Ideas of Michael Williams, by Theme

[British, fl. 1989, Graduate of Oxford. Professor at Yale University.]

green numbers give full details    |    back to list of philosophers    |     expand these ideas

---

3. Truth / C. Correspondence Truth / 3. Correspondence Truth critique

3593	The only way to specify the corresponding fact is asserting the sentence

3. Truth / D. Coherence Truth / 1. Coherence Truth

3584	Justification needs coherence, while truth might be ideal coherence

3585	Coherence needs positive links, not just absence of conflict

5. Theory of Logic / A. Overview of Logic / 3. Value of Logic

3599	Deduction shows entailments, not what to believe

11. Knowledge Aims / A. Knowledge / 4. Belief / a. Beliefs

3591	We could never pin down how many beliefs we have

11. Knowledge Aims / B. Certain Knowledge / 1. Certainty

3582	Propositions make error possible, so basic experiential knowledge is impossible

11. Knowledge Aims / C. Knowing Reality / 2. Phenomenalism

3592	Phenomenalism is a form of idealism

12. Knowledge Sources / B. Perception / 4. Sense Data / a. Sense-data theory

3579	Sense data avoid the danger of misrepresenting the world

12. Knowledge Sources / B. Perception / 4. Sense Data / d. Sense-data problems

3581	Sense data can't give us knowledge if they are non-propositional

13. Knowledge Criteria / A. Justification Problems / 1. Justification / a. Justification issues

3564	Is it people who are justified, or propositions?

13. Knowledge Criteria / A. Justification Problems / 2. Justification Challenges / a. Agrippa's trilemma

8851	Coherentists say that regress problems are assuming 'linear' justification

13. Knowledge Criteria / B. Internal Justification / 2. Pragmatic justification

3595	What works always takes precedence over theories

13. Knowledge Criteria / B. Internal Justification / 4. Foundationalism / a. Foundationalism

8849	Traditional foundationalism is radically internalist

13. Knowledge Criteria / B. Internal Justification / 4. Foundationalism / b. Basic beliefs

3580	Experience must be meaningful to act as foundations

8853	Basic judgements are immune from error because they have no content

13. Knowledge Criteria / B. Internal Justification / 4. Foundationalism / c. Empirical foundations

3578	Are empirical foundations judgements or experiences?

8855	Sensory experience may be fixed, but it can still be misdescribed

13. Knowledge Criteria / B. Internal Justification / 4. Foundationalism / f. Foundationalism critique

3576	Foundationalists are torn between adequacy and security

3577	Strong justification eliminates error, but also reduces our true beliefs

13. Knowledge Criteria / B. Internal Justification / 5. Coherentism / c. Coherentism critique

3589	Why should diverse parts of our knowledge be connected?

3590	Coherence theory must give a foundational status to coherence itself

13. Knowledge Criteria / C. External Justification / 1. External Justification

3574	Externalism ignores the social aspect of knowledge

3571	Externalism does not require knowing that you know

13. Knowledge Criteria / C. External Justification / 2. Causal Justification

3569	In the causal theory of knowledge the facts must cause the belief

3586	Only a belief can justify a belief

3567	How could there be causal relations to mathematical facts?

13. Knowledge Criteria / C. External Justification / 3. Reliabilism / a. Reliable knowledge

3573	Externalist reliability refers to a range of conventional conditions

13. Knowledge Criteria / C. External Justification / 3. Reliabilism / b. Anti-reliabilism

3565	Sometimes I ought to distrust sources which are actually reliable

13. Knowledge Criteria / C. External Justification / 5. Controlling Beliefs

3566	We control our beliefs by virtue of how we enquire

13. Knowledge Criteria / C. External Justification / 10. Anti External Justification

8852	In the context of scepticism, externalism does not seem to be an option

13. Knowledge Criteria / D. Scepticism / 1. Scepticism

3594	Scepticism just reveals our limited ability to explain things

13. Knowledge Criteria / D. Scepticism / 2. Types of Scepticism

3575	Scepticism can involve discrepancy, relativity, infinity, assumption and circularity

14. Science / A. Basis of Science / 1. Observation

3587	Seeing electrons in a cloud chamber requires theory

19. Language / A. Nature of Meaning / 7. Meaning Holism / a. Sentence meaning

3588	Foundationalists base meaning in words, coherentists base it in sentences