Edmund Gettier's Is Justified True Belief Knowledge?
Traditional analysis of knowledge says to know that P. the following requirements must be satisfied: (1) You believe that P, (2) You have justification for P and (3) that P is true. This definition of knowledge was thought to have satisfied many philosophers for centuries after Plato, this was until philosopher Edmund Gettier wrote ‘Is justified true belief knowledge?’. In this short paper he argues that justification and truth is necessary for knowledge but not sufficient thus concluding that we need something more. Although Gettier hasn’t written anything since, there have been a number of responses that attempt to either prove the jtb theory as right, or to add or take away from the Jtb theory in order to make it a valid argument. Throughout this essay I will discuss the responses that Gettier has
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Consequently if the proposition had turned out to be false then but the subject still had his reasons then it is not knowledge. This can be used to disprove the gettier cases for example, Smith had his reasons based on perception for believing Jones had ten coins in his pocket. Now if the proposition ‘the man who will get the job has ten coins in his pocket turns out to be false then would Smith still have his reasons? yes he would and thus Dretske’s 4th condition is not satisfied. To no surprise Dretske’s conclusive reasons account received much criticism. It is argued that it requires the reasons to be so strong that it equates all knowledge with infallible knowledge this leads to the proposal that I wouldn’t have had these reasons for my beliefs at all unless I was right. This can be quite controversial as it leads to the thought that we don’t know a whole lot at
Consequently if the proposition had turned out to be false then but the subject still had his reasons then it is not knowledge. This can be used to disprove the gettier cases for example, Smith had his reasons based on perception for believing Jones had ten coins in his pocket. Now if the proposition ‘the man who will get the job has ten coins in his pocket turns out to be false then would Smith still have his reasons? yes he would and thus Dretske’s 4th condition is not satisfied. To no surprise Dretske’s conclusive reasons account received much criticism. It is argued that it requires the reasons to be so strong that it equates all knowledge with infallible knowledge this leads to the proposal that I wouldn’t have had these reasons for my beliefs at all unless I was right. This can be quite controversial as it leads to the thought that we don’t know a whole lot at