Philosophy Knowledge-first Epistemology
by
Clayton Littlejohn
  • LAST REVIEWED: 18 November 2022
  • LAST MODIFIED: 29 November 2018
  • DOI: 10.1093/obo/9780195396577-0380

Introduction

Although there has long been a tradition of trying to analyze knowledge in terms of things taken to be more basic (e.g., beliefs that are true and that meet further conditions), this approach to knowledge has fallen somewhat out of favor; this is in part because it is believed that all such analyses are inadequate. Timothy Williamson has proposed that we should try to run these analyses in the other direction and use the concept of knowledge to give philosophically fruitful characterizations of belief, evidence, justification, and rationality. This has inspired a considerable amount of recent work in epistemology and in the philosophy of mind.

Foundational Texts

We find an early statement of the idea that knowledge is not something that can be properly characterized as a belief that meets further conditions in Cook Wilson 1926 and in Prichard 1909. Williamson 2000 defends this negative view, too, but then proposes that we should try to use knowledge to give an account of other notions such as belief, evidence, rationality, justification, and warranted assertion. This proposal has generated a great deal of discussion in the recent literature.

  • Cook Wilson, John. Statement and Inference. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1926.

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    Cook Wilson defends the position that knowledge is something that cannot be characterized in other terms. In particular, he denies that knowledge is a kind of belief that meets further conditions (e.g., that it is true and supported by the evidence, etc.). This is an early and important source of skepticism about the possibility of providing a fruitful philosophical analysis or account of knowledge.

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  • Prichard, H. A. Kant’s Theory of Knowledge. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1909.

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    In the course of criticizing Kant’s epistemology, Prichard maintains that we ought to adopt a kind of primitivist view of knowledge. He thought that it would be impossible to have a theory of knowledge because he thought that any attempt to explicate knowledge in other terms would be bound to fail. His work showed the influence of John Cook Wilson.

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  • Williamson, Timothy. Knowledge and Its Limits. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000.

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    Williamson defends the view that knowledge cannot be analyzed in terms of anything more basic and proposes that we might be able to use the concept of knowledge to give analyses of other notions. He defends the view that knowledge is the most general factive mental state, that we should identify a thinker’s evidence with his or her knowledge, and that knowledge is the normative standard for assertion and belief. Rather than think of knowledge as a justified belief that meets further conditions, knowledge is what justifies belief.

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Edited Collections

There have been a number of discussions of knowledge-first epistemology in edited collections. Greenough and Pritchard 2009 contains essays from leading epistemologists discussing Williamson 2000 (cited under Foundational Texts) and its knowledge-first approach to epistemology. Williamson responds to each of the essays. The essays in Carter, et al. 2017 debate the merits of the knowledge-first movement and address arguments from the recent literature. The essays in Mitova 2018 are primarily concerned with the role that truth plays in our epistemic assessments, but many of the essays discuss this in the context of criticizing or defending a knowledge-first approach to epistemology.

  • Carter, J. Adam, Emma Gordon, and Benjamin Jarvis, eds. Knowledge First: Approaches in Epistemology and Mind. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017.

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    A collection of papers that defends or criticizes central parts of the knowledge-first movement. All of the main controversies in philosophy of mind and epistemology are covered.

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  • Greenough, Patrick, and Duncan Pritchard, eds. Williamson on Knowledge. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009.

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    In this collection, many leading epistemologists critically discuss Williamson’s knowledge-first approach to epistemology and philosophy of mind. Williamson responds to each of his critics.

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  • Mitova, Veli, ed. The Factive Turn in Epistemology. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2018.

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    A collection of papers discussing the idea that truth or accuracy enters directly into certain forms of epistemic assessment. Many of the entries are concerned with the idea the propriety of belief, assertion, or treating something as a reason depends upon what an agent knows.

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General Discussions

Knowledge-first epistemology is often contrasted with an approach that treats propositional knowledge as a special case of belief (i.e., a belief that meets further conditions). For a discussion of the difficulties in analyzing knowledge in terms of belief, see Ichikawa and Steup 2017 and Shope 1983. Antognazza 2015 and Dutant 2015 argue that it would be a mistake to think of this belief-centric approach to knowledge as a traditional view, as it is often described. Kalderon and Travis 2013, Marion 2000, and Mulligan 2014 discuss the historical roots of knowledge-first epistemology. Benton 2014, McGlynn 2014, and Williamson 2000 provide helpful overviews of the current discussion of knowledge-first epistemology with a focus on the literature responding to Williamson 2000.

  • Antognazza, Maria-Rosa. “The Benefit to Philosophy of the Study of Its History.” British Journal for the History of Philosophy 23 (2015): 161–184.

    DOI: 10.1080/09608788.2014.974020Save Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    Antognazza provides an overview of the history of epistemology and explains how uncommon it was for philosophers to try and characterize knowledge as a kind of belief that meets further conditions.

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  • Benton, Matthew. “Knowledge Norms.” In Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy (2014).

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    Benton provides an overview of the recent work on the normative significance of knowledge. The entry contains many bibliographic references for work on the connection between knowledge, assertion, belief, and disagreement.

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  • Dutant, Julien. “The Legend of the Justified True Belief Analysis.” Philosophical Perspectives 29 (2015): 95–145.

    DOI: 10.1111/phpe.12061Save Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    This paper critically discusses the idea that the traditional view of knowledge was one on which knowledge is a combination of a belief that attains a positive status and truth.

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  • Ichikawa, Jonathan Jenkins, and Matthias Steup. “The Analysis of Knowledge.” In Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Edited by Edward N. Zalta. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2017.

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    Ichikawa and Steup provide a summary of work on the analysis of knowledge with sections dedicated to whether knowledge can be analyzed and on the knowledge-first movement.

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  • Kalderon, Mark, and Charles Travis. “Oxford Realism.” In The Oxford Handbook of the History of Analytic Philosophy. Edited by M. Beeney, 489–518. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013.

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    This is a look at the Oxford Realists: John Cook Wilson and H. A. Prichard. Early proponents of the view that knowledge cannot be understood as a combination of belief and further conditions.

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  • McGlynn, Aidan. Knowledge First? Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave Macmillan, 2014.

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    McGlynn offers a critical discussion of knowledge-first epistemology and philosophy of mind. Provides extensive coverage of the main issues.

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  • Marion, Mathieu. “Oxford Realism: Knowledge and Perception.” British Journal for the History of Philosophy 8 (2000): 299–338.

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    This is an examination of the Oxford Realism of John Cook Wilson and H. A. Prichard, early proponents of the idea that knowledge cannot be understood as a belief that meets further conditions.

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  • Mulligan, Kevin. “Knowledge First—a German Folly?” In Liber Amicorum Pascal Engel. Edited by J. Dutant, D. Fassio, and A. Meylan, 380–400. Geneva, Switzerland: Université de Genève, Faculté des Lettres, 2014.

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    The “Oxford Folly” was, according to Ramsey, the idea that knowledge is sui generis and cannot be explained in other terms. Mulligan discusses the seeds of this view in the work of Husserl and other Austro-German philosophers.

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  • Shope, Robert. The Analysis of Knowing: A Decade of Research. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1983.

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    A review of the expansive literature on the Gettier problem. Surveys proposed solutions and the problems they faced. Discusses the history of a problem that has led some to conclude that knowledge cannot be analyzed in other terms.

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  • Williamson, Timothy. “Knowledge First Epistemology.” In The Routledge Companion to Epistemology. Edited by S. Bernecker and D. Pritchard, 208–219. London: Routledge, 2000.

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    Williamson offers an overview of the knowledge-first approach to epistemology in his own work. Discusses some important challenges to this approach.

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Analysis and Explanatory Priority

In the wake of Gettier 1963 and its criticism of the tripartite analysis of knowledge as a true belief that a person is justified in holding, epistemologists have sought to find further conditions that would give us a fruitful analysis of knowledge. After struggling to find a suitable analysis, many philosophers started to suspect that it would be impossible to identify necessary and sufficient conditions that would yield a non-circular account of knowledge. (See Blome-Tillmann 2007 and Zagzebski 1994 for arguments against the possibility of providing such an analysis.) Williamson 2000 (cited under Foundational Texts) proposes reversing the order of explanation. On his approach, we think of knowledge as a prime state rather than a composite of more basic or fundamental things. Gerken 2018 argues that it would be a mistake to try to analyze other notions in terms of knowledge even if it is prime. Brueckner 2002 criticized the arguments designed to show that knowledge is prime. For further helpful discussion of the different ambitions of the knowledge-first movement, see Ichikawa and Jenkins 2017.

  • Blome-Tillmann, Michael. “The Folly of Trying to Define Knowledge.” Analysis 67 (2007): 214–219.

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    Blome-Tillmann argues that knowledge cannot be analyzed into something more basic. His argument focuses on the connection between warrant (understood as that which “turns” a true belief into knowledge) and truth.

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  • Brueckner, Anthony. “Williamson on the Primeness of Knowing.” Analysis 62 (2002): 197–202.

    DOI: 10.1093/analys/62.3.197Save Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    This is a critical discussion of Williamson’s argument for the thesis that knowledge is prime. Argues that the argument is powerless against composite views that hold that internal and external components of knowledge are connected by things such as causation.

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  • Gerken, Mikkel. “Against Knowledge-First Epistemology.” In Knowledge-First: Approaches in Epistemology and Mind. Edited by E. Gordon, B. Jarvis, and A. Carter, 46–71. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2018.

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    Gerken argues that proponents of knowledge-first epistemology might rest on a mistake. Even if we reject the idea knowledge can be analyzed in terms of more basic items, he cautions that we might not be able to analyze anything else in terms of knowledge.

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  • Gettier, Edmund. “Is Justified True Belief Knowledge?” Analysis 23 (1963): 121–123.

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    Gettier argues that knowledge cannot be identified with a true belief that a thinker is justified in holding. The focus of much of the discussion of the problem of identifying the further factors that “turn” a true belief into knowledge.

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  • Ichikawa, Jonathan Jenkins, and C. S. I. Jenkins. “On Putting Knowledge ‘First’.” In Knowledge First: Approaches in Epistemology and Mind. Edited by J. Carter, E. Gordon, and B. Jarvis, 113–132. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017.

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    Jenkins and Ichikawa provide an overview of the literature on knowledge-first epistemology and distinguishes between different approaches that might be associated with this movement.

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  • Zagzebski, Linda. “The Inescapability of Gettier Problems.” Philosophical Quarterly 44 (1994): 65–73.

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    Zagzebski identifies a general problem for theories of knowledge to try and give an account of knowledge in terms of true belief that meets further conditions that would, if added to true belief, be sufficient for knowledge. Provides some motivation for the idea that knowledge cannot be analyzed in other terms.

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Epistemic Norms

Some philosophers have proposed that the two fundamental questions in epistemology are: “What can we know?” and “What should we believe?” Some would go so far as to argue that these questions should be pursued separately and that knowledge has little if anything to do with the normative side of epistemology. Many proponents of the knowledge-first approach to epistemology have challenged this and argued that epistemic standards or norms make reference to knowledge. There has been a robust debate over the past twenty to thirty years over whether there are epistemic norms that govern assertion, belief, and practical reasoning and whether these normative standards make reference to knowledge. Philosophers who are attracted to the idea that these normative standards make reference to knowledge often complain that truth-centric approaches lack the resources to explain many of our intuitions about cases (e.g., why it seems that ordinary perceptual beliefs might be justified if beliefs about the outcomes of fair lotteries are not). Among the philosophers who think that knowledge is the norm of assertion, belief, or practical reasoning, there is no consensus view as to whether we should think of the relevant normative notions along internalist or externalist lines (e.g., whether we should allow for false, justified beliefs or whether we should allow that it might be proper for a speaker in a Gettier-type situation to assert that something is true).

Assertion

We evaluate assertions along a number of dimensions, and it appears that one of these dimensions is epistemic. As Williamson 2000 (cited under Foundational Texts) notes, we will often say that someone should not have asserted something if we think that they do not have the warrant or authority to do so. Along with Williamson 2000 (cited under Foundational Texts), DeRose 2002, Slote 1979, and Unger 1975 argue that we have warrant to assert p if we know p. Brown 2008, Lackey 2007, McKinnon 2013, and Weiner 2005 criticize the knowledge account of assertion and argue that knowledge is either unnecessary or insufficient for warranted assertion. In these debates about warranted assertion, some authors (e.g., DeRose 2002) have argued that we ought to combine the knowledge account of assertion with a contextualist account of knowledge ascriptions. This combination of views is criticized by Williamson 2005 and subsequently defended by Blome-Tillmann 2013.

  • Blome-Tillmann, Michael. “Contextualism and the Knowledge Norms.” Pacific Philosophical Quarterly 94 (2013): 89–100.

    DOI: 10.1111/j.1468-0114.2012.01446.xSave Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    Blome-Tillmann defends a contextualist view of knowledge ascriptions with the further view that there are knowledge norms that govern assertion, belief, and practical reasoning.

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  • Brown, Jessica. “The Knowledge Norm for Assertion.” Philosophical Issues 18 (2008): 89–103.

    DOI: 10.1111/j.1533-6077.2008.00139.xSave Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    Brown provides an important critical discussion of the idea that knowledge is necessary and sufficient for warranted assertion. Among other things, Brown clarifies precisely what it means to say that knowledge is the norm of assertion.

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  • DeRose, Keith. “Assertion, Knowledge, and Context.” Philosophical Review 111 (2002): 167–203.

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    In the course of defending and developing a contextualist view of knowledge ascription, DeRose defends the proposal that knowledge is necessary for warranted assertion.

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  • Lackey, Jennifer. “Norms of Assertion.” Noûs 41 (2007): 594–626.

    DOI: 10.1111/j.1468-0068.2007.00664.xSave Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    Lackey provides an important critical discussion of the idea that knowledge should be the norm of assertion. Among other things, she provides a helpful discussion of the connection between the norms of assertion and the rules of games.

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  • McKinnon, Rachel. “The Supportive Reasons Norm of Assertion.” American Philosophical Quarterly 50 (2013): 121–135.

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    McKinnon is critical of the idea that knowledge is the norm of assertion. She argues that the speaker’s supporting reasons determine whether the speaker has warrant for assertion and that the speaker can properly assert what she does not know provided that the support from these reasons is sufficient.

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  • Slote, Michael. “Assertion and Belief.” In Papers on Language and Logic. Edited by Jonathan Dancy, 177–190. Stafford, UK: Keele University Press, 1979.

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    Slote provides an early defense of the idea that knowledge is necessary for properly asserting that something is so.

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  • Unger, Peter. Ignorance. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1975.

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    In this monograph, Unger argues for a radical from of skepticism and then spends a considerable amount of time discussing the implications of this skeptical view. In this discussion, he argues that if we do not know, we must remain silent.

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  • Weiner, Matthew. “Must We Know What We Say?” Philosophical Review 114 (2005): 227–251.

    DOI: 10.1215/00318108-114-2-227Save Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    Weiner provides a critical discussion of the suggestion that knowledge is the norm for warranted assertion. Among other things, he tries to show that a truth-centric approach can account for many of the observations offered in support of the knowledge account of assertion.

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  • Williamson, Timothy. “Knowledge, Context and the Agent’s Point of View.” In Contextualism in Philosophy: On Epistemology, Language and Truth. Edited by G. Preyer and G. Peter, 91–114. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005.

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    Williamson argues that we should not combine a contextualist account of knowledge ascriptions with the view that knowledge is the norm of assertion. He criticizes the idea that a single speaker might be rightly said to have warrant and to lack warrant for asserting something by speakers in different contexts.

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Practical Reason

What role, if any, does knowledge play in practical reasoning? Hawthorne and Stanley 2008 proposes that there is a knowledge norm that governs practical reasoning, one that says that it is proper to treat p as a reason for action if the thinker knows that p. Brown 2008 and Neta 2009 argue that we can properly treat something as a reason for action if we do not know it and that it might be improper to treat what we know as a reason for action. Fantl and McGrath 2009 defend an alternative proposal according to which it is proper to treat p as a reason for action when we have knowledge-level justification to believe p. Hyman 1999 proposes a different connection between knowledge and practical reasoning, defending the view that knowledge is the ability to do things for propositionally specified reasons. On his proposal, an agent has the ability to act for the reason that p if the agent knows that p. Unger 1975 (cited under Epistemic Norms: Assertion) defends a similar proposal, arguing that an agent must know p if p is one of the propositionally specified reasons that is the agent’s reason for believing, feeling, or doing something. Hornsby 2008 (cited under Action and Psychological Explanation) defends a disjunctive account of acting for reasons, one that is designed to secure a role for knowledge in practical reasoning while handling arguments from error.

  • Brown, Jessica. “Subject-Sensitive Invariantism and the Knowledge Norm for Practical Reasoning.” Nous 42 (2008): 167–189.

    DOI: 10.1111/j.1468-0068.2008.00677.xSave Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    Brown criticizes the idea that knowledge is necessary or sufficient for properly treating something as a reason for action. Instead, she argues that there is no fixed epistemic standard that governs practical reasoning. In some situations, less than knowledge is needed. In some, knowledge alone is not enough.

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  • Fantl, Jeremy, and Matthew McGrath. Knowledge in an Uncertain World. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009.

    DOI: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199550623.001.0001Save Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    Fantl and McGrath criticize the view that knowledge is needed for properly treating something as a reason for action but argue instead that knowledge-level justification should be necessary and sufficient for properly treating something as a reason for action.

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  • Hawthorne, John, and Jason Stanley. “Knowledge and Action.” Journal of Philosophy 105 (2008): 571–590.

    DOI: 10.5840/jphil20081051022Save Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    Hawthorne and Stanley propose that knowledge is the norm for practical reason. In this view, it is appropriate for an agent to treat p as a reason for action for some p-dependent choice if the agent knows p.

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  • Hyman, John. “How Knowledge Works.” Philosophical Quarterly 49 (1999): 433–451.

    DOI: 10.1111/1467-9213.00152Save Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    Hyman proposes that knowledge should be understood in terms of an ability: the ability to be rationally guided by reasons that are facts. On this view, knowledge plays a foundational role in an account of motivation.

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  • Neta, Ram. “Treating Something as a Reason for Action.” Nous 43 (2009): 684–699.

    DOI: 10.1111/j.1468-0068.2009.00724.xSave Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    Neta criticizes Hawthorne and Stanley’s proposal that knowledge is the norm of practical reason. Gettier cases and cases of non-culpably mistaken belief are discussed. Neta offers an alternative account of when it is proper to treat something as a reason for action.

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Belief

Is knowledge the norm of belief? Should we refrain from believing what we do not know? Sutton 2007 (cited under Rationality and Justification) has argued that it is proper to believe all and only what we know. While this view remains controversial, Gibbons 2013, Huemer 2007, Littlejohn 2013, and Smithies 2012 have proposed accounts of the normative connection between belief and knowledge that are similar in spirit. These authors disagree about whether knowledge is necessary for proper or justified belief. For a helpful critical overview of knowledge-first approaches to the norm of belief, see Whitcomb 2014.

  • Gibbons, John. The Norm of Belief. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013.

    DOI: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199673391.001.0001Save Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    Gibbons defends a number of proposals concerning rational belief and also defends a view on which the things that we are in a position to know must be among the things that bear on what we ought to believe. He is highly critical of the truth-centric approaches to epistemic normativity.

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  • Huemer, Michael. “Moore’s Paradox and the Norm of Belief.” In Themes from G. E. Moore: New Essays in Epistemology and Ethics. Edited by S. Nuccetelli and G. Seay, 142–158. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007.

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    Huemer argues that knowledge represents a kind of normative standard for belief. A rational believer, he argues, will think of her belief about p as one that satisfies a kind of comprehensive epistemic assessment and one that tests whether her belief about p meets the conditions necessary for knowing p.

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  • Littlejohn, Clayton. “The Russellian Retreat.” Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 113 (2013): 293–320.

    DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-9264.2013.00356.xSave Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    Littlejohn argues that knowledge rather than truth must be the fundamental norm of belief: this is on the grounds that only the knowledge-first approach can properly account for the fact that epistemic assessment is concerned both with the accuracy of our beliefs and the reasons for which the beliefs are held. The truth-centric account cannot properly account for this second inward-looking aspect of epistemic assessment.

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  • Smithies, Declan. “The Normative Role of Knowledge.” Noûs 46 (2012): 265–288.

    DOI: 10.1111/j.1468-0068.2010.00787.xSave Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    Smithies argues that the reason that knowledge is the standard for assertion and practical reasoning is that it is the fundamental norm of belief. He then proposes that a belief is correct iff it is knowledge and that a belief’s justification turns on whether a thinker has justification to believe that they are in a position to know it.

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  • Whitcomb, Dennis. “Can There Be a Knowledge-First Ethics of Belief?” In The Ethics of Belief. Edited by J. Matheson and R. Vitz, 89–112. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014.

    DOI: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199686520.003.0006Save Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    Whitcomb provides a critical overview of a variety of knowledge-first approaches to justification and/or rationality. This is a helpful guide to the literature as it identifies potential counterexamples and points to areas where important details would need to be filled in.

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Reasons, Justification, and Understanding

The promise of the knowledge-first approach to epistemology is not simply to use the concept of knowledge to shed light on issues in epistemology. One way to do this would be to try and use the concept of knowledge give an account of reasons and evidence. Rather than try to characterize knowledge as a state of belief that is held for good reasons and meets further conditions, a knowledge-first approach would reverse the order of explanation by drawing some link between evidence and knowledge. In addition to Williamson 2000 (cited under Foundational Texts) and its identification of knowledge with evidence, we have seen knowledge accounts of justified or rational belief and knowledge accounts of understanding.

Reasons

Williamson 2000 (cited under Foundational Texts) and Hyman 2006 have defended the view that a thinker’s evidence consists of all and only what she knows. This view has been criticized by Comesaña and Kantin 2010 on the grounds that knowledge and evidence play different theoretical roles in our best account of the justification of belief. Hawthorne and Lasonen-Aarnio 2009 discusses the problem of reconciling a non-skeptical view of knowledge with the identification of knowledge and evidence with a focus on objective chance. Weinberg discusses a bootstrapping problem that is troubling for the identification of evidence and knowledge. White 2014 discusses problems that arise for externalist accounts of evidence with a focus on the identification of knowledge and evidence. Kiesewetter 2017 has argued that we can use the concept of knowledge in an account of normative reasons, arguing that the reasons that determine what we ought to do are always part of our evidence and thus things we can know. Sylvan 2016 provides a helpful overview of recent debates on reasons and discusses links between reasons and knowledge.

  • Comesaña, Juan, and Holly Kantin. “Is Evidence Knowledge?” Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 80 (2010): 447–454.

    DOI: 10.1111/j.1933-1592.2010.00323.xSave Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    Comesaña and Kantin raise a number of now influential objections to the idea that knowledge is evidence by focusing on the different roles that evidence and knowledge might play in the justification of belief.

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  • Hawthorne, John, and Maria Lasonen-Aarnio. “Knowledge and Objective Chance.” In Williamson on Knowledge. Edited by P. Greenough and D. Pritchard, 92–108. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009.

    DOI: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199287512.003.0007Save Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    Hawthorne and Lasonen-Aarnio discuss a potential problem with reconciling the identification of knowledge and evidence with the view that we can have knowledge of the future in an indeterministic world. The discussion focuses on the connections between evidential probability, rational degrees of belief, and chance.

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  • Hyman, John. “Knowledge and Evidence.” Mind 115 (2006): 891–916.

    DOI: 10.1093/mind/fzl891Save Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    Hyman argues that a thinker’s evidence consists of all and only what he or she knows. The case for this view differs significantly from the one that Williamson provides, and the two approaches are contrasted.

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  • Kiesewetter, Benjamin. The Normativity of Rationality. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017.

    DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198754282.001.0001Save Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    Kiesewetter defends the view that available normative reasons determine what is rational and how an agent ought to believe and act. He identifies available normative reasons with an agent’s evidence and takes knowledge to be necessary for availability of these reasons.

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  • Sylvan, Kurt. “Epistemic Reasons I: Normativity.” Philosophy Compass 11 (2016): 364–376.

    DOI: 10.1111/phc3.12327Save Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    Sylvan provides an overview of recent debates about normative reasons in epistemology. There is considerable discussion of the connection between these reasons and knowledge.

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  • Weinberg, Jonathan. “Bootstrapping in General.” Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 81 (2010): 525–548.

    DOI: 10.1111/j.1933-1592.2010.00448.xSave Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    Although this is not the main focus of the paper, Weinberg discusses a bootstrapping problem that arises when we identify our evidence with our knowledge. This identification suggests that it might be acceptable for us to add our inferential conclusions to our bodies of evidence in a way that licenses a problematic form of bootstrapping.

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  • White, Roger. “What is My Evidence that Here is a Hand?” In Scepticism and Perceptual Justification. Edited by D. Dodd and E. Zardini, 298–322. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014.

    DOI: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199658343.003.0014Save Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    White raises a series of problems for externalist accounts of evidence according to which it is possible for pairs of subjects in the same non-factive mental states to have different evidence for their beliefs. Among other things, White argues that externalist accounts of evidence (e.g., those that identify evidence with knowledge) will play no interesting role in our response to the skeptical paradoxes.

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Rationality and Justification

Knowledge-first accounts of rationality and justification characterize these notions in terms of knowledge. Sutton 2007 defended the view that a belief is justified if that belief constitutes knowledge. Bird 2007, Ichikawa 2014, Jackson 2012, Reynolds 2013, and Rosenkranz 2018 each defend knowledge-first views that allow for the possibility of justified beliefs that fail to constitute knowledge. Goldman 2009 provides a critical response to the knowledge-first approach to justification. Kelp 2016, Millar 2009, and Miracchi 2015 defend knowledge-first virtue-theoretic approaches to justification.

  • Bird, Alexander. “Justified Judging.” Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 74 (2007): 81–110.

    DOI: 10.1111/j.1933-1592.2007.00004.xSave Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    Following the suggestion that we characterize justification in terms of knowledge, Bird argues that a belief is justified if either it is knowledge or it fails to be knowledge for reasons that are extrinsic to the thinker’s mental states.

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  • Goldman, Alvin. “Williamson on Knowledge and Evidence.” In Williamson on Knowledge. Edited by D. Pritchard and P. Greenough. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009.

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    Goldman criticizes certain aspects of Williamson’s proposals concerning the connections between knowledge, evidence, and justification. He also discusses the differences between Goldman’s preferred reliabilist approach to justification and evidence with the one found in Knowledge and its Limits.

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  • Ichikawa, Jonathan Jenkins. “Justification is Potential Knowledge.” Canadian Journal of Philosophy 44 (2014): 184–206.

    DOI: 10.1080/00455091.2014.923240Save Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    This is another attempt to characterize justification in terms of knowledge while respecting certain internalist intuitions about error cases and misleading evidence. On this view, a justified or rational belief is a potential piece of knowledge.

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  • Jackson, Alexander. “Two Ways to Put Knowledge First.” Australasian Journal of Philosophy 90 (2012): 353–369.

    DOI: 10.1080/00048402.2011.587438Save Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    Jackson argues that we should distinguish the view that treats knowledge as the norm of belief from views that take knowledge to be what determines if our beliefs are rational or justified. Once this distinction is recognized, Jackson thinks we should accept the first proposal, not the second.

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  • Kelp, Christopher. “Justified Belief: Knowledge-First Style.” Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 93 (2016): 79–100.

    DOI: 10.1111/phpr.12272Save Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    Kelp develops a hybrid of knowledge-first epistemology and virtue epistemology, delivering a view on which justified beliefs are distinct from knowledge but nevertheless related to the exercise of capacities that deliver knowledge.

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  • Millar, Alan. “What is it that Cognitive Abilities are Abilities to Do?” Acta Analytica 24 (2009): 223–236.

    DOI: 10.1007/s12136-009-0062-4Save Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    Millar defends an account of perceptual-recognitional abilities according to which such abilities are understood in terms of the acquisition of knowledge and not simply in terms of the ability to accurately represent or form true beliefs.

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  • Miracchi, Lisa. “Competence to Know.” Philosophical Studies 172 (2015): 29–56.

    DOI: 10.1007/s11098-014-0325-9Save Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    Miracchi develops a knowledge-first virtue epistemology and argues that we can characterize the capacities and competencies that yield justified beliefs in terms of knowledge.

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  • Reynolds, Steven. “Justification as the Appearance of Knowledge.” Philosophical Studies 163 (2013): 367–383.

    DOI: 10.1007/s11098-011-9820-4Save Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    Reynolds tries to characterize justification in terms of knowledge while maintaining the distinction between justified belief and knowledge. On this view, justification is understood in terms of the appearance of knowledge.

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  • Rosenkranz, Sven. “The Structure of Justification.” Mind 127 (2018): 309–338.

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    Rosenkranz defends a knowledge-first account of justification according to which propositional justification is understood in terms of negation and being in a position to know. On this view, a thinker has justification to believe when he or she is not in a position to know that she is not in a position to know.

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  • Sutton, Jonathan. Without Justification. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2007.

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    Sutton provides a knowledge-first account of justification. He defends the view that justified beliefs just are beliefs that constitute knowledge.

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Understanding

What is the relationship between knowledge and understanding (e.g., between knowing why something happened and understanding why it happened)? Kvanvig 2003 argues against the identification of knowledge and understanding, pointing to cases where he thinks that conditions that would prevent a thinker from knowing p would not prevent her from understanding why p. Hills 2015 provides further arguments against the identification of knowledge and understanding. Sliwa 2015 argues that we ought to see knowing why as necessary and sufficient for understanding why.

  • Hills, Alison. “Understanding Why.” Nous 49 (2015): 661–688.

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    Hills argues against reductive views of understanding—views that identify understanding with knowledge. On her view, someone might understand why p even if they did not know that p and did not know why p.

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  • Kvanvig, Jonathan. The Value of Knowledge and the Pursuit of Understanding. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2003.

    DOI: 10.1017/CBO9780511498909Save Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    Kvanvig argues that understanding is distinct from knowledge. In turn, this should help us understand how understanding could have a kind of final value that he thinks knowledge might lack.

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  • Sliwa, Paulina. “Understanding and Knowing.” Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 115 (2015): 57–74.

    DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-9264.2015.00384.xSave Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    Sliwa defends a reductive account of understanding according to which understanding is just knowledge. A thinker will understand why something happened, for example, if they possess a certain kind of knowledge.

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Philosophy of Mind

Although philosophers have long held that knowledge has a mental aspect or component, many philosophers have proposed that the mental component of knowledge is belief and that knowledge should be understood as a composite of belief and some further conditions. Some philosophers have held, however, that there are genuine factive mental states, mental states that have fact-like objects where these facts are not exclusively facts about our own mental lives. Williamson 2000 (cited under Foundational Texts) argues that knowledge is itself a state of mind and that ‘knows’ is the most general factive mental state operator. There has been considerable subsequent discussion as to whether knowledge is itself a mental state, whether “knows” is indeed the most general factive mental state operator, and what role, if any, should knowledge play in our theories of mind and of mental state attribution. Connected to these debates are debates in action theory about whether knowledge plays an important role in the explanation of intentional action or whether the difference between knowing and not tells us anything interesting about what motivates an agent to act.

Development and the Theory of Mind

Williamson 2000 (cited under Foundational Texts) argues that knowledge is itself a state of mind and that “knows” is the most general factive mental state operator. Nagel 2013 defends the view that knowledge is a mental state along with some proposals about the significance of our grasp of the concept of knowledge for mindreading. Butterfill 2013 and McGlynn 2017 provide important critical discussions of her proposals. Cassam 2009 and Fricker 2009 provide critical discussions of the idea that “knows” is the most general factive mental state operator and the idea that knowledge is a mental state. Bernecker 2007 and McDowell 1995 argue that it is possible for a thinker to be in a factive mental state without knowing, focusing on the case of propositional memory and perception respectively. Malcolm 1963 defends a knowledge-centric approach to remembering. Hossack 2007 develops a knowledge-first approach to the metaphysics of mind.

  • Bernecker, Sven. “Remembering Without Knowing.” Australasian Journal of Philosophy 85 (2007): 137–156.

    DOI: 10.1080/00048400601176460Save Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    Bernecker argues that a thinker can remember that p without knowing that p on the grounds that remembering requires neither belief nor justification. His position, if correct, would show that it is possible to have a factive mental state without knowledge, contrary to the arguments of Williamson 2000 (cited under Foundational Texts).

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  • Butterfill, Stephen. “What Does Knowledge Explain? Commentary on Jennifer Nagel, ‘Knowledge as a Mental State’.” In Oxford Studies in Epistemology. Vol. 4. Edited by T. Gendler and J. Hawthorne, 309–320. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013.

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    Butterfill provides a critical discussion of the knowledge-first approach to belief. He argues that even if knowledge is indeed a mental state, it might be possible for a child to attribute beliefs to others without grasping the concept of knowledge.

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  • Cassam, Quassim. “Can the Concept of Knowledge Be Analysed?” In Williamson on Knowledge. Edited by P. Greenough and D. Pritchard, 12–31. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009.

    DOI: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199287512.003.0003Save Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    This is a discussion of different conceptions of ways of knowing: that is, the minimal one that treats the various ways of knowing as determinates of the determinable knowledge and the more explanatory ambitious one that treats ways of knowing as means to acquiring knowledge that explain how knowledge is possible. Includes a discussion of Williamson 2000 (cited under Foundational Texts) and the idea that “knows” is the most general factive mental state operator.

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  • Fricker, Elizabeth. “Is Knowing a State of Mind? The Case Against.” In Williamson on Knowledge. Edited by P. Greenough and D. Pritchard, 31–60. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009.

    DOI: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199287512.003.0004Save Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    Fricker critically discusses the suggestion that knowledge is a mental state. While she believes that Williamson has successfully undercut a variety of objections to this thesis, she thinks that further objections remain.

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  • Hossack, Keith. The Metaphysics of Knowledge. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007.

    DOI: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199206728.001.0001Save Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    Hossack’s monograph provides a detailed discussion of a knowledge-first approach to the metaphysics of mind. Contains discussions of the connections between knowledge and belief, reference, and acquaintance.

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  • Malcolm, Norman. Knowledge and Certainty. New York: Prentice Hall, 1963.

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    Malcolm defends an account of propositional memory that appears to be a kind of knowledge-first account of remembering. On his view, a subject remembers that p when the subject knows that p because they knew earlier that p.

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  • McDowell, John. “Knowledge and the Internal.” Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 55 (1995): 877–893.

    DOI: 10.2307/2108338Save Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    McDowell defends the view that our perceptual experiences can be a matter of a fact being made manifest to us. He further argues that knowledge is possibly only on this conception of experience. This view clashes with the view defended by Williamson 2000 (cited under Foundational Texts) in that McDowell’s view, if correct, shows that there are factive mental states that do not involve knowledge.

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  • McGlynn, Aidan. “Mindreading Knowledge.” In Knowledge First: Approaches in Epistemology and Mind. Edited by J. Carter, E. Gordon, and B. Jarvis, 72–94. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017.

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    McGlynn discusses the empirical research on the acquisition of concepts of belief and knowledge and discusses their significance for the claim that knowledge is a state of mind and for the claim that we need the concept of knowledge in order to attribute beliefs to others.

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  • Nagel, Jennifer. “Knowledge as a Mental State.” In Oxford Studies in Epistemology. Vol. 4. Edited by Tamar Gendler and John Hawthorne, 275–310. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013.

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    Nagel discusses and defends the proposal, common from the psychological literature, that knowledge is a mental state. The work draws on a large body of empirical research and has generated considerable subsequent discussion.

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Action and Psychological Explanation

What role, if any, should knowledge play in a theory of action and action explanation? Gibbons 2001 defends the idea that knowledge (and not merely belief) might explain an agent’s action. While Gibbons’s focus is on the problem of wayward causal chains, Hornsby 2008 and Hyman 2015 argue that knowledge plays an essential role in action explanation on the grounds that an agent’s ability to act for a propositionally specified reason depends upon what the agent knows. Williamson 2000 (cited under Foundational Texts) had argued that knowledge sometimes provides a better explanation of action than belief. Magnus and Cohen 2003 and Molyneux 2007 criticize Williamson’s arguments. Williamson 2017 refines some earlier claims about the analogies between practical and theoretical reasoning.

  • Gibbons, John. “Knowledge in Action.” Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 57 (2001): 579–600.

    DOI: 10.1111/j.1933-1592.2001.tb00075.xSave Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    Gibbons defends the view that knowledge might play an important role in the explanation of intentional action. His discussion focuses on problems having to do with wayward causal chains.

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  • Hornsby, Jennifer. “Acting for Reasons: A Disjunctivist Thesis.” In Disjunctivism: Perception, Action, Knowledge. Edited by A. Haddock and F. Macpherson, 242–261. Oxford University Press, 2008.

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    Hornsby defends the idea that an agent’s reasons might be understood in terms of things she knows by exploring a disjunctivist approach to acting for reasons on which the agent’s reasons can differ in good cases and bad.

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  • Hyman, John. Action, Knowledge, and Will. Oxford University Press, 2015.

    DOI: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198735779.001.0001Save Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    Hyman defends the idea that we cannot have the ability to do things for reasons that are facts unless we have knowledge of them.

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  • Magnus, P. D., and Jonathan Cohen. “Williamson on Knowledge and Psychological Explanation.” Philosophical Studies 116 (2003): 37–52.

    DOI: 10.1023/B:PHIL.0000005558.40211.01Save Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    This paper critically evaluates Williamson’s claims about the role of composite states in the explanation of action. Magnus and Cohen argue that knowledge-based explanations of behavior are not superior to explanations that cite only the agent’s beliefs and desires.

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  • Molyneux, Bernard. “Primeness, Internalism and Explanatory Generality.” Philosophical Studies 135 (2007): 255–277.

    DOI: 10.1007/s11098-005-2330-5Save Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    Molyneux argues that if Williamson’s argument established that knowledge was a factive mental state, this would show, contrary to Williamson’s intentions, that knowledge is causally irrelevant to behavior.

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  • Williamson, Timothy. “Acting on Knowledge.” In Knowledge First: Approaches in Epistemology and Mind. Edited by J. Carter, E. Gordon, and B. Jarvis, 163–182. Oxford University Press, 2017.

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    In this paper, Williamson develops and refines his views concerning the analogy between knowledge and intentional action. It discusses the analogies between knowledge and belief on the one hand and action and intention on the other.

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Further Areas of Inquiry

Although most of the work that is associated with the knowledge-first movement is in the philosophy of mind or concerns epistemic norms and the justification of belief, there is considerable exploration in other areas, too. Benton 2019 defends a knowledge account of lying, and Buckwalter and Turri 2014 defend a knowledge account of pedagogical norms. Hawthorne and Srinivasan 2013 outlines a knowledge-first approach to rational disagreement. Blome-Tillmann 2017 proposes a knowledge-first solution to the puzzles concerning the role of statistical evidence in the law. DeRose 1991 gives a knowledge account of epistemic modals. Sliwa 2017 proposes a knowledge-centered approach to moral responsibility. Williamson 1992 provides a knowledge-centered approach to vagueness.

  • Benton, Matthew. “Lying, Belief, and Knowledge.” In The Oxford Handbook of Lying. Edited by J. Meibauer, 120–133. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2019.

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    Benton defends an account of lying on which knowledge plays an essential role in an account of lying. We lie, he argues, when we tell others things that we know not to be true.

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  • Blome-Tillmann, Michael. “‘More Likely Than Not’ Knowledge-First and the Role of Bare Statistical Evidence in Courts of Law.” In Knowledge First: Approaches in Epistemology and Mind. Edited by J. Carter, E. Gordon, and B. Jarvis, 278–293. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017.

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    Blome-Tillmann offers a knowledge-first explanation as to why some kinds of evidence ought to be admissible in courts of law when verdicts should not be based entirely on bare statistical evidence.

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  • Buckwalter, Wesley, and John Turri. “Telling, Showing and Knowing: A Unified Theory of Pedagogical Norms.” Analysis 74 (2014): 16–20.

    DOI: 10.1093/analys/ant092Save Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    Buckwalter and Turri argue that knowledge is not just essential for understanding when it is proper to telling others that something is so, it is also essential for understanding what is essential for instructional demonstration.

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  • DeRose, Keith. “Epistemic Possibilities.” Philosophical Review 4 (1991): 581–605.

    DOI: 10.2307/2185175Save Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    DeRose defends an account of epistemic possibility according to which open epistemic possibilities are understood in terms of knowledge. What an individual knows is epistemically necessary. If a speaker can correctly say, “It might be that ~p” then the possibility that p is false is compatible with the speaker’s knowledge.

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  • Hawthorne, John, and Amia Srinivasan. “Disagreement Without Transparency: Some Bleak Thoughts.” In The Epistemology of Disagreement: New Essays. Edited by D. Christensen and J. Lackey, 9–30. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013.

    DOI: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199698370.003.0002Save Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    Hawthorne and Srinivasan propose a knowledge-first approach to the norms of disagreement. According to this view, the crucial question to ask when trying to decide what to do in cases of peer disagreement is whether knowledge could be preserved in the face of disagreement.

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  • Littlejohn, Clayton. “Who Cares What You Accurately Believe?” Philosophical Perspectives 29 (2015): 217–248.

    DOI: 10.1111/phpe.12064Save Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    Littlejohn argues against the veritist idea that the fundamental epistemic good is truth or accuracy by arguing that there is nothing good per se about holding beliefs that are accurate. He defends gnosticism, a knowledge-first account of epistemic value on which the only beliefs that realize the fundamental epistemic good are those that constitute knowledge on the grounds that only they can provide us with reasons.

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  • Sliwa, Paulina. “On Knowing What’s Right and Being Responsible for It.” In Responsibility: The Epistemic Condition. Edited by P. Robichaud and J. Willem Wieland, 127–145. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017.

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    Sliwa defends an account of moral responsibility according to which knowledge plays an essential role in moral credit and blame. We can be blamed properly for something only when we knew that we had acted wrongly and can properly be credited for doing the right thing only when we know that we have done the right thing.

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  • Williamson, Timothy. “Vagueness and Ignorance.” Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 66 (1992): 145–177.

    DOI: 10.1093/aristoteliansupp/66.1.145Save Citation »Export Citation » Share Citation »

    Williamson defends a version of the epistemicist view of vagueness. On his view, vagueness should be understood in terms of ignorance: the absence of knowledge.

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