Some Strategies for Handling Gettier Problems

An Introduction to Epistemology pp. 65-82

Goal: Amend the JTB (Justified True Belief) analysis so that we can preclude Gettier-type (wrong evidence for a belief) cases.

• There are 3 proposals. We need to look for an “analysis that ties our justification more closely to the truth of the belief, such that it is less of an accident that the belief turns out true, given the evidence the agent has” (66) which is also known as « the accidentality problem »

Proposals:

1. Causal Theories
   • This theory involves a subtly different understanding of the justification condition, shifting from “evidential” to “causal” sense of justification.
     • A belief is an instance of knowledge if the belief is true and is caused in the right way… i.e. The target belief is the causal result of reasons (other beliefs).
     • Example: You believe that there is coffee in the mug because when you look over there is a mug, and it contains coffee. Your belief is true because there is coffee in the mug.
   • Goldman states, “S knows that p IFF the fact p is causally connected in an “appropriate” way with S’s believing p.” (68) … what is appropriate?
     • An appropriate process is a causal chain using perception, memory, and/or inference.
     • Problem: One can be led to infer that the cause of X’s death is an apparent death wound, but in reality, X was poisoned.
   • “Evidential” vs “Causal” Justification:
     • “Consider again the belief that there is coffee in the cup. Clearly, a causal connection exists between agent and cup, namely, perception. In the causal view, the fact of this connection is enough to justify the agent’s belief; there is a reason for the agent’s belief. In the evidential sense of reason, however, for the agent to be justified, the existence of this causal connection is not enough. The agent must also, at the very least believe that this connection exists” (69)
2. Indefeasibility Theories
   • Indefeasible justification is one for which there is no undermining evidence.
     • i.e. there exists no other evidence such as that, if revealed, the justification would be undermined (very strong condition).
     • Undermining evidence is also called defeating evidence.
     • A justification is defeasible IFF there is defeating evidence.
     • Thus, “the sort of justification required for knowledge is not simply [JTB] but also indefeasible justification” (69)
   • Question: how to guarantee that there is no defeating evidence?
     • “Indefeasibility theorists do not require that an agent be able to show that there are no defeaters. Nor do they require that the agent believe there are no defeaters. Rather, for a justification to be indefeasible, these theorists require merely that there in fact be no defeaters. Whether this fact is reflected in the agent’s beliefs makes no difference to the defeasibility of the agent’s justification” (71) … surprised Pikachu face what is the point then ??
   • Genuine vs Misleading “Defeaters” Problem:
     • Example: You come to believe that planet earth is spherical. You saw the pictures, heard scientists talk about it, and read plenty of convincing evidence. One day, a video of the “Pope of Science” circles around where he states, “Earth is flat, and those NASA conspirators are brainwashing the public.” That might sound like a “defeater” at first glance, however, you were unaware that the video was actually a deepfake
     • Misleading defeaters are defeaters that can themselves be defeated to “restore” the original justification.
     • Indefeasible justifications must be able to withstand the acquisition of new information.
     • Robert Meyers: “What protects your knowledge is not the original justification but the fact that you learned the counterevidence along with the evidence that nullifies it” (73).
     • Response: “the indefeasibility theorist might suggest the following: a justification need not include evidence sufficient to rule out misleading defeaters; it is only necessary that the agent could acquire that evidence without changing or giving up the beliefs that comprised the original justification” (74).
   • Practical Issues:
     • Difficult to find a way to amend the JTB analysis that distinguishes between genuine and misleading defeaters.
     • The condition may be too strong and rule out legitimate cases of inductive knowledge.
     • If the condition is weaker, it may fail to distinguish between defective and merely incomplete justifications.
3. No-False-Premise Views (a 4th-condition approach)
   • Fourth condition: the justification does not depend on any false premises.
     • Too strong. What if some false premise is not essential to the justification?
     • “The agent would not be justified in believing that P unless the agent also believed some further proposition Q. The proposition Q is then said to be essential to the agent’s justification” (75).
   • Meyers’ fourth condition: “S is justified in believing p on the basis of q only if: every proposition essential to S being justified in believing p on the basis of q is true” (76).
   • Feldman’s Objection (Explicit vs Implicit false premise): if S had seen Nogot driving a Ford and S had been told that Nogot owned a Ford, and had immediately inferred that someone in the office owned a Ford, then S’s justification would not depend on a false premise.
     • Response: whether S articulates or reasons explicitly from a false proposition, S clearly seems to believe something false (that Nogot owns a Ford)… but how to decide which “background beliefs” are essential to the explicit belief?

Significance of Gettier:

• Two main issues: (a) the nature of knowledge (b) the nature of justification
• As it stands, roughly, the 3 proposals present JTB as necessary, if not sufficient, for knowledge.
• It is possible to avoid the Gettier issue? There seems to be a gap between the satisfaction of the justification condition and the satisfaction of the truth condition.
• Ernest Sosa suggested that “knowledge is apt (true) belief” (77).
  • simple perceptual beliefs vs complicated chain of inductive reasoning
• Mark Kaplan hinted, in an article, that “It’s Not What You Know That Counts.”
  • The environment has deceived the agent, but what can the agent do?
• Gettier cases suggest that “we can have knowledge only in a generally cooperative environment. If we rely on our generally ‘accredited routes to knowledge,’ we count on the world being more or less normal” (79) … true, we are “lucky” the world is sensible

Accounts of knowledge and Justification (79):

1. Externalism: roughly the idea that an agent’s justification or knowledge depends on some condition that need not be reflected in an agent’s beliefs
2. Internalism: roughly holds that a belief is justified only if the relevant justifying conditions are in some respect reflected in the agent’s beliefs or cognitive perspective.
   • “The causal theory does not appear to insist that knowledge depends on the reasons for which an agent holds the belief. This has led some to think that knowledge is externalist in nature, while justification is internalist” (79).

Foley’s Take (80):

• “In asking whether a person knows, we are asking whether, relative to the ‘neighborhood’ of the target belief, the person has sufficient true beliefs.”
  • Connection between knowledge and justified belief is “dubious.”
  • It is difficult to identify the relevant “neighborhood” (context) of a target belief, but Foley suggests that is true of any account of knowledge.
• “Foley further suggests that externalists are principally interested in knowledge, while internalists are principally concerned about the nature of justification.”
• This marks the “beginning of the division between internalist and externalist conceptions of knowledge and justification.”