The indexicality of ‘knowledge’

Blome-Tillmann, Michael

doi:10.1007/s11098-006-0008-2

Cited by 27 publications

(15 citation statements)

References 23 publications

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“…We will work with the 1 In Schaffer (2004) and Blome-Tillmann (2008, contextualism is specifically identified with the view that 'know' is an indexical term. The treatment of 'know' as a relational term is treated as a nearby alternative to contextualism.…”

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Epistemic comparativism: a contextualist semantics for knowledge ascriptions

Schaffer

Szabó

2013

Philos Stud

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Knowledge ascriptions seem context sensitive. Yet it is widely thought that epistemic contextualism does not have a plausible semantic implementation. We aim to overcome this concern by articulating and defending an explicit contextualist semantics for 'know,' which integrates a fairly orthodox contextualist conception of knowledge as the elimination of the relevant alternatives, with a fairly orthodox ''Amherst'' semantics for A-quantification over a contextually variable domain of situations. Whatever problems epistemic contextualism might face, lack of an orthodox semantic implementation is not among them.Keywords Epistemic contextualism Á Knowledge Á Semantics Á Context Questioning is the cutting edge of knowledge; assertion is the dead weight behind the edge that gives it its driving force…. Information may be the body of knowledge, but questioning is its soul….[A]sking a question means envisaging alternatives, and only one at most of these alternatives can really exist. (Collingwood 1924, pp. 78-79) Knowledge ascriptions seem context sensitive. For instance, if Ann was wondering who stole the diamonds and then found Claire's fingerprints on the safe, then it would seem true for Ann to say:1. I know that Claire stole the diamonds J. Schaffer (&) Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ, USA e-mail: jonathan.schaffer@rutgers.edu Z. G. Szabó Yale University, New Haven, CT, USA e-mail: zoltan.szabo@yale.edu 123Philos Stud (2014) 168:491-543 DOI 10.1007 Yet if Ann was instead wondering what Claire stole and then found Claire's fingerprints on the safe, then it would seem false for her to say 1. After all, the fingerprint evidence bears on the question of who stole the diamonds, but not on the question of what Claire stole.Epistemic contextualism is the thesis that things are as they seem: knowledge ascriptions are context sensitive. But contextualism has faced sustained criticism on several fronts. Perhaps the main criticism is that contextualism is semantically implausible. Contextualists seldom articulate an explicit compositional semantics for 'know,' but usually just draw analogies with indexical pronouns, gradable adjectives, and/or quantificational determiners. These analogies are at best partial. And so many philosophers have grown openly skeptical of epistemic contextualism. As Stanley (2005, p. 47) writes: ''[T]he alleged context-sensitivity of knowledge ascriptions has no other parallel among the class of uncontroversial contextsensitive expressions.'' Call this the semantic problem.We aim to solve the semantic problem by articulating and defending a contextualist semantics for 'know.' Essentially, we will argue that 'know' may be treated as an A-quantifier (alongside adverbial quantifiers and modals). Our semantics integrates a fairly orthodox contextualist conception of 'know' as requiring the elimination of the relevant alternatives, with a fairly orthodox ''Amherst'' semantics for A-quantifiers as ranging over a contextually variable domain of situations. We call this a comparativist se...

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Epistemic comparativism: a contextualist semantics for knowledge ascriptions

Schaffer

Szabó

2013

Philos Stud

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“…I then take each linguistic objection in turn ( §1.2-1.4). I argue that, while Michael Blome-Tillmann (2008) shows how contextualists can deal with the first objection, his attempt to deal with the second objection runs into problems, and is of no use in dealing with the third objection. I develop alternative solutions to the second and third objections.…”

Section: The Linguistic Objectionsmentioning

confidence: 93%

Epistemic contextualism defended

McKenna

2014

Synthese

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Epistemic contextualists think that the extension of the expression 'knows' (and its cognates) depends on and varies with the context of utterance. In the last 15 years or so this view has faced intense criticism. This paper focuses on two sorts of objections. The first are what I call the 'linguistic objections', which purport to show that the best available linguistic evidence suggests that 'knows' is not context-sensitive. The second is what I call the 'disagreement problem', which concerns the behaviour of 'knows' in disagreement reports. These may not be the only objections to epistemic contextualism, but they are probably the most influential. I argue that the best current epistemic contextualist response to the linguistic objection is incomplete, and I show how it can be supplemented to deal with the full range of linguistic objections. I also develop a new solution to the disagreement problem. The upshot is that neither sort of objection gives us any reason to reject epistemic contextualism. This conclusion is, in a sense, negative -no new arguments for epistemic contextualism are advanced -but it's a vital step towards rehabilitating the view. Introductory RemarksEpistemic contextualists -henceforth, 'contextualists' -think that the extension of the expression 'knows' (and its cognates) depends on and varies with the context of utterance. Consequently, in showing that contextualists can deal with these objections, I deal with the main reason why many reject contextualism. My conclusion is, in a sense, negative -no new arguments for contextualism are put forward -but it's a vital step towards rehabilitating the view.

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“…Halliday and Blome‐Tillman both respond to the gradability objection on behalf of the contextualist.…”

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“…Hawthorne (, 98–111) presents a closely related objection concerning indirect belief reports. See Blome‐Tillman (, 32–41) and DeRose (, 161–74) for responses on behalf of contextualism.…”

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Pragmatic Contextualism

Pynn

2015

Metaphilosophy

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Contextualism in epistemology has traditionally been understood as the view that “know” functions semantically like an indexical term, encoding different contents in contexts with different epistemic standards. But the indexical hypothesis about “know” faces a range of objections. This article explores an alternative version of contextualism on which “know” is a semantically stable term, and the truth‐conditional variability in knowledge claims is a matter of pragmatic enrichment. The central idea is that in contexts with stringent epistemic standards, knowledge claims are narrowed: “know” is used in such contexts to make assertions about particularly demanding types of knowledge. The resulting picture captures all of the intuitive data that motivate contextualism while sidestepping the controversial linguistic thesis at its heart. After developing the view, the article shows in detail how it avoids one influential linguistic objection to traditional contextualism concerning indirect speech reports, and then answers an objection concerning the unavailability of certain types of clarification speeches.

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The indexicality of ‘knowledge’

Cited by 27 publications

References 23 publications

Epistemic comparativism: a contextualist semantics for knowledge ascriptions

Epistemic comparativism: a contextualist semantics for knowledge ascriptions

Epistemic contextualism defended

Pragmatic Contextualism

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