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Comments on Possibility of Knowledge<br />
Consider<strong>in</strong>g that most epistemologists claim that their theories of knowledge<br />
capture our everyday concept of knowledge and best concord with our everyday use of<br />
the word “knowledge” and with our pretheoretical <strong>in</strong>tuitions about knowledge claims,<br />
the claim that most of these theories are revisionist may easily be misunderstood as the<br />
claim that these theories are all wrong. For this reason I want to emphasize two po<strong>in</strong>ts.<br />
First, as I have just noted, theories are only revisionist if the obstacles they dissipate are<br />
not just products of mistaken theoriz<strong>in</strong>g. So unless these pr<strong>in</strong>ciples really are as<br />
<strong>in</strong>tuitively plausible as some epistemologists believe, theories which offer dissipat<strong>in</strong>g<br />
<strong>in</strong>stead of overcom<strong>in</strong>g strategies are not revisionist at all.<br />
The second po<strong>in</strong>t I want to emphasize is that a theory of knowledge can be<br />
revisionist or conservative <strong>in</strong> more than one way. So far I discussed only the acceptance<br />
or denial of certa<strong>in</strong> epistemic pr<strong>in</strong>ciples. Let’s call a theory which denies an <strong>in</strong>tuitively<br />
plausible epistemic pr<strong>in</strong>ciple pr<strong>in</strong>ciple-revisionist and a theory which accepts it<br />
pr<strong>in</strong>ciple-conservative. In these terms scepticism may be the only completely pr<strong>in</strong>cipleconservative<br />
epistemology. But of course an epistemologist cannot simply rely on what<br />
epistemic pr<strong>in</strong>ciples people <strong>in</strong>tuitively assent to; we also have to consider our everyday<br />
use of the word “knowledge” and our pretheoretical <strong>in</strong>tuitions concern<strong>in</strong>g knowledge<br />
claims. Call a theory which respects our everyday use of “knowledge” as well as our<br />
<strong>in</strong>tuitive judgments about knowledge claims use-conservative and a theory which for<br />
some reason discards them use-revisionist. As we all know, when asked, people<br />
subscribe to many pr<strong>in</strong>ciples which they fail to live up to. Thus, there is no reason to<br />
expect that pr<strong>in</strong>ciple-conservatism will always go hand <strong>in</strong> hand with use-conservatism.<br />
It is therefore perfectly possible that some theory of knowledge best captures our<br />
everyday use of “knowledge” and our <strong>in</strong>tuitions about knowledge-claims while at the<br />
same time be<strong>in</strong>g pr<strong>in</strong>ciple-revisionist. In fact, one possible explanation of the sceptical<br />
paradox is that no theory of knowledge can be pr<strong>in</strong>ciple-conservative and useconservative<br />
at the same time. Thus deny<strong>in</strong>g (1) is certa<strong>in</strong>ly use-revisionist, while<br />
deny<strong>in</strong>g (2) or (3) is probably pr<strong>in</strong>ciple-revisionist. 110<br />
110 Thanks to Andreas Erz for comments on an earlier draft of this paper.<br />
98<br />
Simon Sauter<br />
Heidelberg University<br />
Simon.Sauter@stud.uni-heidelberg.de