Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-jn8rn Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-23T11:57:26.770Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

An epistemology for practical knowledge

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2020

Lucy Campbell Open the ORCID record for Lucy Campbell [Opens in a new window]
Lucy Campbell*
Affiliation:
University of Oxford, Oxford, UK
*
E-mails: [email protected], [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Anscombe thought that practical knowledge – a person’s knowledge of what she is intentionally doing – displays formal differences to ordinary empirical, or ‘speculative’, knowledge. I suggest these differences rest on the fact that practical knowledge involves intention analogously to how speculative knowledge involves belief. But this claim conflicts with the standard conception of knowledge, according to which knowledge is an inherently belief-involving phenomenon. Building on John Hyman’s account of knowledge as the ability to use a fact as a reason, I develop an alternative, two-tier, epistemology which allows that knowledge might really come in a belief-involving and an intention-involving form.

Keywords

Practical knowledgespeculative knowledgeself-knowledgeintentionanscombeknowledge as an abilitytwo-tier epistemology
Type
Articles
Information
Canadian Journal of Philosophy , Volume 48 , Issue 2 , 2018 , pp. 159 - 177
Copyright
Copyright © Canadian Journal of Philosophy 2017

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Alvarez, Maria. 2010. Kinds of Reasons. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199550005.001.0001CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Anscombe, G. E. M. 1957. Intention. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Anscombe, G. E. M. 1979. “Under a Description.” Noûs 13(2): 219–233.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Austin, J. L. 1946. “Other Minds.” Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society Supplementary 20: 148–187.Google Scholar
Bliss, Ricki, and Kelly, Trogdon. 2014. “Metaphysical Grounding.” Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/grounding/.Google Scholar
Bratman, Michael. 1984. “Two Faces of Intention.” The Philosophical Review 93(3): 375–405. 10.2307/2184542CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bratman, Michael. 2009. “Intention, Belief, Practical, Theoretical.” In Spheres of Reason, edited by Robertson, Simon, 29–61. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199572939.001.0001CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dancy, Jonathan. 1985. Introduction to Contemporary Epistemology. Oxford: Blackwell.Google Scholar
Davidson, Donald. 2001. “Agency.” Essays on Actions and Events, 43–61. Oxford: Clarendon Press. 10.1093/0199246270.001.0001CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Donnellan, Keith S. 1963. “Knowing What I am Doing.” The Journal of Philosophy 60(14): 401–409. 10.2307/2022825CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ezio, di Nucci. 2009. “Simply, False.” Analysis 69(1): 69–78.Google Scholar
Frost, Kim. 2014. “On the Very Idea of Direction of Fit.” Philosophical Review 123(4): 429–484. 10.1215/00318108-2749720CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Grünbaum, Thor. 2009. “Anscombe and Practical Knowledge of What Is Happening.” Grazer Philosophische Studien 78: 41–67.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Haddock, Adrian. 2011. “The Knowledge that a Man has of his Intentional Actions.” In Essays on Anscombe’s Intention, edited by Ford, Anton, Hornsby, Jennifer and Stoutland, Frederick, 147–169. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Holton, Richard. 2009. Willing, Wanting, Waiting. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199214570.001.0001CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hughes, Nick. 2014. “Is Knowledge the Ability to φ for the reason that P?” Episteme 11(4): 457–462. 10.1017/epi.2014.16CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hyman, John. 1999. “How Knowledge Works.” The Philosophical Quarterly 49(197): 433–451. 10.1111/phiq.1999.49.issue-197CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hyman, John. 2006. “Knowledge and Evidence.” Mind 115(460): 891–916. 10.1093/mind/fzl891CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hyman, John. 2015. Action, Knowledge and Will. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198735779.001.0001CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Koslicki, Kathrin. 2015. “The Coarse-Grainedness of Grounding.” In Vol. 9 of Oxford Studies in Metaphysics, edited by Karen, Bennett and Dean, Zimmerman.306–344. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198729242.001.0001CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Langton, Rae. 2004. “Intention as Faith.” In Agency and Action, edited by Hyman, John and Steward, Helen, 243–258. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 10.1017/CBO9780511550843CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Locke, Dustin. 2015. “Knowledge, Explanation, and Motivating Reasons.” American Philosophical Quarterly 52(3): 215–232.Google Scholar
McGlynn, Aidan. 2014. Knowledge First? Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. 10.1057/9781137026460CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Moran, Richard. 2004. “Anscombe on ‘Practical Knowledge.’” In Vol. 55 of Agency and Action, edited by Hyman, John and Steward, Helen, 43–68. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 10.1017/CBO9780511550843CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Newstead, Anne. 2006. “Knowledge by Intention? On the Possibility of Agent’s Knowledge.” In Aspects of Knowing, edited byStephen, Hetherington, 183–201. Oxford: Elsevier. 10.1016/B978-008044979-1/50013-8CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Newstead, Anne. 2009. “Interpreting Anscombe’s Intention §32FF.” Journal of Philosophical Research 34: 157–176. 10.5840/jpr_2009_14CrossRefGoogle Scholar
O’Brien, Lucy. 2003. “On Knowing One’s Own Actions.” In Agency and Self-Awareness, edited by Roessler, Johannes and Eilan, Naomi, 358–382. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
Paul, Sarah K. 2009. “How We Know What We’re Doing.” Philosophers’ Imprint 9(11): 1–24.Google Scholar
Pickard, Hanna. 2004. “Knowledge of Action Without Observation.” Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 104(3): 203–228. 10.1111/paso.2004.104.issue-3CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rödl, Sebastian. 2007. Self-Consciousness. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Setiya, Kieran. 2008. “Practical Knowledge.” Ethics 118(3): 388–409. 10.1086/528781CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Setiya, Kieran. 2009. “Practical Knowledge Revisited.” Ethics 120(1): 128–137. 10.1086/606000CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Teichmann, Roger. 2008. The Philosophy of Elizabeth Anscombe. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199299331.001.0001CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Thompson, Michael. 2011. “Anscombe’s Intention and Practical Knowledge.” In Essays on Anscombe’s Intention, edited by Ford, Anton, Hornsby, Jennifer and Stoutland, Frederick, 198–210. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Velleman, David. 1989. Practical Reflection. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Velleman, David. 2000. The Possibility of Practical Reason. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Williamson, Timothy. forthcoming. “Acting on Knowledge.” In Knowledge-first, edited byCarter, J. A., Gordon, E., and Jarvis, B.. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Williamson, Timothy. 2000. Knowledge and Its Limits. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Wilson, J. 2014. “No Work for a Theory of Grounding.” Inquiry 57(5–6): 1–45.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wiseman, Rachael. 2016. Routledge Philosophy Guidebook to Anscombe’s Intention. Abingdon: Routledge.Google Scholar