In a message dated 5/22/2015 5:01:53 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time,
wokshevs@xxxxxx writes: "W was making a serious point about the kind of inquiry
philosophy is. One of its aims is to clarify the conditions and nature of the
knowledge-claims and judgements we make, and expose nonsense we fall prey to
in virtue of bewitchment by language. (For a very good and detailed
articulation of the philosophical enterprise in the spirit if not the letter
of
W, vide *Making it explicit* by Robert Brandom. For a less technical
account, see his *On doing and saying*."
But perhaps an Oxonian would say that it all depends.
I learned from Geary to use "depends": I used to feel like an obligation to
keep on adding on what, but as Geary notes, 'it all depends' is true
_simpliciter_.
If you are into a conceptual analysis of 'knowledge', then it may well be
true that
i. Here is a hand.
ii. Here is another.
iii. And so, there are least two material things.
iv. And so, you, claiming that there are no material things, are wrong.
If Moore feels one condition for a valid proof is that the reasoner should
know for certain that the premise P holds, then he is at liberty of
'stretching', as it were, the utterance from (i), Here is a hand, to
v. I know for certain that here is a hand.
So now back to Walter O.:
"W[itters is] making a serious point about the kind of inquiry philosophy
is. One of its aims is to clarify the conditions and nature of the
knowledge-claims and judgements we make, and expose nonsense we fall prey to in
virtue of bewitchment by language. (For a very good and detailed articulation
of the philosophical enterprise in the spirit if not the letter of W, vide
*Making it explicit* by Robert Brandom. For a less technical account, see
his *On doing and saying*)."
Perhaps we have here Witters's idea that philosophers wrongly crave for
generalities applied to Witters himself. That may be ONE kind of what
philosophical inquiry is.
Another kind is precisely the opposite: to identify philosophers, like
Witters, who turn into a mere condition of 'appropriateness' for the use of
'know for certain' into a necessary and sufficient condition, when it isn't.
The onus probandi seems to be on anyone who doubts, as I'm sure Witters
didn't a thing like:
vi. Moore does NOT know for certain that here is a hand.
For it is a Mooreian fact, as philosophers call it.
Cheers,
Speranza
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