Epistemology

Epistemology is the branch of philosophy that studies knowledge, justification, belief, and the limits of what can be known.

Knowledge: Knowledge is factive, justified cognitive success: one knows a proposition only if it is true. Epistemology asks what distinguishes knowledge from true belief or mere confidence.
Evidentialism: Evidentialism holds that a belief's justification depends on the believer's evidence. It makes evidential support the central measure of justified belief.
Gettier Problem: The Gettier problem uses cases of justified true belief that seem not to constitute knowledge. It challenges the traditional analysis of knowledge as justified true belief.
Plato: Plato was an ancient Greek philosopher whose dialogues examine knowledge, truth, and the nature of reality. His dialogues helped establish knowledge as a distinct philosophical problem.
Problem of Induction: The problem of induction asks how past observations can justify expectations about unobserved cases. It challenges the evidential basis for generalizations and predictions.
Belief: Belief is an attitude of taking a proposition to be true. Theories of knowledge explain how belief relates to truth and justification.
Reliabilism: Reliabilism holds that a belief is justified when produced by a reliable process. It grounds justification in how beliefs are formed, rather than accessible evidence alone.
Internalism and Externalism: Internalism and externalism disagree about whether justification depends only on factors accessible to the believer. Their dispute concerns whether unseen causes can make a belief epistemically justified.
Meno: Meno is a Platonic dialogue about virtue, inquiry, and whether learning is recollection. Its account of true belief tied down by reason anticipates later analyses of knowledge.
Problem of Other Minds: The problem of other minds asks how anyone can know that other people have conscious experiences. It tests whether observable behavior can justify beliefs about private mental states.

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