Knowledge and the Gettier Problem - Softcover

Hetherington, Stephen

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1316603970 ISBN 13: 9781316603970

Publisher: Cambridge University Press, 2019

Synopsis

Edmund Gettier's 1963 verdict about what knowledge is not has become an item of philosophical orthodoxy, accepted by philosophers as a genuine epistemological result. It assures us that - contrary to what Plato and later philosophers have thought - knowledge is not merely a true belief well supported by epistemic justification. But that orthodoxy has generated the Gettier problem - epistemology's continuing struggle to understand how to accommodate Gettier's apparent result within an improved conception of knowledge. In this book, Stephen Hetherington argues that none of epistemology's standard attempts to solve that problem have succeeded: he shows how subtle yet fundamental mistakes - regarding explication, methodology, properties, modality, and fallibility - have permeated those responses to Gettier's challenge. His fresh and original book outlines a new way of solving the problem, and an improved grasp of Gettier's challenge and its significance is the result. In a sense, Plato can now embrace Gettier.

About this title

Book Description:

Plato regarded knowledge as a true belief well supported by evidence. Philosophers believe that Plato's view was disproved by Edmund Gettier in 1963. But - this book argues - philosophers do not yet understand Gettier's result, let alone knowledge. A new approach is proposed: in a sense, Plato can now embrace Gettier.

About the Author:

Stephen Hetherington is Professor of Philosophy at the University of New South Wales, Sydney. His publications include Epistemology's Paradox (1992), Good Knowledge, Bad Knowledge (2001) and How To Know (2011).

About this edition

• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• Publication date: 2019
• ISBN 10: 1316603970
• ISBN 13: 9781316603970
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 253