英语论文网

The contrasts listed above reveal that there are really at least two sorts of knowledge, commonly labelled (i) propositional (or, somewhat misleadingly, theoretical knowledge), and (ii) practical knowledge. The late Oxford philosopher Gilbert Ryle (1900 – 1976) expressed this distinction with characteristic terseness: it is the distinction between knowing that and knowing how.

TASK 2: Which, in Ryle’s terms, is propositional knowledge, and which is practical knowledge? Can you give three more examples from everyday life of ‘knowing that’ and ‘knowing how’? Now can you provide examples of each sort from your primary field of advanced study?

Epistemologists, like philosophers in general, try to understand things better by breaking them into more fundamental components. (This is not unlike the approach of the natural scientist). However if we are not careful we can forget that in real life the components do not always occur discretely. For example, you might know someone who claims to know Latin (perhaps you do!) Is that propositional knowledge or practical knowledge? The answer is that it involves both. If you know Latin, you (to use Ryle’s terms) know that the Latin word for “country” is “patria”. But you also know how to translate, say, a verse of the love poetry of Catullus into English (or whatever is your background language). The same is true of knowing astro-physics or psychology. That is why, in serious conversation as opposed to chit chat, we are often reluctant to claim to “know philosophy” or “know biochemistry” – in claiming to know a field, we can give the impression that we know everything that there is to be known in that field. This reluctance is not just humility or modesty. Rather, as the Delphic Oracle is reputed to have declared more than two millennia ago, “The man who knows the most knows how much he doesn’t know.”

I said above that there are at least two types of knowledge, propositional and practical. But there is a third.

4. A Third Kind of Knowledge?

If you know the Vice-Chancellor of Bond University, or know Kylie Minogue, is that propositional or practical knowledge? Well, it certainly implies you have some propositional knowledge; you would, for example, know who these people are. But the reverse is not true; you can know who these people are, but not know them. (Many of us would know who Kylie Minogue is, but few – if any – of us would actually know her. The late Cambridge philosopher Bertrand Russell (1872 -1970) expressed the distinction this way. He introduced a contrast between what he called (i) knowledge by description and (ii) knowledge by acquaintance. Most of us, I suspect, have “knowledge by description” of Kylie Minogue (i.e. we know who she is, and maybe could recognise her picture) but few, if any, would have “knowledge by acquaintance”. The latter requires some history of a degree of direct interaction and familiarity. (Russell’s knowledge by description corresponds very roughly to what we have labelled propositional knowledge.)

5. What Sorts of Knowledge is Epistemology Concerned With?

The answer, overwhelmingly – and sadly! – has been propositional knowledge, together with the edifices composed largely of propositional knowledge such as theories. Practical knowledge has – again sadly! – been left largely to the ethicists or moral philosophers – people concerned 本论文由英语论文网提供整理，提供论文代写，英语论文代写，代写论文，代写英语论文，代写留学生论文，代写英文论文，留学生论文代写相关核心关键词搜索。