Feldman claims both that there are different kinds of knowledge, and that not all kinds of knowledge are reducible to propositional knowledge. He argues that both acquaintance knowledge and ability knowledge are irreducible to propositional knowledge.
Let's focus upon acquaintance knowledge here. Feldman says this: "No matter how many facts you know about a person, it does not follow that you know that person. Knowing a person or thing is being acquainted with that person or thing, not having propositional knowledge about the person or thing." (11)
Is Feldman right about this? Suppose Smith has never met Jones, but Smith is stalking Jones. Smith is not just any stalker. Rather, Smith is what we might call "an Ultimate Stalker". This means that, for any proposition p about Jones, Smith knows that p. So, Smith knows all of Jones' dispositions, attitudes, desires, attributes, thoughts, history, etc. In short, if it's true of Jones, Smith knows it. Now further suppose that you ask Smith, "Hey, do you know Jones?" Smith replies, "Well, I've never met Jones, but yeah, I know him." That doesn't sound too strange. But if Feldman's right, it should. Indeed, it should sound contradictory. But it doesn't. That's bad for Feldman.
Feldman also offers us this: "Knowing x isn't a matter of knowing facts about x. Instead, it is a matter of being acquainted with x--having met x and perhaps remembering that meeting." (11)
This suggests the following: S knows x =df. S met x and remembers that meeting.
But is that right? Here's an objection to that account. Suppose Feldman is at a book-signing at Barnes and Noble. He's signing copies of his Epistemology. Wilson goes, shakes Feldman's hand, exchanges names, gets his book signed, and leaves. Years later, you ask Wilson, "Hey, do you know Feldman?" Wilson replies, "Well, I met Feldman, and I remember that meeting well, but no, I don't know him." That doesn't sound too strange. But if Feldman's right, it should. Indeed, it should sound contradictory. But it doesn't. That's bad for Feldman.
What do you make of all this? Be sure to interact with each other!
Based on our discussion in class, I find that I cannot agree with Feldman. Knowing a person cannot simply be reduced to meeting them once and remembering it but as your example shows, knowing everything there is to know factually about someone without ever meeting them doesn't seem to be knowing them either.
ReplyDeleteMaybe knowing someone has to do with time spent and revelation given by that person. Such as how much time you spend with someone mutuatlly revealing things about yourselves to each other. It seems that most people would not say that they know some old high school friend that they hadn't talked to in 3 decades but they would say that they knew them instead. They were in the process of knowing each other in the past but they are not presently knowing each other now. Knowing someone also seems to be a mutual activity based on revealing things about you to another person and vice versa. If someone claims to know someone generally the reverse is true, the other person would also claim to know the first person since they got to know one another at the same time.
I guess you could apply this to the God question too, spending time trying to understand and learn Gods revelation to us would constitute knowing God. As for this applying to how God knows us, I'm not sure it would apply to him at all. Since a Smith-Jones ultimate stalker type sinerio is impossible for any human we need time and personal revelation to know someone; but since God is not bound by the same human qualities he can know us without time and our revelation.
Does this make any sense? What do you guys think?
-Rebekah
Rebekah, I really like your idea of knowing a person is a process of spending time with the person and learning about them. It does seem to fit with how we talk about knowing people, an example is a have a ‘friend’ that I have not talked to in years and I would say that I knew him, but I don’t know him now.
ReplyDeleteYet, a thought came to me while reading your post. Suppose there are two high-schoolers named Bob and Phil. Bob and Phil meet each other years and years ago and became fast friends, spending time together, learning about each other – the whole song and dance. Over the past year or so they have not been learning that much about each other. Every time when they hangout they go over to Bob’s house and watch television and they never talk or at least nothing more than “get the chips.”
If someone were to ask Phil if he knew Bob and he said yes, he knows bob, does that seem odd? To me it doesn’t but as I understand your view it would.
What do you thing?
-Chad
well, I posted last night, but apparently it didn't go through...
ReplyDeleteI find the argument for all knowledge being reducible to propositional knowledge compelling, even though I don't want to. Maybe the whole "I know him" thing is all language games...for example, when I see a cute boy in Chuck's and I think "I want to get to know him" what I am really saying is "I want to spend time with him in order to gain some factual knowledge about him and evaluate it"
But I also think Rebekah is making a good point--we believe that there needs to be some sort of mutual understanding and a mutual relationship formed in order for the "i know her" to seem real. I am not sure why that is and I don't think that belief stems from the whole 'know God/know about God' idea. Maybe some sort of intuitive relationship needs to take place (i know this statement doesn't sound legitimate, and it's reminding me of Avatar when the creatures link their hair to other creatures and have some connection thing)
I don't think any of us want to believe this (that all knowledge is reducible), because it would mean that humans are reducible to propositional knowledge. We don't want to believe that about ourselves. We want to believe we are complex and intricate, more complex and intricate than a series of facts.
I think Feldman is right, but not as careful with his language as he should be. In saying that acquaintance knowledge is predicated on having an encounter with the person in question, I think he may be too narrow in his focus. Rather than saying that acquaintance knowledge comes from an encounter, he would be better served to say that acquaintance knowledge comes from data collected either with the person in question, or in a community that knows the person.
ReplyDeleteAlso, how does facebook change the dynamic. Two winters ago I met a girl at a party. A few days later we became facebook "friends," now I can see her around and talk as if I actually know what is going on in her life, but really I have just been following her newsfeed. We don't have a relationship, but the knowledge I have of her has either come from her (over the net) or from person's in the interweb community.
What do you think?