Practical knowledge and abilities
Name
608215768-MIT.pdf
Description
Full printable version
Size
8.3 MB
Format
Adobe PDF
Checksum (MD5)
b6ca2e169deb58b1f79f1f7730f26dc5
Author(s)
Glick, Ephraim N
Advisor(s)
Robert Stalnaker.
Date Issued
2009
Publisher
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Abstract
The thesis is an exploration of the relations between know-how, abilities, and ordinary knowledge of facts. It is shown that there is a distinctively practical sort of know-how and a corresponding interpretation of 'S knows how to [phi]', and that this special sort of know-how, while possessing representational content, is not simply ordinary knowledge-that. The view rests on a novel distinction between two interpretations of the Intellectualist slogan, familiar from the work of Gilbert Ryle, that know-how is a kind of knowledge-that. The distinction allows us to clarify the issues that are at stake in the debate and see the possibility of a position that combines aspects of both Intellectualism and anti-Intellectualism. An entailment from knowhow to a certain sort of ability is defended, and it is shown that the present view preserves the possibility of appealing to know-how to block Frank Jackson's "knowledge argument" against physicalism.
Description
Thesis (Ph. D.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Linguistics and Philosophy, 2009.
Cataloged from PDF version of thesis.
Includes bibliographical references (p. 115-118).
Subjects
Linguistics and Philosophy.
MIT Department
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Linguistics and Philosophy
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copyright. They may be viewed from this source for any purpose, but
reproduction or distribution in any format is prohibited without written
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