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From: sarge@thirdi.UUCP (Sarge Gerbode)
Newsgroups: sci.philosophy.tech
Subject: Re: Justified true belief
Message-ID: <107@thirdi.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 24-Aug-87 19:01:35 EDT
Article-I.D.: thirdi.107
Posted: Mon Aug 24 19:01:35 1987
Date-Received: Wed, 26-Aug-87 01:25:38 EDT
Reply-To: sarge@thirdi.UUCP (Sarge Gerbode)
Organization: Institute for Research in Metapsychology
Lines: 51
Keywords: philosophy definition linguistics semantics knowledge
Summary: Philosophy should have to do with wisdom.

Re: article <3259@eagle.ukc.ac.uk> rjf@ukc.ac.uk (Robin Faichney):

I read with interest your discussion of philosophy, and I agree that your
definition is a redefinition.  I guess my concern was that there was some baby
being thrown out with the bathwater.  I tend to agree with *somebody* who said
that reducing philosophy to a discussion of meanings was to fuse philosophy
and semantics or philosophy and linguistics.  Semantics and linguistics are, of
course important, as is mathematics and logic, and my concept of philosophy was
that it was a rational way of approaching the "Big Issues" of life, rather than
relegating these to blind faith or authority.  Things like what is right and
wrong, what is the good, the bad, and the ugly?  I am optimistic in that I
think there *are* ways of approaching these issues rationally and finding
answers that enhance the quality of life or act as a guide to life.

I wouldn't be comfortable with a definition of philosophy that omitted these
things.  In fact, I *wasn't*.  I left philosophy when I observed it was getting
too tied up in linguistic analysis.

If we accept your definition of philosophy, then we must find another term to
describe the rational pursuit of wisdom.  And I don't think that term is
"psychology" or "art appreciation".  Nor do I think it's "religion".

>As the person who first (in this group :-) I think :-) ) suggested the
>justified true belief definition, I'm totally with Jim on this one.

Re: "justified true belief". So *you're* the culprit!

>I long ago came to the conclusion that knowledge, in strict terms is
>impossible, though I used another route to get to this point. I won't go
>into that here - it would make for a rather long posting, and I'd probably
>get flamed to death from people who are tired of consciousness/subjectivity/
>objectivity discussions in mod.ai or whatever it is now. Suffice it to say
>that I have reason to believe that objectivity, strictly speaking, is
>impossible, and that knowledge is an intrinsically objectivist (using that
>word very loosely) concept.

I agree with you about objective truth.  It isn't just to be a devil's advocate
that I've been trying to work out a *subjective* criterion.

>Does anyone still believe in absolute knowledge? (Outside of religious
>experience, PLEASE)

It seemed to me that some people were talking as though they did.
-- 
"Absolute knowledge means never having to change your mind."

Sarge Gerbode
Institute for Research in Metapsychology
950 Guinda St.
Palo Alto, CA 94301
UUCP:  pyramid!thirdi!sarge