What is Epistemology?

Stephen Hetherington

• Publisher: Polity
• Year: 2019
• Print ISBN: 9781509529513, 9781509529506
• eBook ISBN: 9781509529537
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Philosophy
• Subtopic: Philosophy History & Theory

Epistemology is the philosophical study of knowledge. Epistemologists seek to understand knowledge's nature and availability. What is knowledge? There are competing theories. Can we really have knowledge? Challenges abound.

In this lively book, Stephen Hetherington introduces us to epistemological theorizing. He builds a theory and tests it, refines it, and challenges it again. He explores such topics as evidence, truth and belief, different kinds of knowledge, and knowledge's value, as well as sceptical views concerning knowledge of the physical world, one's own mind and memory, and rational limits for observation and reason. This epistemological theorizing is then applied to some of life's most pressing issues, such as how to live and how to understand ourselves and others.

What is Epistemology? is a practical and student-friendly guide to one of the most dynamic areas of philosophy. It will be the go-to introductory epistemology text.

1
Doing Epistemology

1.1 A parable, or two

What is epistemology? It is … no, wait a moment. Let us start more slowly and reflectively, with an analogy.

Have you heard the parable of the blind men and the elephant? These men encounter their first elephant. ‘What is this?’ ‘It's an elephant, I was told.’ ‘What is that?’ One man – touching the trunk – answers that an elephant is like a snake. Another grasps an ear: ‘An elephant is like a fan.’ A third man feels the animal's side: ‘No, an elephant is like a wall.’ And so on. Each man touches a distinct part of the animal, deriving a view of the whole on the basis of that part – with each being mistaken about that whole. None of the men experiences enough of the elephant to know its general nature. But none of them thinks of himself as being too limited in that way. Each pronounces confidently – although ignorantly – upon the nature of elephants, by applying some evidence; not enough evidence, though.

We can adapt that parable. We can apply it to people puzzled about the nature of knowledge (rather than of elephants). We should do this because epistemology typically begins by reaching out and asking – puzzled – about knowledge's nature, as those blind men pondered the nature of elephants. How do we ensure that we will not fail as those men did? Can we understand knowledge's nature? Or – like the blind men – are we too restricted to do so? Must we remain ignorant, without realizing it, about what knowledge is?

Imagine asking different people, ‘What is knowledge?’ This is not the same question as ‘What is known?’ In epistemology, our aim is not to compile a list of instances of knowledge – what you know, what your mother knows, etc. Such a list could include useful data, as we seek to understand what knowledge is. But it is not our ultimate goal. Instead, we want to push our thinking beyond any such list. We wish to discover what makes anything on that list an instance of knowledge: why is your knowledge knowledge? What makes anyone's knowledge knowledge? Thinking about only your knowledge, say, is like touching simply the elephant's tail. Thinking just about your mother's knowledge is like touching merely the elephant's tusk. We need to think far more widely about knowledge.

How much more widely, though? Knowing knowledge's nature is like knowing the nature of elephants. You need to observe or think about enough instances and aspects of knowledge, if you are to understand knowledge's nature, just as scientists need to observe or think about enough instances and aspects of elephants, if they are to uncover the general nature of elephants.

People usually assume that they use the term ‘know’ accurately because they already understand what knowledge is. But might that optimism be mistaken? Centuries of philosophical thought have discovered subtlety and complexity in the term ‘know’ (and its variants). Is everyone aware of that history, that subtlety and complexity? Imagine asking ‘What is knowledge?’ to people from different professions – educated people who are paid well to apply knowledge appropriate to their profession. Their answers could vary dramatically – so that not all of them could be correct – much as the blind men's answers did. A business-person might claim that all real knowledge (‘worthy of the name’) can be ‘monetized’ – usable in ways that bring financial success. A theoretical physicist might expect that all knowledge (‘worthy of the name’) encodes a numerical reality, regardless of whether money can be made from that knowledge. An experimental physicist might regard as real knowledge (‘worthy of the name’) only what can be verified by observations, including in controlled experiments. A sociologist might insist that all knowledge (‘worthy of the name’) is whatever is socially believed. And so on. Each professional gives voice to a conception of knowledge used within her field. Equally, though, maybe none of those professionals takes into account how the others – within their fields – think about knowledge's nature. Potentially, we have another version of the blind-men-and-the-elephant parable. Maybe each professional notices only part of the story, just an aspect of what knowledge is. Each might be wrong – too limited in their thinking – about knowledge in general.

That is more significant for them than they might realize. If you do not understand what knowledge in general is, you do not understand what knowledge is at all. Just as the blind men were wrong about what even one elephant is, each of our professionals might be wrong about what even one instance of knowledge is. That is, they could be wrong about what they assume is their own kind of knowledge, given their lack of understanding of knowledge in general. And none of them will notice this failing, just as each blind man was oblivious to his own failing.

This is where epistemology enters. It asks about knowledge in general – everyone's knowledge, all knowledge, at any time, in any place. It aims to reveal the nature of something – knowledge-possession – that could well unite us with people from all cultures and all centuries. What you know differs from what ancient Chinese or Greek people knew. Yet was their knowledge the same general kind of thing as yours? Knowledge seems to be something that people have long gained, especially as humanity has developed over the millennia. But can we be more detailed and insightful about what knowledge is?

With that question, we take a first step towards being epistemological.

1.2 Epistemology as philosophy

Further steps are then needed. After asking ‘What is knowledge?’, what should we do next? Well, epistemology is part of philosophy. Its methods and aims are philosophical. It seeks to understand knowledge in a philosophical way. But what does this mean? What is a philosophical understanding?

Here is a suggestion.

When someone claims to have a philosophy, for her it is a template and a tool. She uses it to regard, interpret, and react to the world – hoping to understand the world in a special way. What does ‘special’ mean here? Her philosophy is a lens through which she views the world, perhaps explaining to herself what she sees and experiences. Her philosophy can be a manual to guide her actions. She might be able to use it, often and widely: no matter what challenges she meets in life, she might hope that her philosophy will supply answers. It can also give her confidence about how best to describe and respond to the world.

Now, if that is the basic idea of a philosophy at all, many people should claim to have a philosophy. Many embrace a religion; and religions are often held in that same spirit, amounting to philosophies. If a philosophy is an interpretive and motivating model – helping one to regard and react to the world – then a religion can be a philosophy. Of course, not only religions are like that. An epistemology is a philosophy by being an interpretive and motivating model: it allows one to decide when knowledge is present, perhaps how to gain and act with knowledge. A religion can also be a philosophy by being an interpretive and motivating model, such as of the world's creation and of what it is to live morally well.

It seems, then, that there are many philosophies. But are all of them equally worthy, powerful, or insightful? Possibly not. One way for a philosophy to be better as a philosophy is for it to be a more fundamental picture of the world. There are at least the following two elements in this fundamentality.

First, a philosophy of X should portray X's fundamental nature. Religions often aspire to that, as do the epistemological theories that you will meet in this book. A religion wants to distinguish properly between whatever is sacred, say, and whatever is not – as part of understanding what it is to be sacred. An epistemology wants to distinguish properly between whatever is knowledge, say, and whatever is not – as part of understanding what it is to be knowledge. (The blind men needed – but failed – to distinguish properly between elephants and non-elephants, in trying to understand what...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Table of Contents
• Series page
• Title page
• Copyright page
• Preface and Acknowledgements
• 1: Doing Epistemology
• 2: Kinds of Knowledge
• 3: A First Theory of Knowledge
• 4: Refining Our Theory of Knowledge
• 5: Is It Even Possible to Have Knowledge?
• 6: Applying Epistemology
• Further Reading
• End User License Agreement