subjective, I don't think it fits the point in the definition. One who has belief to something most probably also thinks that he has justification for that. That is NOT the point - the point is to ask whether one actually has a point. This is why justification criterium is brought forth in the first place. Probably the easiest and most compact way of explaining what JTB stands for is to say that belief is the subjective, justification is the intersubjective and truth is the objective ingredient of knowledge. Knowledge is then something that links a subjective assumption through generally accepted ways to something actual - grounding the belief in the reality. Justification is needed to carry the belief to the actual - a mere true belief is true "by accident", which I believe means that there is no direct epistemological link from the subjective states of affairs to the objective. It is a mere coincidence that they match. Of course, the nature of intersubjectivity is open for debate, but justification ought to be distinguished both from the subjective intensional state of believing and from the objective state of something being like something. There are theories of truth that omit the truth, but I think this is only accomplished through careful analysis of that which is directly accessible to us: beliefs and justifications. If the definition of justification leads to omitting truth, then it does, but let us assume that such a thing exists. If it doesn't, then call it an indirect proof - that would make any mathematician proud . Machiveli, Morrandir wrote: So a certain piece of knowledge would be something to which no (rational - I will leave this open for now) system of belief can be invented which would make it only understandable. That is, this knowledge is justified in every system of belief, and thus is, simply, justified. Pieces of knowledge are then such that one could invent such a system (or hold one) where this justification for this piece of knowledge would render it only understandable, not justified. The reason this is vague is that it just came to my mind. I will try to formulate my idea better. x's proposition p is understandable from the point of view of y, if y considers x justified to state p within x's belief system A. x's proposition p is justified from the point of view of y, if y considers x justified to state p within y's belief system B. So, we have two belief-systems: A and B. It doesn't matter what those include, but they are the relevant things that x and y consider true, respectively. Understandability requires something I would call axiomatic or philosophical empathy, that is, the ability to set oneself into the belief system of another, for the sake of argument, so to speak. It is related to normal empathy in that if one lacks empathy, one cannot understand others - and if one lacks axiomatic empathy, then one does not consider any action understandable; she considers it only either justified or not justified. We also have a statement p, which can be either true or false, which is something we do not concern ourselves with here. We also assume that the belief-systems A and B are accessible to both x and y - something that is of course ideal, but we are trying to define justification, not forming criteria to when the assumptions of justification are false; we can do that only if we know in what situation one would be justified. Thus understandability of x's proposition from the point of view of y is dependent only on x's belief-system A. The justification of it is dependent on y's system of belief B. Note that when we switch the aspect, we will see that something that is justified for y might be merely understandable to x. The justification of x's proposition (for y) on the other hand is only dependent on B, not A. Thus if we fix the point of view to y's, then: 1. x's belief that p is understandable iff y considers it justified in A. 2. x's belief that p is merely understandable iff y considers it justified in A, but not in B. 3. x's belief that p is justified iff y considers it justified in B. Now you might be concerned about the excess-usage of justification here. What makes something justified in B? That is another matter that we will return to later, but for now I only try to explain the difference between understandability and justification as well as I can. Note that y doesn't have the final word here - what y considers justified for x to claim might in turn be merely understandable to z and so on. Now to the matter of knowledge versus certain knowledge. Knowledge occurs when p is justified, but when there are belief systems that would render p merely understandable (number 2). Certain knowledge occurs when p is justified, and there are no belief system that could render p merely understandable. When are there such belief-systems? We would have to have a criterion for a belief-system, but we do not. Let me then at least say that the belief-system must be rational. The rationality is, once again, undefined, but that is the case in philosophy in general. We cannot here handle the problem of "rationality", but we will have to keep that again fixed somewhere. This is of course the exact problem with skepticism: one can always doubt, but can this doubt be rational? This is something that is simply too big to handle here. If we assume some criterion for rational doubt, then we accept some criterion for rational belief-system, and we can all, I think, agree that a piece of knowledge is certain if it cannot be rationally doubted - after all, this is all I am saying, but I am trying to formulate this in the language of justification and understandability. Jaoman suggested that my criterion is too strong. I think it is not, because the demand for certain knowledge is very strong to begin with. It only formulates the idea of certain (undoubtable) knowledge in the language of justification. I agree that it is difficult to attain such heights of justification, but it is equally hard to attain such certainty of knowledge too - my definitions can be considered correct insofar as the difficulties raise in parallel. That is, all things being equal, demanding more of justification means demanding more of knowledge, and vice versa. Moreover, it doesn't, I think, render it wholly impossible to attain certain knowledge. I do think that "all bachelors are unmarried" expresses a certain piece of knowledge (please do not take this claim too seriously, because it is a sidepoint: I do not wish to derail the discussion to the certainty of analytic propositions). It is also true, I think, that this is at piece with my definition: we cannot rationally imagine such a belief system that would render this statement merely understandable (meanings of words being equal, of course, otherwise we are not speaking of the same proposition). Even more defence for my system is gained when one thinks what would render this piece of knowledge uncertain: it would do that when someone imagined a case where it could be false. Exactly as I would have it. There is an interesting link from this to the problem of necessity, that I will now examine in brief. p is necessarily true iff it is true in all possible worlds. p is only possible, that is, not necessarily true, iff it is false at least in one possible world (but not all). Now consider this in connection with my justification-criterium, and you will see that: 1. "p" is certain knowledge iff it is justified in all possible belief-systems. 2. "p" is knowledge iff it is merely understandable in at least one possible belief-system (but not in all). This means, I think, that my definition would lead to a parallel kind of consideration regarding epistemology as the possible worlds semantics does regarding truth. (I believe this is also applicable to the third kind of certainty, that is: subjective certainty as an attitude towards one's beliefs: one is incapable of coming up with any believable proposition that would render the subjective certainty faulty - subjective possible worlds of beliefs, so to speak...) Now there is still something to add. My terminology is far from conclusive. The word "justification" itself is related to its common use in epistemology (it might be that it should be revised instead of redefined), and understandability is introduced only to express the difference between unconditional justification and conditional justification. Instead of "p is understandable" I might as well say that "p is c-justified (for conditionally justified)" or something like that. I just think the understandability-criterium expresses in concrete terms what I am trying to say, so that the IDEA could be expressed - even if the formulation should in the end be different. I want you to say to yourself "Ah, THAT's what he is trying to say" - only after that we can consider whether different expressions should be used. If I started using conditional justification or some such, I think it would lead people astray: most things that have too much relativistic connotations tend to do that. Darkcrow, If a major and minor premise are true does not the conclusion follow? Is the conclusion not inherent? I don't know what you mean by major and minor premise...? Are those names for the premises in, for example, modus ponendo ponens? I am not sure if a conclusion can be inherent, because a conclusion is a way of deriving knowledge from knowledge (or truth from truth). It is the final step in the process that is made possible by deductive logic. There is no inherent conclusions in the premises, I should think. But this is mere speculation, as I am not sure what it is that you are asking. Reformed Nihilist, I am not responding to the opening remarks, because I do not disagree. Thanks for explicating, by the way. It is often hard to see whether one is disagreeing on one point alone, or through that point everything the other says. That is, it is hard to see what kind of basis the criticism sets for the whole system. A belief is "something that is held to be true", can we agree on that? On this thread, we can agree to that. With a minor addition: the belief is held true by an individual - or a group of individuals. When we say "Finns believe that...", we mean that they share the same belief - not that there is a conscious entity, Finns, that believe something collectively. This point can be argued, though, but perhaps it is easiest not to, at least here. I agree that the words can be used in such an such a way, but this is not what I mean when I speak of beliefs in my justification-criterium. Can we also agree that anything that is held to be true is so held for a reason (good bad or otherwise)? Justification seems to be a reason that we generally (intersubjectively) agree is valid or worthwhile. If we can agree that beliefs have reasons, then when we take an intersubjective (or imagined objective) point of view, then justification is redundant. It is a belief from a point of view, that has a reason (considered good from that point of view). So, you are saying that because beliefs have reasons, then if we assume that the group x has a belief (the people comprising the group believe the same thing), the group has its reasons, and these reasons are then intersubjective, and therefore able to constitute justification - or make justification redundant because the intersubjective reasons are enough? I guess you can do that, but then you are not speaking of the same thing. The problem is that the reasons I might have for believing whatever are mostly not epistemological reasons in any way: my belief that there went a car past my window is based on the direct perception of the sound of a car, and then on some implicit non-cognized reasoning. Only after someone asks "WHY do you believe that", I can start poking into myself to see why I in fact did. Often a perception is behind it all, sometimes we can only shrug helplessly and say "I don't know - I just thought that it was so for some reason". Here we see a difference between the subjective grounds for believing something (the reason - it might even be a causal reason, mind you!) and the intersubjective grounds for believing something. I have no justification for my belief that it is day outside, but I can formulate a justification by referring to my perception, perhaps even showing someone that it is bright outside. The justification is something that is uttered, or formulated, or communicated in some other way. I have a host of beliefs (probably millions all the time) that are not epistemological - but can be made such when questioned. This is the difference between reason and justification. The reason is no justification. Justifications are reasons that are held to be good enough to hold - that is, we give those to people who question something. This is the point in knowledge in general: knowledge is subjective dispositions taken to objective/intersubjective world through communication, and perhaps through somehow comparing those dispositions to reality. I do not think a group can have reasons in the same sense as you say individual's beliefs have reasons. It is important to understand that the reason behind a belief might be a mere causal procedure (my reason for believing a perception is that this perception was caused by a firing neuron in my head), but this causal procedure is no justification. If it was so, then everything we did was justified just because everything we do is done for a reason. Causal or otherwise. I'm missing what is so disasterous about saying that justification is redundant when intersubjectivity is introduced. Why not just say reasoned (I thought that was implicit, but it seems more accurate that justified)? Simply because having a reason does not amount to having a justification. I think I have expressed above why justification seems redundant to me, in this system...but I'm sure you'll let me know if I'm wrong (read unjustified). Well, I am sure you have your reasons... I am saying that justification comes from the attempt to divorce our beliefs from subjectivity, by appealing and accepting a community as judge. Very much true, I think. Knowledge differs from mere subjective assumptions in the same sense. We believe them because we have reason to. They are reasonable. "having a reason" is not the same thing as "being reasonable". It is an expression in language that is misleading. To have a reason is best translated as to have a cause (either mechanistic, or perhaps a reason based on will etc). Being reasonable is very different - and equating these can amount to a host of problems in your stance. "Come on, be reasonable" does not mean the same as "Come on, have reasons". That is because "reasoning" is NOT the same thing as "having reason", and this is because the underlying words are different: reason means either our cognitive faculty to make rational assumptions or some such, or it means a cause of something. Our beliefs as having reasons is simply not the same thing as them being reasonable. When we say that "your beliefs are reasonable", we say that they are considered well, that is, reason is applied to them well. This is a simple categorical mistake here. It might be a linguistic slip, or it might be something that grounds your way of seeing justification and reason - you should give this some thought. Cuthbert, I think the distinction you are making is between justification for a belief, which is the grounds for holding it, and vindication of a belief, which is the event of its turning out to be true. Justification for a belief I think is not the same thing as justification OF a belief. That is, I may justify my belief in many ways, but it doesn't follow that it is justified. Justification is something, at least here, that can be measured, that the action of justifying can fail. It is the same as trying to prove a theorem and actually proving it. The point is that this proof can be evaluated by others. By justifying my belief I give you the reasons for believing it. The belief is justified only when these reasons are deemed good enough (this is rather vague, of course, because justification depends on who is doing the evaluation). Vindication would indeed include the truth of a statement. You are then saying that I am confusing justification for vindication, is that it? I think that claim is warranted, but not entirely true. Note that even my certain knowledge does not include truth - even a certain piece of knowledge can be proven to be false: the criterium is that no one could think of a way for it to be false. It is true that the first question I presented: "how can a proposition be justified and yet false" indicates this confusion, but it is only a question that leads to the definition of justification. This is a good point, though, because I had not considered the concept of vindication. I may be justified in believing that p, even though p is false. That is because my justification is weak. My belief, though justified, will not be vindicated. This is true. However, a question: when is this vindication "justified"? That is, let me claim that JFK was assassinated by CIA. I may not have sufficient justification for this, but it might then turn out that someone finds a document holding conclusive evidence that this was so: my belief was vindicated, right? But this vindication may yet prove out to be false: the document was forged. I would then be deprived of my vindication. So the vindication is linked to justification: there is no such thing as something turning out to be true - we may always ask for the justification for assuming that that something indeed is true. It seems to me that vindication is then tied up with justification - and might indeed be reduced to analysis of understandability and justification in my system: vindication happens when some system of belief that would justify my claim turns out to be acceptable, even though my belief-system is not enough. In short: something comes up that fills my belief-system so that the belief becomes justified. This does not implicate that there could be yet another system of belief rendering this justification insufficient. Your 'understandable' means justified, and your 'justified' means vindicated (I think.) In a sense, yes. Understandable is c-justified (conditionally justified), and justified would be unconditionally justified. But as I laboured to show in the beginning of this moster-of-a-post, this justification is again only c-justification from the point of view of another belief-system. The real justification is always linked with certainty: we can consider that which is justified in all systems to be justified irrelative to those belief systems. But as I also said just above, this does not yet link to truth - a certain piece of knowledge may be false! But vindication here includes a relation to truth. Vindication too is conditional, and in fact it is highly problematic: "look, there is a sheep there after all!" may be an error again, and my vindication may be short lived. Just because we gain more support for our justification, and thus make the merely understandable belief justified, it doesn't mean that it may yet again be rendered merely understandable. Vindication would then be simply the rendering of an understandable or c-justified belief into a justified belief. But this is again just c-justified to someone else. Your analysis is very sharp-sighted, and I will think on this more. But the connection of vindication to truth makes me doubt that this is what I am saying. With regard to moral actions, your 'understandable' needs to be unpacked, I think, into 'excusable', 'justifiable' and 'comprehensible'. Let me pass this problem by. My intention was not to discuss moral justification - it was meant as an introduction to the idea of understandability. Perhaps I should have chosen another example, but because so many people consider truth to be fixed, but agree that there are no moral facts, I thought it was easiest to start from there. A. There is no restaurant in town at which I may not dine tonight. Therefore, I may dine at every restaurant in town tonight. B. There is nothing that I certainly know that I may not doubt. Therefore I may doubt everything that I certainly know. I would be interested to hear anyone's thoughts on why we are often taken in by B but would not for a moment be deceived by A. But that might be another thread. Another thread indeed, but I think it is only produced by your use of temporal expressions in A. I can't dine at every restaurant in town TONIGHT, but I can dine at every restaurant in town in my LIFETIME. I can't doubt everything I know for certain AT ONCE, but I can doubt everything in their turn. This lack of temporality in B amounts for it to be far more plausible than A. In fact, A may be true in cases where there are, for example, only two restaurants in the town. I may justify my belief that p and I may then be required to justify my justification for my belief that p. There is potentially no end to justifying. Again, it does not follow from the fact that I may be required to justify any given justification, that every belief is unjustified. True to some extent. This is analogical to the problem between knowledge and certain knowledge. Just because someone can doubt my knowledge it does not follow that I do not know. It does follow, that (if the doubt is rational) it is not certain, but that is entirely another matter. Jaoman, I find it strange that you would look to a third person perspective to award the title of justification to a first person view. I am merely conforming to the fact that something that x considers justified may not be considered justified by y. Thus to speak of justification as unrelated to the justifying person is misleading. It is like saying that the number 27 is great. It is great only in relation to some number that is smaller than it. I think my actions are, then, justified When John wallops Peter, if John is thinking - which is an oxymoron not far from the famous "military intelligence" - John believes he is justified. He has assessed the situation, and based on those facts finds justification to hit Peter. In other words, John has a justified belief that hitting Peter is the way to go. Yes, but the justification criterium in JTB is not such a justification as expressed here. It does not mean that the proposition "pi is rational" is justified just because someone thinks that it is. This is the crux of the matter: the 'justification' as expressed in JTB is not something merely subjective, and it seems to me that it is not something merely objective either - it is something intersubjective. It is then to be asked: when does something constitute justification? We do not consider that x is justified in believing that "pi is rational" just because he thinks that irrational numbers cannot exist in nature and pi exists in nature. He surely has reasons, and those reasons are expressible and even evaluatable, but he has no justification - or so we think. Basically: the justification I am trying to understand is that justification in JTB, which is not subjective justification. The difficulties associated with justification are, then, the exact problems of determining how to distinguish real justification from assumed justification. On the other hand, based on my experience, I believe violence doesn't solve anything - well, rarely. Of course it does. If there are two people disagreeing on how to share the apples, if the other kills the other, the problem is solved . I think the "violence doesn't solve anything" is actually a rather vague sentiment. It solves a whole lot of things. What we mean is that it produces other problems that make us think that the solving of x is not worth it because it produces the problems y and z. Moreover, we think that solving problems through violence is barbaric and not constructive. This is, of course, very much off-topic, but I just had to say this What distinguishes John and me is the social ruling. John has no legal right to strike Peter, and is condemned by the court. For all that John found justification for his belief, when considered "globally" - to say, with all the facts - it proved to be false. The "true" element of justified true believe acts as the go-between with the outside world, as opposed to justified, which is there only to insure a criteria for belief in general. I agree that there is a sense of justification that amounts to your points, but I am not speaking of that - and I claim that neither are epistemologists when they speak of knowledge being justified true belief. The justification here is indeed linked with the social ruling, so to speak. But this is not merely so: it is not arbitrary to say that science can justify things better, but it is grounded (in a sense, again justified) on experience and the results of science. Phew! That was a long post. ~M~ Edited by Morrandir on 05/26/05 - 04:30 AM. Reason: Some fixes and additions.
Philosophy is disciplined bewilderment. A mathematician is a person who thinks that if there are supposed to be three people in a room, but five come out, then two more must enter the room in order for it to be empty. http://www.beyondappearances.com

darkcrow
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Posted 05/26/05 - 08:58 AM:	#36
Morrandir wrote: Probably the easiest and most compact way of explaining what JTB stands for is to say that belief is the subjective, justification is the intersubjective and truth is the objective ingredient of knowledge. Knowledge is then something that links a subjective assumption through generally accepted ways to something actual - grounding the belief in the reality. Justification is needed to carry the belief to the actual - a mere true belief is true "by accident", which I believe means that there is no direct epistemological link from the subjective states of affairs to the objective. It is a mere coincidence that they match. Darkcrow, I don't know what you mean by major and minor premise...? ~M~ Do I understand this clearly…We could say that the, foundational beliefs, (intersubjective) are whatever an arbitrary %, say 85% of what one=s contemporaries accept; as say opposed to any inductive- warrant? Darkcrow, I don't know what you mean by major and minor premise...? ~M~ I won’t respond to this since it makes no sense to you as stated and would only detract from the thread.
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jaoman
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Posted 05/26/05 - 10:06 AM:	#37
Morrindir, aye-yay-yay...how long did it take you to type that behemoth? It seems the use of understandability in your opening post threw me off. Makes a lot more sense when you formulate it as conditionally justified. However, I still see the same problem within it, and you seem to be aware of it too: namely, that without defining the rational belief criteria you're still dancing around your original question. You have narrowed in, admittedly. But, as you’ve mentioned, an intersubjective belief is just a subjective belief shared. It can be subject to the same irrationalities as any purely subjective belief. It makes me wonder: if we’re, in fact, needing to define a standard of rationality to answer the question anyway, is the intersubjective distinction even necessary? If we find and establish the basic criteria, would they not serve as well individually for evaluation? Morrandir wrote: Of course it does. If there are two people disagreeing on how to share the apples, if the other kills the other, the problem is solved . I think the "violence doesn't solve anything" is actually a rather vague sentiment. It solves a whole lot of things. What we mean is that it produces other problems that make us think that the solving of x is not worth it because it produces the problems y and z. Moreover, we think that solving problems through violence is barbaric and not constructive. This is, of course, very much off-topic, but I just had to say this Actually, I agree with this very much. But I could never resist the opportunity to practice my internet acting.
"With no relation to class or social background, whether it suits them or not, people yearn for a dream. Sustained by a dream, hurt by a dream, revived by a dream, killed by a dream. And even after being abandoned by a dream, it continues to smolder from the bottom of one's heart... probably until the verge of death. A man should envision such a lifetime once. A life spent as a martyr to the god named "dream." - Kentaro Miura

Reformed Nihilist
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Posted 05/26/05 - 04:03 PM:	#38
Ok, I think it is important, as Morri says, that we stick to justification. I also do realize that I was somewhat unclear. Criterea for evaluating justification is intersubjective, 'common sense' and 'common knowledge' would be often cited justifications for many propositions. Looking at Wikipedia I found this: Justification is a normative activity One way of explaining the theory of justification is to say: A justified belief is one which we are within our rights in holding. By this is meant, not political rights, or moral rights, but "intellectual" rights. In some way each of us is responsible for what we believe. We don't just go off and believe anything. We each have an intellectual responsibility or obligation, to believe what is true and to avoid believing what is false. Being intellectually responsible involves being within one's intellectual rights in believing something; in such cases one is justified in one's belief. Thus, justification is a normative notion. That means that it has to do with norms, rights, responsibilities, obligations, and so forth. The standard definition is that a concept is normative iff it is a concept regarding or depending on the norms, or obligations and permissions (very broadly construed), involved in human conduct. It is generally accepted that the concept of justification is normative, because it is defined as a concept regarding the norms of belief. AKG wrote: You misread me. By "actual justifications" I mean the justifications that were actually given by the person. By your redefinition of "justified," it doesn't matter so much what actual justifications a person gives, simply what the community is willing to consider justified. I haven't redefined the word. See MW online: One entry found for justify. Main Entry: jus·ti·fy Pronunciation: 'j&s-t&-"fI Function: verb Inflected Form(s): -fied; -fy·ing Etymology: Middle English justifien, from Middle French or Late Latin; Middle French justifier, from Late Latin justificare, from Latin justus transitive senses 1 a : to prove or show to be just, right, or reasonable b (1) : to show to have had a sufficient legal reason (2) : to qualify (oneself) as a surety by taking oath to the ownership of sufficient property To prove that something is reasonable, we must be proving it to someone, correct? Justification is by it's very defintion intersubjective. It seems your definition has nothing to do with justification, but rather with what a community considers justified. Yup. That is a redundant statement IMO...But it's not my definition. You seem to make "justified" an arbitrary label. I hate the misuse of the word arbitrary. What's arbitrary about it? Things are justified in a very clear way. The body of people in question deems the justification reasonable. But what does it mean when a community says that something seems justified to them? It means that they think that whatever belief has been adequately shown to be correct. Yes. Now your redefinition makes it impossible for the community to be wrong. However, if a belief is false, then it can never be adequately shown to be correct, since it can never even be correct. What do you mean by correct? True (in a correspondic sense)? If so, that has little to do with justification. Can I not be justified and believe something that is incorrect? If I attend Oxford, and my prof tells me that quarks are only mathematical objects, and shows me a textbook that says so, would I not be justified in believing it? I don't know if it is true or not, in a correspondic way, but I would be justified in believing it. If I'm hungry, and the community believes that you've adequately demonstrated to them that I'm not hungry, that doesn't make you justified. If I offer you a variety of different food, and you refuse it all, and say "I'm not hungry", then I would say I was perfectly justified in believing that you were not hungry. Because justified isn't "the community believes it's been shown correct", it means, "it really has been shown correct," and you can't demonstrate a falsehood to be correct. Shown to whom? Is there another word you'd like to use? I think you might find it difficult to find one. So you're saying that we can only say that those people were wrong according ... The real reason we want to believe in justified things is because they are true, and there are reasons that allow us to be certain of this truth. I'll refer to my comments above about the difference between 'correct and incorrect', and justification. I apologise for becoming sidetracked into conversations about truth. It's one of my favorite subjects.
Nobody ever became a famous philosopher by being a champion of ecumenical hybridism Daniel Dennett Freedom Evolves

AKG
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Posted 05/26/05 - 04:37 PM:	#39
Reformed Nihilist wrote: Ok, I think it is important, as Morri says, that we stick to justification. I also do realize that I was somewhat unclear. Criterea for evaluating justification is intersubjective, 'common sense' and 'common knowledge' would be often cited justifications for many propositions. In some way each of us is responsible for what we believe. We don't just go off and believe anything. We each have an intellectual responsibility or obligation, to believe what is true and to avoid believing what is false. Being intellectually responsible involves being within one's intellectual rights in believing something; in such cases one is justified in one's belief.[/quote]This is what I said, that we want to have justified beliefs because we want to (or as they curiously put it, are obliged to) have true beliefs. Your definition of "justified" can only hope to coincidentally have anything to do with having true beliefs. We want to believe things for reasons that make the proposition true, not reasons that match the communities standard for good reasons. There are reasons that make a proposition true, and there are reasons that a community believes are required to make a statement justified. By your definition, the two are only coincidentally related. On the other hand, the definition you've provided talks about proving that something is just, right, or reasonable. "Reasonable" may be subjective, but "right" is not. Not everything is right if I think it is. Somethings require more than my belief to be right. To prove that something is reasonable, we must be proving it to someone, correct? Justification is by it's very defintion intersubjective. Your claim here is that since "justification" and "intersubjective" can be uttered in the same sentence, then the criteria for what is justified is intersubjective. Theft is intersubjective because it requires one subject to steal from another, just as justification is intersubjective because it requires one subject to convince another. But that doesn't mean that the criteria for theft is intersubjective. If the victim doesn't know he's been robbed, that doesn't mean that the theif didn't steal anything from him. And if no one stole anything from him, but he accuses someone of stealing (whereas he really just misplaced that thing), and even if the whole community agrees, that doesn't mean that theft has actually occured. Justification requires one person showing another that something is right. "Showing another" implies intersubjectivity, but there's also the element of something being "right." In fact, "reasonable" is not really intersubjective. "Reasonable" should mean that it is based on good reasons, reasons that tend to lead to right conclusions. People can be wrong about what's reasonable. It seems you might be confusing "understandable" and "reasonable." A community of idiots will understand when another person makes an idiotic justification for a false claim, and they may think it's reasonable, but it's not. "Understandable" is intersubjective, because it requires someone to do the understanding. "Reasonable" means that it's based on good reasons, and good reasons tend to lead to true results, and the truth of results isn't subjective. Yup. That is a redundant statement IMO...But it's not my definition. Well it's not what anyone means by justification, so I wonder whose definition it is. Justification is about proving things to be true, not about giving reasons that are standardly accepted. If we are all reasonable people, then the standards of justification that we collectively accept are likely to be the very standards that assure that things are proven true. However, people back in the day were not reasonable, in which case the collective standard of justification was actually an incorrect standard of justification - it led to false results. I hate the misuse of the word arbitrary. What's arbitrary about it? Things are justified in a very clear way. The body of people in question deems the justification reasonable. Arbitrary: determined by chance, whim, impulse, etc. It's just a label that is flung at a class of propositions that doesn't really tell us anything about it. Someone who became "racist" against people with abnormally long fingers would be making an arbitrary distinction, as opposed to a distinction that was really consequential. Unless we have a reasonable community, you're definition of justified doesn't really tell us whether the justifications are good or not for a given proposition. They just tell us whether other people will tend to agree, more or less. Yes. And can't they be wrong? If something is false, can it be adequately be shown to be correct? No proof is sufficient proof if we are trying to prove a falsehood. So those community members who think that some proof for a false statement is adequate and is sufficient, wouldn't they be wrong? What do you mean by correct? True (in a correspondic sense)? If so, that has little to do with justification. Can I not be justified and believe something that is incorrect? If I attend Oxford, and my prof tells me that quarks are only mathematical objects, and shows me a textbook that says so, would I not be justified in believing it? I don't know if it is true or not, in a correspondic way, but I would be justified in believing it. I can understand why you would believe it, I could perhaps sympathize with you, but you wouldn't be justified if it turned out to be false. If I offer you a variety of different food, and you refuse it all, and say "I'm not hungry", then I would say I was perfectly justified in believing that you were not hungry. No, you wouldn't. Shown to whom? Is there another word you'd like to use? I think you might find it difficult to find one. It doesn't matter. It could be shown to the community. But the community would be wrong if they think a falsehood was shown to them. If I tell you I'm going to show that I can lift 1000 pounds, and I perform some illusion to make it seem that way, then even though the community believes that I have shown them that I can lift 1000 pounds, I actually have shown no such thing. There's a difference between what has been shown, and what is believed to have been shown.
"The only reason we die... is because we accept it as an inevitability." -- Stewie "To enslave nuance to dogma is folly." -- Lord Hillyer

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Posted 05/26/05 - 06:22 PM:	#40
AKG wrote: This is what I said, that we want to have justified beliefs because we want to (or as they curiously put it, are obliged to) have true beliefs. Your definition of "justified" can only hope to coincidentally have anything to do with having true beliefs. We want to believe things for reasons that make the proposition true, not reasons that match the communities standard for good reasons. Why would it be a coincedence? Justification doesn't make something true, it's just a way to test if something is true. It's not airtight, but it works pretty well. There are reasons that make a proposition true, and there are reasons that a community believes are required to make a statement justified. By your definition, the two are only coincidentally related. On the other hand, the definition you've provided talks about proving that something is just, right, or reasonable. "Reasonable" may be subjective, but "right" is not. Not everything is right if I think it is. Somethings require more than my belief to be right.Your claim here is that since "justification" and "intersubjective" can be uttered in the same sentence, then the criteria for what is justified is intersubjective. Except for the coincendence part, this is accurate. Theft is intersubjective because it requires one subject to steal from another, Huh? The belief that a theft happened maybe? Intersubjective is a perspective. If a thaft happens, it can be view subjectively, intersubjectively, ar perhaps (in theory at least) objectively. The theft itself is an event, that begs no particular point of view. just as justification is intersubjective because it requires one subject to convince another. Yes. In the context of this conversation. I suppose you could use justification in a different sense, something like "I can justify this expense to myself...", but I don't think that's what is meant in JTB. But that doesn't mean that the criteria for theft is intersubjective. If the victim doesn't know he's been robbed, that doesn't mean that the theif didn't steal anything from him. If he didn't know he had been robbed, he would not be justified in accusing the thief of robbery, even thought he was right. And if no one stole anything from him, but he accuses someone of stealing (whereas he really just misplaced that thing), and even if the whole community agrees, that doesn't mean that theft has actually occured. If you had a known history of theft, and credible people told me they saw you take something from my house, I would be justified in accusing you of theft. Don't you think so. Justification requires one person showing another that something is right. "Showing another" implies intersubjectivity, but there's also the element of something being "right." Being right/the truth is certainly the goal of justification. In fact, "reasonable" is not really intersubjective. No more or less intersubjective that theft. I might subjectively judge something reasonable, while society might jusge it unreasonable. "Reasonable" should mean that it is based on good reasons, reasons that tend to lead to right conclusions. I agree. People can be wrong about what's reasonable. Yes. Just as people can be justified in holding wrong beliefs. It seems you might be confusing "understandable" and "reasonable." A community of idiots will understand when another person makes an idiotic justification for a false claim, and they may think it's reasonable, but it's not. "Understandable" is intersubjective, because it requires someone to do the understanding. "Reasonable" means that it's based on good reasons, and good reasons tend to lead to true results, and the truth of results isn't subjective. Who said the 'truth of results' was subjective? I have only said that beliefs were objective, and justification was intersubjective. Well it's not what anyone means by justification, so I wonder whose definition it is. Justification is about proving things to be true, not about giving reasons that are standardly accepted. What does 'proving to be true' mean? Doesn't it mean that you give reasons? Shouldn't those reasons make sense? Or are you saying that something is justified only if it is true beyond any possible doubt? If we are all reasonable people, then the standards of justification that we collectively accept are likely to be the very standards that assure that things are proven true. Yes, that's why justification works pretty well. However, people back in the day were not reasonable, By our standards? By yours? If not, by whose? How can you judge reasonableness without applying standards? in which case the collective standard of justification was actually an incorrect standard of justification - it led to false results. Yes. Justification isn't a guarenteed pipeline to correspondic truth. If it were, nobody would put truth in JTB, because it would be implicit in J. Arbitrary: determined by chance, whim, impulse, etc. And justification is arbitrary how? It's just a label that is flung at a class of propositions that doesn't really tell us anything about it. Someone who became "racist" against people with abnormally long fingers would be making an arbitrary distinction, as opposed to a distinction that was really consequential. Only if his reasons were impulsive or whimsical. Unless we have a reasonable community, you're definition of justified doesn't really tell us whether the justifications are good or not for a given proposition. They just tell us whether other people will tend to agree, more or less. That is true, unless you would like to introduce 'personal justification into it. The problem with that is belief works just fine by itself if you do. And can't they be wrong? If something is false, can it be adequately be shown to be correct? No proof is sufficient proof if we are trying to prove a falsehood. So those community members who think that some proof for a false statement is adequate and is sufficient, wouldn't they be wrong? I think I've already made it clear that you can be justified and wrong about something. I can understand why you would believe it, I could perhaps sympathize with you, but you wouldn't be justified if it turned out to be false. When it 'turned out' to be false, then you would be justified in believing I was wrong. So would I. 'Turned out' implies new data, or new criteria for judging. No, you wouldn't. It doesn't matter. It could be shown to the community. But the community would be wrong if they think a falsehood was shown to them. If I tell you I'm going to show that I can lift 1000 pounds, and I perform some illusion to make it seem that way, then even though the community believes that I have shown them that I can lift 1000 pounds, I actually have shown no such thing. There's a difference between what has been shown, and what is believed to have been shown. They would be wrong. They would also be justified in believing it (if you were convincing enough). What's the problem?
Nobody ever became a famous philosopher by being a champion of ecumenical hybridism Daniel Dennett Freedom Evolves

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