Date: Thu, 1 Jan 1998 19:01:02 -0500 (EST) Message-Id: <199801020001.TAA13934@locke.ccil.org> Reply-To: "=?iso-8859-1?Q?Jorge_J._Llamb=EDas?=" Sender: Lojban list From: "=?iso-8859-1?Q?Jorge_J._Llamb=EDas?=" Subject: Re: & (Was Knowledge & Belief) X-To: lojban To: John Cowan Status: OR X-Mozilla-Status: 0011 Content-Length: 1171 X-From-Space-Date: Thu Jan 1 19:01:09 1998 X-From-Space-Address: LOJBAN@CUVMB.CC.COLUMBIA.EDU Julian: > "I know that >it will snow tomorrow". ... >Can "know" mean more than "predict" >here? Yes. As Rob says, knowledge is justified _true_ belief. Prediction does not necessitate the "true" bit. Consider this example: On Monday Jane says: "I know that it will snow tomorrow" and June says "I predict that it will snow tomorrow". Now suppose that it really snows on Tuesday. Then on Wednesday Jane says: "I knew that it would snow yesterday" and June says "I predicted that it would snow yesterday". All is well. Now suppose that it didn't snow on Tuesday. Then on Wednesday, June can still say "I predicted that it would snow yesterday, but I was wrong". But Jane cannot say "I knew that it would snow yesterday, but I was wrong". Something is wrong with that sentence, because "know" requires a true fact, whereas "predict" does not. Since we don't know for sure before it happens whether or not "it will snow tomorrow" is true or not, we also don't know for sure whether "Jane knows that it will snow" is true or not. But we can take both as true as long as they don't conflict with reality. We do that all the time, not only for future events. co'o mi'e xorxes