January 7th, 2003
 
Professor Wiredu (pronounced Wheh-Reh-Do), from Ghana, introduced himself. Doctoral Thesis work: Oxford, England. Covered class schedule (Tuesday, Thursdays 3:30 to 4:45), then launched into a minor lecture about the basis for the entirety of the class, namely Epistemology.

Epistemology: The philosophy of the nature of knowledge.

1. Is knowledge possible? Went minorly into skepticism, discussed in a future class & the reading materials.
2. Limits of knowledge: what it is possible to know and what isn't possibly truly knowable.

January 9th, 2003

Side Notes:
• In Ghana: never speak to someone without greeting them first. Professor stands heavily on this point.
• "The Oxford Companion to Philosophy" is available with full text online from the USF library.

Professor launched into the major divisions of the study of philosophy, which with feedback of the class, he grouped into the following categories:

Philosophy of Epistemology: the search for the meaning of knowledge and the meaning of truth.

On the differences between theology and philosophy in terms of God:
   Theology is based upon the belief in the existence of God, while philosophy has to build a rationalized argument to the existence, non-existence, or to the impossibility of the ability of anyone to prove there is a God.
   He then goes on to state that the philosopher, when asking or answering the question "Does God exist?" must first explain all possibly debated terms: said philosopher's understanding of what God is, then what the definition of existence is, as part of the process of asking and attempting to answer the question.

We base the majority of our knowledge on a basis of causality -- that there is a direct correlation between cause and effect, especially at the macrophysical level of our lives. If we extend the causality to everything (and all situations), the process of doing so is termed Determinism. Under determinism causality falls into the realm of metaphysics (rather than into the realm of Philosophy of Logic), in that determinists say that all choices are already predetermined by past events.

Free Will: the notion that we are cable of choosing for ourselves from the possible choices, without the presence of predeterminism.

Doesn't Free Will and Determinism conflict by definition? Yes.
Aren't there multiple possible effects (even under determinism) from any cause? Yes, although the determinists argues that we can trace to an illusion of identical causes when in reality there are subtle differences in all different experiences, no matter how similar they are.

One of the attempts by philosophers to resolve this conflict by developing a theory (Philosophy of Compatiblism), which states that both determinism and free will can coexist validly. Alternatively, Hard Determinists (believers of "hard determinism") say free will is an illusion because determinism is stronger than free will can be, and thus determinism is more certain.
   Another group says free will is more certain than determinism or causality, claiming that causality is not absolute; this group ascribes to Libertarianism, a division of incompatibilism.

The philosopher is the person who raises such concepts and attempts to answer them validly (causality, determinism, free will, et cetera).
The attempt to integrate these multiple, oft conflicting views is called Coherence.

Epistemology: the search of the meaning of knowledge, or more simply "What is it to know?"

January 14th, 2003

Side Notes:
• Descartes name is often written in a variety of different formats, including: Des Carte, De Carte, DesCarte, DeCartes, DesCartes, or DeCarte in various publications. This is because of the attempt to Anglicize his name differently by various disciplines and authors.

Readings summary:
Chapter 1: Methods of acquiring knowledge.
Chapter 2: Descartes' basis -- Cartesian Epistemology, basic concepts and the cyclic arguments that he used (as well as the "givens" which Descartes accepted) that invalidated his arguments -- in large because of his own introduction of doubts within the arguments he puts forth (such as the Evil Genius Theory).

The significance of Descartes' work ws the self-examination from scratch and the self-centered ("I") basis for the analysis of Epistemology: "I think therefore I am" in the book "Meditations: First Philosophies".

Sensible Knowledge: that knowledge which is acquired through our senses (physically), which at times can deceive us. It is this deceptive nature that led Descartes to pursue his "Meditations".

Categorical Imperative: (Immanuel Kant, 1724-1804) Reason itself can discover the most rudimentary morality. Rule your actions so as to analyze it for human-wide embrace as a behavior, a general maxim of action. Basically the same as the golden rule concept, taken in a larger perspective. This is not part of epistemology.

Si Fallor Sum: (Augustine) a precursor to Descartes, he stated "If I err, I exist", written as Si Fallor Sum in Latin.

Descartes forwards a "Methodological Skepticism" based on his tear-down and reconstruction of knowledge in a method-based manner.

Light of Knowledge: that which our minds have grasped in such a clear way that it can not be doubled. Included in this realm is Cogito Ergo Sum ("I think, therefore I exist").

Having established himself (his existence), Descartes sets out to desolve his own "Evil Genius" argument via proving the existence of God (as an omnipotent and all-good being). Descartes' proof (paraphrased): "that I, as an imperfect being, can conceive of a perfect being, a God, which means that this thought must have in originated in God, therefore God must exist."
   The fallacy is in the basis for this supposed proof -- does conception of perfection implicitly imply existence of said perfection? Is Descartes' vision of what God is even valid: is God perfectly good even we accept his existence (vs. to being the embodiment all things, including evil)?

January 16th, 2003

Side Notes:
• Selected Readings packets distributed to 95% of students (308 pgs).

Q: Was Descartes a skeptic?
A: No. He starts with skepticism for the sake of the basis of argument and then beats the skeptic arguments as the method of the construction of his theories.

Descartes is a departure from the philosophies of the middle ages, but still drags certain mentalities of the middle ages with him into his theories -- specifically, his perception of God, as a being of perfection having all (and only) positive attributes, and no negative ones.

Anselm's Definition of God: I define God as the greatest possible, conceivable being (i.e. - the greatest being the ability of humans can conceive of). And thus God must exist, for if you can imagine God and God's non-existence, AND existence is a higher state than non-exitance, then the highest imaginable state is God's existence.

Q: If God is all powerful, all good, why does he create a world filled with imperfection? (question from a student)
   Modern philosophy's answer: to create free will in humans, which is a contradiction to perfection, since perfection is a mandatory choice rather than a free choice among possible options.

Levels of Doubt/Levels of Fallibility (Skepticism) as addressed by Descartes:

1. Perceptual Illusion -- not accurately interpreting that which we sense
2. Dream -- are we sure reality is real?
3. Evil Genius theory

Conditions Required for Knowledge as addressed by Descartes:

1. Requires that the belief is beyond doubt.
2. Requires that the knowledge is factually true.
3. Requires that the knowledge is supported by some justification in your belief of the "truth".

READING ASSIGNMENT: READ CH 3.

January 21st, 2003

Test is this Thursday (January 23rd).
Test results will count towards your grade only if they are beneficial. Getting a good grade on this test will exempt you from having to write one of the short papers.

Subjects for the test

January 23rd, 2003

Late to class, so this day's notes are incomplete...

If you saw an Unicorn, would you believe your eyes?

A human being has to go on some beliefs; to suspect all beliefs is to deprive yourself of all humanity and survival.

[back to the unicorn] If were to see an unicorn, would it convince you that unicorns exist? If you had no doubt left and are in their presence, then does it make sense to question their existence? No, because it is redundant. Once the concept fits an object, the question of the concept's existence becomes moot.
  Now extend that to the concept of "I" (as in yourself). Thus just as it doesn't make sense to question a known object's existence, the question "Do I exist?" becomes meaningless.

Color, weight are properties of an object. Existence is not a property, but a conception.
"X exists" (which in symbolic logic would be written as X ∃) is the same as saying "The concept of 'x' applies to an object -- an item which satisfies our perception of what an object 'x' should be."

There are a lot of beliefs which we can not come face-to-face with. But we can say an item exists if we can substantiate an instance of it.

Kant says existence is not a preposition.
Q: How do you know a substantiation is right or wrong (take a mirage of an oasis as an example)?
A: The difference. [MG: sorry, this didn't make much sense]

An object substantiates a concept, and an object has properties.

The real question, as a result of all this, is whether Descartes' theory (Cogito Ergo Sum) even makes sense, since it makes no sense to question a known object's existence.

Tests returned. Notes on test results:
squiggly line in the margin means "difficult to correct or comment on."
Test grading basis: A+ = 13/13. Subtract 1/3rd of a grade for each mistake (i.e. -1 = A, -2 = A-, -3 = B+, etc).

THEOLOGY: the attempt to explain why a perfect God created an imperfect world.

January 28th, 2003

Descartes has three conditions for knowledge:

1. That you have the knowledge beyond any reasonable doubt
2. That the knowledge is in fact, true
3. That you have experienced supporting evidence of the belief

Person must believe it (Person "A", statement or proposition "ρ")
  For (A knows ρ) the following must be true:
1. A belief that ρ (since we discussed the existence of ρ being the same as just saying 'ρ' in the last class);
2. ρ must be true. Note that the "must" is tricky in this context.
3. ρ is justified.
This system is known as the "Justified True Belief" (oft abbreviated to JTB).

Gettier (published in 1963) wrote a short paper called "Is Knowledge Justified Belief?" that set the field upon it's ear.

First Gettier example:
Suppose you and Jones have applied for a single job. You find out that Jones is going to get the job as per the CEO, who tells you this a few days before the job is to be filled. You also KNOW out that the person to get the job has ten (10) coins in their pocket, and you have noticed previously that jones has 10 coins in his pocket. Thus you have JTB that Jones will get the job. For some reason (reason unexplained, but you can assume Jones died, declined the job, etc) you get the job, and you turn out to unwittingly have ten (10) coins in your pocket.

Second Gettier example:
Somebody owns a Mercedes, and you have good reason to believe that Mr Smith owns the mercedes because he is a member of the Mercedes club, gets Mercedes dealer and club mail constantly, etc. You have even seen him driving a mercedes yourself (which unknown to you was either a rental or a loaner). You also know that someone in the company has a mercedes, because you see it daily in the parking lot. Given this information, you presume that it is Mr. Smith's mercedes (but in fact, it isn't, rather it belongs to another employee).
This is a justified Belief, but an incorrect truth.

Gettier never gave a 4th or other condition beyond those outlined by Descartes, but did state that the existing three were insufficient to encompass the entirety of the truth of knowledge.

Consider then what TRUTH means. Now consider it for the purposes of our daily lives -- what is truth?

January 30th, 2003

There are three major, classical theories of truth: