Formal Epistemology

Description

&The project Formal Epistemology consists of four sub-projects. Methodologically it is part of formal epistemology. Contentwise we will deal with topics from both the traditional theory of knowledge as well as the modern epistemology of belief.One of the central themes of the traditional theory of knowledge is the tripartite definition of knowledge as justified true belief. The project Justification focuses on the notion of justification in this definition. One question is who or what it is that is justified: is it the believed proposition; the person believing this proposition; or the method used by this person to learn new information? Here we aim to go beyond coherentist theories of justification and to acknowledge insights from formal learning theory. In contrast to this the project "Knowledge" takes the notion of knowledge as primitive and uses it to analyze the notion of justification.Historically the projects "Belief" and "Degrees of Belief" are rooted in the work of Hintikka and Ramsey, respectively. Nowadays both epistemic logic as well as the theory of degrees of belief are primarily advanced in Artificial Intelligence. The Lockean Thesis is of particular philosophical interest. It describes a simple relation between qualitative belief and quantitative degrees of belief: qualitative belief consists in sufficiently high degree of belief. An important question is how to justify various theories of degrees of belief: why should a rational agent?s degrees of belief obey certain laws rather than different ones? However, there is no theory of degrees of belief that defines a reasonable notion of qualitative belief satisfying the Lockean Thesis; nor is there a theory of degrees of belief that can be said to be justified beyond reasonable doubt.&

Participants
  • Brössel, Peter - Academic staff
  • Eder, Anna-Maria - Academic staff
  • Huber, Franz - Project leader
Institutions
  • Department of Philosophy
  • Zukunftskolleg
Publications
  Bewersdorf, Benjamin (2012): Belief and Its Revision

Belief and Its Revision

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The role of experience for belief revision is seldom explicitly discussed. This is surprising as it seems obvious that experiences play a major role for most of our belief changes. In this work, the two most plausible views on the role of experience for belief change are investigated: the view that experiences merely cause belief change and the view that experiences can justify belief changes. It will become apparent that these views are highly relevant for several arguments on belief revision.

While there are several theories for belief revision which are in accordance with the first view, there is no satisfactory account which is in accordance with the second view. Here, such an account will be developed and its presuppositions and implications will be closely investigated.

Origin (projects)

Anglberger, Albert J. J.; Brössel, Peter (2008): Zur Definition von "Definition" FÜRST, Martina, ed. and others. Beiträge zum 8. internationalen Kongress der Österreichischen Gesellschaft für Philosophie in Graz : Bd. 2 Analysen, Argumente, Ansätze. Frankfurt [u.a.]: Ontos Verl., 2008, pp. 95-106. ISBN 978-3-86838-015-6

Zur Definition von "Definition"

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Zusammenfassung:
Wir werden in dieser Arbeit zwei neue Definitionsvorschläge von ‘Definition’ entwickeln, die folgende Eigenschaften aufweisen: (i) Sie verzichten auf die üblicherweise vorhandene Induktivität der Definition von ‘Definition’, was dazu führt, dass die Reihenfolge in der Definitionen angegeben wurden, keine Rolle mehr dafür spielt, ob es sich um korrekte Definitionen handelt. (ii) Sie sind sehr einfach und elegant, sodass auch eine praktische Anwendung damit verbunden ist: Wissenschafterinnen können damit nämlich von einer beliebigen Menge von Formeln sehr leicht feststellen, ob diese Menge eine Menge korrekter Definitionen ist und was als Grundvokabular dafür vorausgesetzt werden muss. (iii) Aus einem Definitionsvorschlag ergibt sich ein Algorithmus, mit dessen Hilfe eine Anordnung gefunden werden kann, die eine Menge von Formeln zu einer Folge korrekter Definitionen im “alten” Sinne macht. (iv) Die Definitionsvorschläge sind zu der Definierbarkeit im “klassischen” Sinne äquivalent. Somit ergänzt dieser Beitrag die klassische Definitionstheorie.

Origin (projects)

Funding sources
Name Finanzierungstyp Kategorie Project no.
Emmy-Noether-Programm third-party funds research funding program 602/07
Further information
Period: since 14.04.2013