“I don’t think. I know.” We’ve all heard this, and most of us have probably uttered this phrase ourselves a time or two. But when you think about it (no pun intended), this phrase represents a misuse of language. It sets up a contrast between thinking and knowing, wherein “thinking” denotes uncertainty and “knowing” denotes certainty. While this may reflect a popular connotation of these words, denotatively speaking, neither has anything to do with certainty.
“Think” is a description of what the mind does. It describes the mind’s activity. Knowledge is “justified, true belief.” Certainty is not part of the definition, and thus certainty is not required for knowledge. To know something only requires that we have adequate justification.
If knowledge required certainty, then there is very little we could claim to know (the laws of logic, mathematics, and analytical truths such as “a bachelor is an unmarried male”). Most things we claim to know we cannot be certain of, and yet we are still justified in claiming to know them because we have good justification to believe they are true. For example, I know that my car is in my driveway right now even though I can’t see it. I can’t be certain of this since it’s always possible that someone stole it while I’m typing this, or that my wife drove to the store recently without my knowledge, but I am still justified in claiming to know my car is in the driveway.
Furthermore, it’s clear that “think” is not opposed to “knowledge” or “certainty” because we necessarily have thoughts about that which we know or are certain of. For example, I am certain that 2+2=4 and that bachelors are unmarried males. To have certain knowledge of these facts, I must also have the thought that “2+2=4” and the thought that “bachelors are unmarried males”. And if I have thoughts about them, then it is appropriate to say “I think 2+2=4” and “I think that bachelors are unmarried males.” One simply cannot know something without also thinking about it, and thinking it to be true.
Thinking to Believe 
March 19, 2014 at 2:44 pm
The whole point of your argument is that you do not need fact, reality, reason, logic or even knowledge in order to know. This spurious argument, once qualified as their language therefore makes belief knowledge if it is described as having a good legitimate reason and is based on fact or reality, accurate or exact. Once qualifying it that way then you suppose that your “beleif” then is Knowledge. So laughable
There are lots of people around the world right now who have justified, true belief, about the missing Malaysian plane but no one has the “knowledge”, notwithstanding the hijackers who themselves would not have justified true belief either because they have the certainty of knowledge. Knowledge is certainty, belief never is. Only religion would try to assert knowledge as belief by adjectivefying, verbing and adverbing belief:
Justified: having a good legitimate reason;
Belief: an acceptance that something exists
True: on the other hand is “fact or reality, accurate or exact
Only belief is the qualifier for theologians; neither “true” nor “justified” can be used as descriptors.
It may or may not be ‘defeasible’, in other words, defeatable, by a better argument. The Copernican Revolution was the defeat of Catholic justified true belief, by the arguments of Galileo who used the mathematics of Copernicus. (See ‘defeator arguments’ or ‘defeasors’)
President Kennedy had a justified true belief that we could get to the moon, because he was shown the proof, without which his belief could not have been justified.
A rational proposition that is not a fallacy has justification, that is, it is ‘justified’. This means the logic is sound and it has a correspondence to facts of reality.
Therefore, a ‘justified true belief’ is one that has been shown to be logically sound, or is accepted as logically sound ONLY if it corresponds with fact of reality; which religion and the mythology of Gods do not.
One way of explaining the theory of justification is to say that a justified belief is one that we are “within our rights” in holding. The rights in question are neither political nor moral, however, but intellectual.
In some way, each of us is responsible for what we believe. Beliefs are not typically formed completely at random, and thus we have an intellectual responsibility, or obligation, to try to believe what is true and to avoid believing what is false. An intellectually responsible act is within one’s intellectual rights in believing something; performing it, one is justified in one’s belief.
But remember that using this notion of justified, true belief to support your belief in the proposition that God exists can also be used by the atheist to support the belief in the proposition that God does not exist; in other words, against every statement its contradiction may be advanced with equal justification.
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March 19, 2014 at 2:51 pm
If you think “The whole point of your argument is that you do not need fact, reality, reason, logic or even knowledge in order to know,” then either I’m a poor communicator, or you are a poor interpreter, because that has nothing to do with the point of my post. Clearly, the point of my post is that saying “I think X” does not mean that one is uncertain of X, and that saying “I know X” does not require or imply that one is certain of X.
The rest of what you had to say is tangential, so I will not be responding.
Jason
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March 19, 2014 at 3:39 pm
Great thought!
As you adequately pointed out, our “certainty” is only justified so long as it remains true. There is always the possibility that it will change. How do we know 2+2=4? Do the concept of values and numbers and math even exist apart from our understanding of them? Do things always happen the way we think they do? Why? Because we observe them to? Does our observation of them validate their truthfulness at all?
Perhaps there is an evil demon in our minds, pulling the strings, and telling us that 2+2=4. Ah, Descartes…
Just my rambling thoughts upon your thoughts. Nothing substantial, really, just musings. 😉 Thank you for bringing them into my mind with this post.
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March 19, 2014 at 4:01 pm
I think neither of your statements are true.
“Knowledge is “justified, true belief.” and then elucidate several points to support the statement.
Tangential is academia vernacular which is ridiculous since my entire commentary closely connected to your post; but, as in psychology and logic, it does use rationalization (also known as making excuses) as a defense mechanism in which perception is unable to be logically justified and explained in a rational or logical manner in order to avoid any true explanation, by plausible means.
“I will not be responding” is close enough to an admission of intellectual laziness or inability to refute the logic of my position by relying on philosophy from 500 BCE, notwithstanding the thoughtfullness of Plato.
Against every statement, its contradiction may be advanced with equal justification.
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March 19, 2014 at 4:04 pm
SonofMan,
“I will not be responding” is an admission that I am tired of responding to your rants, unrelated assertions, and rabbit trails.
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March 19, 2014 at 4:05 pm
Jason
You do have a sense of humour, I must say.
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March 19, 2014 at 5:08 pm
“I don’t think, I know” is a colloquial phrase. Shouldn’t you look at it with the colloquial meanings of words? Or at least the relevant denotations?
“Think” denotatively means “to have a particular opinion, belief, or idea about someone or something.” But you ignore that definition, and go straight to the next irrelevant definition.
Which makes the entirety of your post a failed semantic argument.
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March 20, 2014 at 5:02 pm
“Furthermore, it’s clear that ‘think’ is not opposed to ‘knowledge’ or ‘certainty’ because we necessarily have thoughts about that which we know or are certain of.”
Consider the exercise of guessing or determining the number of jelly beans in the glass jar. I would respond saying, “I THINK there are ‘X’ number of jelly beans in the jar.” I don’t KNOW with absolute surety so I must surmise. I must employ reason by examining the relative size of the jar and the size and shape of the jelly beans to conceive of how many I would estimate can fit within the volume of the glass jar. I must venture a mental calculated approximation of the probable amount.
Now, if the person who actually filled the jar with the beans gets me on the side and INFORMS me precisely how many jelly beans they placed into that particular glass jar then I can respond by saying, “I KNOW the answer! There are exactly ‘X’ number of jelly beans in that glass jar.” I do not have to THINK about it at all because the information has been provided to make me aware of the number by a totally reliable source.
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March 20, 2014 at 11:59 pm
terabyte06, I acknowledged the colloquial use, but said I am referring to a more precise meaning of the words: “While this may reflect a popular connotation of these words, denotatively speaking, neither has anything to do with certainty.” When we are trying to be precise, a colloquial use of words is not good enough.
Jason
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March 21, 2014 at 5:38 am
Jason:
You really need to look at the secular dictionary sometimes to understand meanings of words not the theological dictionary of definitions like “justified true belief”. Well, I suppose know is a belief in the same way that creationism is a science or Islam is a religion of peace; in other words, when language no longer really means anything.
You say that “know” does not mean certainty but that statement is clearly an uneducated statement and I draw your attention particularly to definition number 7 below and number 9 which is a biblical definition and # 13 which is more your mindset by thinking belief is knowledge which it never is nor ever can be.
know (nəʊ)
— vb , knows , knowing , knew , known
1. ( also intr; may take a clause as object ) to be or feel certain of the truth or accuracy of (a fact, etc)
2. to be acquainted or familiar with: she’s known him five years
3. to have a familiarity or grasp of, as through study or experience: he knows French
4. ( also intr; may take a clause as object ) to understand, be aware of, or perceive (facts, etc): he knows the answer now
5. ( foll by how ) to be sure or aware of (how to be or do something)
6. to experience, esp deeply: to know poverty
7. to be intelligent, informed, or sensible enough (to do something): she knew not to go home yet
8. ( may take a clause as object ) to be able to distinguish or discriminate
9. archaic to have sexual intercourse with
10. I know what I have an idea
11. know what’s what to know how one thing or things in general work
12. informal you know a parenthetical filler phrase used to make a pause in speaking or add slight emphasis to a statement
13. you never know things are uncertain
— n
14. informal in the know aware or informed
[Old English gecnāwan; related to Old Norse knā I can, Latin noscere to come to know]
Now you “know” the rest of the story. And it is with certainty that terabyte06 was correct in concluding with the known observation:
“Which makes the entirety of your post a failed semantic argument.”
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March 21, 2014 at 1:32 pm
PREMISE:
I think about the certainty of knowledge all the time and marvel at the wonderful joy of being set free by certain knowledge. I think about and wonder why so many people prefer to remain in dismal thrall by uncertain belief that can never set you free.
CONCLUSION:
I think belief is abandonment of responsibility, rationale and reasonable doubt transmitted memetically to posterity to dull the senses searching for meaning and truth. In this way one tithes wages to them willing to tell you the meaning and truth, chortling all the way to the bank
MORAL:
By believing that meaning and truth will catch up one day when one is tired of running away from it in search of the cares, riches and pleasures of the world, one sacrifices the discipline of thought for the easy way of putting off until tomorrow what you don’t want to do today; like the Brazilian rainforest monkeys, that never built a shelter for the rainy nights because the sunshine days of play were too captivating.
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March 21, 2014 at 11:05 pm
My wife had a neighbor everyone called “Bachelor Bill”. Therefore, you would think I could say — I know Bill is a bachelor. After asking a few questions, it turned out Bachelor Bill’s wife left him and moved east and nobody knew if they were legally divorced or not. Now I would say — I think Bill is a bachelor but I don’t know because I need proof he is no longer legally married.
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February 24, 2015 at 1:00 pm
Gettier Cases
The tripartite theory of knowledge analyses knowledge as justified true belief. According to this analysis, if something is true, and we believe it to be true, and we are justified in believing it to be true, then we know it.
The tripartite theory, though it has been around since Plato, and though it is still widely used by many philosophers as a working model of knowledge, is false. This was shown to the satisfaction of most philosophers by Edmond Gettier, who developed what are now known as “Gettier cases”.
Gettier cases are cases in which the tripartite theory’s three conditions for knowledge are satisfied, i.e. in which a person does have a justified true belief, but in which there is no knowledge. The existence of such cases shows that there is something more to knowledge than justified true belief, and so that the tripartite theory of knowledge is false.
Suppose that two students, Mark and Sam, have taken a test. Mark is a straight A student, while Sam consistently fails any work he is set. Mark has attended the lessons in preparation for the test, while Sam has been absent due to illness. Mark revised hard for the test, while Sam stayed out all night at a party. Mark wrote furiously for the full duration of the test, while Sam wrote a few lines and then walked out in disgust. Mark says that the test went well, while Sam says that he didn’t even understand the question.
Reflecting on the test, and on a book that he has recently been reading, Sam forms the following belief: the student that will get the highest grade on the test shares a name with the author of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.” Sam clearly has excellent evidence for this belief, he is justified in believing it; he has excellent evidence that Mark will get the highest grade on the test, and can see from the cover of his copy of “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn that it was written by Mark Twain. Furthermore, the belief is true; the student that will get the highest grade on the test does indeed share a name with the author of “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.” According to the tripartite theory of knowledge, therefore, Sam knows that the student that will get the highest grade on the test shares a name with the author of “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.”
Sam, however, does not know this. Mark, despite his excellent grades in the past, perfect attendance, hours of revision, furious writing, and confidence, failed the test. He did not appreciate the subtlety of the question, and so missed its point entirely. Sam, on the other hand, despite his previous poor grades, frequent absences, late night partying, and pessimism concerning his performance, did understand the question. In the few lines that he wrote he managed to scrape a passing grade. Sam, therefore, rather than Mark, got the highest grade on the test.
Unknown to Sam, though, he does share a name with the author of “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.” Its author, who used the pseudonym Mark Twain, was in fact called Samuel Clemens. Sam, therefore, who is the student who will get the highest grade on the test, does share a name with the author of Huckleberry Finn.
Although Sam clearly did have a justified true belief, he equally clearly did not have knowledge. His justification for his belief, far from helping him to discern the truth, threatened to lead him astray. The truth of his belief had nothing to with his reasons for holding it; it was nothing more than good luck that the belief that he formed was true.
This example, and other Gettier cases like it, show that it is possible to have justified true belief without having knowledge; the tripartite theory of knowledge, which holds that justified true belief and knowledge are precisely the same thing, is therefore false.
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