Logic.

Great...

I only say something is true when i can say it must be true. Unfortunately, logic can only prove that a statement is true deductively.

You go on to ignore this problem. I take it the premises of all your deductions are themselves deduced from other premises that have been deduced from an infinite chain of deductions? Otherwise, at some point your knowledge must be built from an induction.

Therefore, no evidence will prove that a claim must be true, unless you're actually directly observing it...

Because you go on to imply observation would be insufficient due to its propensity to be fooled.

I would limit knowledge to learned concepts, definitions, or identification, or observable facts, perceptions and measurements...

Well, I wouldn't. What about learned behaviors? Do those count? How do these things count as knowledge if there's a possibility they're wrong? Or are the concepts and information you've learned all deduced from infallible premise?

Are you attacking my arguments or attacking me?

Right, "attacking".

I am, but you're not using knowledge as I and others define it.

Oh I'm not? Why don't you define it for me then?

You're also conflating knowledge with strong belief.

Well, strong belief with good justification. I don't see the problem. Why can belief and knowledge lie on the same gradient scale? Do you think something special happens in the brain when people know something as opposed to just believing it?

Your original dispute was that justification is enough. I disagreed, and you went on to claim that it means we should sit idle until death (a strawman).

Or you know. A joke. To make the point that you hadn't and still haven't provided a way for us to know anything except from premises that are assumed known.

I was saying justification isn't enough, meaning you need justification and more.

Great, so what else do you need? Why wouldn't that extra information be considered justification?

If you don't want to avoid any biases, then I suppose you're free to remain with your biased conclusions. Just be honest about what you're here for.

yawn

I've been trying to define how I'm using it, and your argument is that it doesn't make sense with your definition of knowledge...

No, I'm still waiting for a viable definition from you that doesn't render knowledge unattainable.

I wouldn't say it's possible for an elephant to be hiding in a room of this size, so I can say there is no biological elephant currently in this room.

Say, for example, I chopped the elephant up and hid it in your cupboards or under your floorboards.

conflating knowing and believing could become equivocating between strong belief without reason/justification vs having proved or observed claims.

But you said even observation can be wrong. Please provide a way for us to know that doesn't involve assuming unknown (i.e. unjustified) premises known.

You even asked about proving something is true, so you're already equivocating between reasonable belief vs proven true.

Please provide a means to prove something true.

So, "bloinggloing is a space camel that races beavers" doesn't have truth value, and I have no reason not to know this is true, according to your definition?

I wouldn't know. Do you have justification for this?

The way I see it, information is supposed to describe something, and they either matches or not...

Information always describes something. Whether it's the thing you were expecting or not depends on your outlook, I suppose.

... Imagine what you'll know tomorrow.

It's an exciting prospect isn't it?

This could be a reconstruction of your model of the world. I wouldn't call that knowledge.

I would.

you're also saying that two people can each know things directly conflict with each other, and both can be accurate in their own accounts.

They can both be consistent with a different models.

So do you not believe in a consistent reality that can only match one model?

Why would two people's models of reality both need to be consistent with reality? Obviously, both models could be tested, and the model which most aligns with reality could be known to be more likely.

Is reality just your construction of knowledge?

Te reiterate, your knowledge doesn't have to match with reality, thus it can be wrong.

But there are always ways we can be unaware of our incorrectness.

Exactly. This is probably the most true thing you've said.

Wouldn't this render knowledge impossible to obtain by your definition? If so, I reject this definition.

I think it's still simpler and more more clear to just say you believed but didn't know until you made another observation or measurement.

Why would you suddenly know then but not before?

Are you also saying that the truth changed? Is truth value also subjective?

No, because knowledge can be wrong.

If you are injecting your definition into how you understand what I'm saying, it's no wonder you're misunderstanding.

It's cute that you think I'm incapable of imagining more than one definition. Try not to patronize me, ok? This is you being a dick.

I can know if I have a connection to the internet, or what I believe is the internet.

So how do you know? How are you so certain? Sometimes, my computer says it's connected to the wi-fi, but it isn't.

Maybe you haven't talked to many scientists, or at least science instructors that were formerly scientists. Do you not talk to or read material from any philosophers or philosophy instructors?

Do you? It seems like if you had you'd realize that there are actually many different views about what knowing and learning are, and you wouldn't so shamelessly mischaracterize all philosophers and scientists as a monolithic block that happen to agree with you. Have you read Piaget? Or Gagne? Or Skinner? Or Gardner? They all have very different understandings of knowledge. I'm partial to Piaget's perspective. Maybe you should go read some.

Well yes. Linguistics or god or anything else really. People normally don't have words in their lexicons representing abstract concepts that could not possibly exist. They especially don't use these words as often as people use the word "know".

This bias.

I'm sorry, would you like to have a conversation and tell me what you disagree with? Do you think people do frequently use words corresponding to abstract concepts that could not possibly exist? This is relevant. If you want to pretend I'm "biased" every time I ask you a question that challenges your conception of knowledge, why even bother having a conversation?

So it means you know? Is it supposed to communicate what you claim to know?

My tag, being two words, is not meant to communicate very much. I meant it to be inflammatory.

You're not using linguistics because it's about describing how people use language, not prescribing how they ought to use it.

Maybe your bias prevented you from seeing that I'm not prescribing how to use words. I'm only noting that there seems to be a disconnect between how you use the word "knowledge", and how I and many people understand it. If you'd like to be understood, you should keep this in mind. This is an expression of my opinion however, and obviously does not pretend to represent some sort of linguistic analysis, unlike the preceding sentence, which although anecdotal, does represent an analysis.

Or are you talking about a different kind of linguistics? Not a fan of science? You seem to be in denial of the observable fact that there are people with a different definition of knowledge.

Is that what it seems like to you?I mean, obviously people mean different things when they say the know something. If you recognize this why do you insist they must mean they're completely certain? Clearly perfect certainty is unobtainable in the real world, so are you advocating that all the people going around saying they know things are wrong? I think it's much more likely that people use the word know so frequently and easily because it isn't actually a claim to perfect certainty.

Nope, not if you're making direct measurements.

So measurements are knowledge? Are you saying they can't be wrong? Or are you saying you're completely sure about what was measured?

I mean, you could always be a brain in a jar with wires hooked up to it. The probability seems remote but non-zero.

I see no reason to ponder that, but I wouldn't say we know that's not the case...

Well if you remember, you had asked me why you couldn't know that you have hands by your definition of knowing, so if you were a brain in a jar, as you admit is possible, then your hands would be illusory, thus you can't be completely certain you have hands. You can't say you know that by your definition if you admit there's a remote possibility you are only a brain in a jar.

I said we can know it has made accurate predictions, at least if we're the ones measuring and observing the accuracy. We can also check the work of others and see if there's consistency even among doubters.

Consistency does not remove entirely the possibility of consistent systematic error. Because of this (perhaps remote) possibility, it doesn't seem you could use this to obtain knowledge by your definition, and that's where I take issue. Knowledge isn't just a disjunct series of claims that have a binary truth value based on correspondence with reality. Knowledge is obviously more complex that that. Knowledge is a conditioned way of understanding a complex experience. Acknowledging this does not "deny and distort what is real".

If you ask people if knowledge is subjective, do you think they'd say yes?

Anyone who realizes that it's possible to understand some things in multiple ways probably would.