Attempts at Understanding Fallibilism
Showing only #2439 and its comments.
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With an account, you can revise, criticize, and comment on ideas.Fallibilism is the idea that all of our knowledge contains errors, and that nothing is obviously true but depends on what one understands about reality. This means that we can't be certain about anything, because all knowledge contains errors. Knowledge, therefore, grows by addressing the errors we encounter as we encounter them. We solve problems by guessing solutions and testing them. This also means we should always be careful not to destroy or even slow down the things and ideas that correct errors and thereby create knowledge. Some of which are freedom, privacy, and free markets. We are also never the passive recipients of our knowledge; we are the creators.
This view is mainly influenced by Popper, and errors are my own.
Fallibilism is the idea that all of our knowledge contains errors…
This is a common mischaracterization of fallibilism. It’s actually a form of cynicism. See https://blog.dennishackethal.com/posts/don-t-take-fallibilism-too-far
In reality, fallibilism is the view that there is no criterion to say with certainty what’s true and what’s false; that, as a result, we inevitably make mistakes; and that some of our knowledge is mistaken at any given time. But not all of it.
So there is no way to tell the truth of our knowledge. It may solve a problem, but that doesn't guarantee that it’s true.
You can still tell whether some knowledge is true. You just can’t tell infallibly, ie with absolute certainty. There is a difference between certainty and knowledge.
If you're not certain which part of your knowledge is true, then there is no difference between what I said and what you said. Because you knew a certain part of your knowledge was true, but it turned out not to be after further inquiry.
… there is no difference between what I said and what you said.
Unclear what “what I said” and “what you said” refer to. Quotes
To rephrase what you said, you can tell fallibly that some knowledge is true, and what I said was "[i]t may solve a problem, but that doesn't guarantee that it’s true."
In that case, I would agree with the second part of #2544 – just because something solves a problem doesn’t mean it’s guaranteed to be true, yes – but the first part is still wrong, IMO: “So there is no way to tell the truth of our knowledge.” There is, just not infallibly.
It certainly (pun intended) does not follow that all our knowledge contains errors, as you originally wrote.
Since you’re voicing a disagreement, this idea should presumably be marked as a criticism.
Now you’re using the word ‘certain’ with two different meanings, which is confusing. You could replace the second instance, “a certain”, with ‘some’ or just ‘a’.
Knowledge, therefore, grows by addressing the errors we encounter as we encounter them.
Remove ‘therefore’
I think the 'therefore' means that the following point is a direct result of the preceding claim.
The word ‘therefore’ in this context means that lack of certainty is the reason error correction is the means by which knowledge is created. I’m not sure that’s the reason.
And it’s not actually clear whether ‘therefore’ refers to the part “This means that we can't be certain about anything” or to “all knowledge contains errors.”
You can avoid all of these issues by simply removing the word ‘therefore’. Simpler.
Knowledge, therefore, grows by addressing the errors we encounter as we encounter them.
The part “as we encounter them” implies that we address every error the minute we find it. That isn’t true. Some errors take a long time to address. We also have to prioritize some errors over others because they are more important or more urgent or both.
We can't solve a problem we haven't encountered yet.
Some theories have enough reach to solve problems we haven’t encountered or even considered yet. I would just remove this sentence.
Finding problems that a knowledge addresses is a form of new knowledge.
Maybe not. Figured that out as I was typing. The knowledge isn't new.
a knowledge
I don’t think it’s correct to use the word ‘knowledge’ with an indeterminate article (meaning ‘a’ or ‘an’).
You could say ‘Finding problems that some knowledge addresses…’
At the same time, there is a notion that I want to address that flows from fallibilism, and the reason decentralized 'things' tend to be more truth seeking. Even though a given knowledge has solved problems we haven't yet discovered, we still got that solution by solving a problem we encountered, and we can't solve problems we haven't encountered. When we try to solve a problem, we might find out that we've already solved it, but that only happens after we have looked at the problem.
When we try to solve a problem, we might find out that we've already solved it, but that only happens after we have looked at the problem.
That still means we solved the problem before we encountered it.
I understand you want to stress that we usually solve a problem after we identify it. Your text already covers that. So I’d still just remove the sentence “We can't solve a problem we haven't encountered yet.” because it’s not true.