Knowledge and Its Limits [Paperback]

Timothy Williamson (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 019925656X | ISBN-13: 978-0199256563 | Publication Date: December 19, 2002

Knowledge and its Limits presents a systematic new conception of knowledge as a kind of mental stage sensitive to the knower's environment. It makes a major contribution to the debate between externalist and internalist philosophies of mind, and breaks radically with the epistemological tradition of analyzing knowledge in terms of true belief. The theory casts new light on such philosophical problems as scepticism, evidence, probability and assertion, realism and anti-realism, and the limits of what can be known. The arguments are illustrated by rigorous models based on epistemic logic and probability theory. The result is a new way of doing epistemology and a notable contribution to the philosophy of mind.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"The best book in epistemology to come out since 1975"--Keith DeRose, British Journal for the Philosophy of Science

"Newness in philosophy is rare. But this important book offers a boldly original view of the nature of knowledge.... A daring new picture of knowledge is skillfully supported with an argumentative verve that its author, the new professor of logic at Oxford University, has made himself known for.... Throughout, Mr Williamson is bold, ingenious and original; the tradition he opposes appears by contrast stale, scholastic and uninspired.... Anyone with a serious interest in philosophy will have much to learn from this challenging book."--The Economist

"Radical and challenging...without question and important exercise of the 'let me show you a new way of looking at things' kind; something we sorely need in epistemology."--Frank Jackson, Australasian Journal of Philosophy

About the Author

Timothy Williamson is Professor of Philosophy at the University of Edinburgh.

Product Details

• Paperback: 352 pages
• Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA (December 19, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 019925656X
• ISBN-13: 978-0199256563
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.1 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #735,345 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

53 of 57 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars wintry and uncompromising exactitude, December 12, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: Knowledge and Its Limits (Paperback)

Here is a great line from a review of Williamson's book by N.M.L. Nathan: "I much admired its wintry and uncompromising exactitude."

The point is partly that Williamson displays a new level of logical precision in epistemology. His ability to spell things out explicitly can be scary.

Perhaps the point is also, partly, that there is almost no humor in this book (unless you count things like, "It is at best negligent to bury someone without evidence that he is dead, even if he is in fact dead" (p. 245)).

Given the history of this subject, the leading idea, viz., that knowledge is conceptually primitive and central to the analysis of concepts like "evidence", "assertion", and maybe even "belief" itself, is novel and bold. It's remarkable to see this now, thousands of years after Plato's Theatetus.

This is mainly a work of epistemology, but philosophers of mind should read it too. Williamson's defense of broadness and the causal efficacy of knowledge is creative and, to me, persuasive.

See also Williamson's sharp defense of a knowledge norm as defining the social practice of assertion. This is a terrific object-lesson in how to relate individual mental states to social practices.

I think the much-discussed anti-luminosity argument is merely clever, and actually the weakest part of the book. But I also think that one could accept most of the rest of the book while holding that knowledge (not, of course, lack-of-knowledge) is in some relevant sense luminous.

I know about a dozen people who bought this book and have had pages 1-12 literally come loose and fall out.

29 of 34 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Groundbreaking Epistemology, December 22, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: Knowledge and Its Limits (Hardcover)

The last several decades have seen epistemology bogged down in various reductionist attempts to define knowledge in non-circular terms. Williamson adopts the view that knowledge is a primitive state. If he is right, epistemology cannot consist in the attempt to give a reductive analysis of knowledge. Williamson then demonstrates the interest of his brand of non-reductive epistemology, by drawing radical conclusions from his characteristically precise arguments about a host of topics from self-knowledge to the nature of evidence. This is the most important book in epistemology in decades, written by the leading living philosopher outside of normative ethics and history.

15 of 28 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars first-rate, November 3, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: Knowledge and Its Limits (Hardcover)

This may well be the most important work in epistemology to have appeared in the last decade. Like its author's other works, it is precise, deep, startlingly creative and deeply thought-provoking -- a first-rate piece of analytic philosophy!