ELFT HÍRADÓ

["Laszlo E. Szabo" <leszabo AT hps.elte.hu>]

Department of History and Philosophy of Science
Eotvos University
Budapest, Pazmany P. setany 1/A

PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCE SEMINAR
(http://hps.elte.hu/seminar)
________________________________________________
7 May 4:00 PM 6th floor 6.54
(Language: English, except all participants speak Hungarian)

 K a t a l i n   F a r k a s
 Philosophy, Central European University, Budapest

 The limits of knowledge

 This is a critical introduction into the ideas of Timothy Williamson's
Knowledge and its limits  (Oxford Univ. Press, 2000), a book which is
considered by many as the most original and  significant contribution to
epistemology in the last few decades.
 Working on theories of knowledge has been a flourishing enterprise in
the twentieth  century. Various versions of foundationalism,
coherentism, causal theories, reliabilism,  subjunctive theories,
contextualist theories - and no doubt other theories - have been
defended and criticised with great erudition.
 Williamson's book breaks a new path in approaching questions of
knowledge. Here are  some of the main claims of the book:

 - knowing is - contrary to what most contemporary theories of knowledge
hold - a state of mind
 - the state of knowing is unanalysable to further constituents - it is,
to use Williamson's  terminology, a prime condition
 - hence it is not possible to give necessary and sufficient conditions
for knowing - Gettierology was a waste of time
  - the state of knowing is explanatory in actions just like states of
beliefs and desires are



The organizer of the seminar:   László E. Szabó

--
Laszlo E. Szabo
Department of Theoretical Physics
Department of History and Philosophy of Science
Eotvos University, Budapest
H-1518 Budapest, Pf. 32, Hungary
Phone/Fax: (36-1)372-2924
Home: (36-1) 200-7318
Mobil/SMS: (36) 20-366-1172
http://hps.elte.hu/~leszabo