Linguistique de l’écrit

Revue internationale en libre accès

Revue | Volume | Article

234700

Knowledge as de re true belief?

Paul Égré

pp. 1517-1529

Résumé

In “Facts: Particulars of Information Units?” (Linguistics and Philosophy 2002), Kratzer proposed a causal analysis of knowledge in which knowledge is defined as a form of de re belief of facts. In support of Kratzer’s view, I show that a certain articulation of the de re/de dicto distinction can be used to integrally account for the original pair of Gettier cases. In contrast to Kratzer, however, I think such an account does not fundamentally require a distinction between facts and true propositions. I then discuss whether this account might be generalized and whether it can give us a reductive analysis of knowledge as de re true belief. Like Kratzer, I think it will not, in particular the distinction appears inadequate to account for Ginet-Goldman cases of causally connected but unreliable belief. Nevertheless, I argue that the de re belief analysis allows us to account for a distinction Starmans and Friedman recently introduced between apparent evidence and authentic evidence in their empirical study of Gettier cases, in a way that questions their claim that a causal disconnect is not operative in the contrasts they found.

Détails de la publication

Publié dans:

Dutant Julien, Fassio Davide, Meylan Anne (2017) Truth & epistemic norms. Synthese 194 (5).

Pages: 1517-1529

DOI: 10.1007/s11229-016-1115-z

Citation complète:

Égré Paul, 2017, Knowledge as de re true belief? Synthese 194 (5), Truth & epistemic norms, 1517-1529. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-016-1115-z.