Formal Models of Fallible Knowledge

In this thesis I review and analyze Holliday’s \citeyearpar{KWF} work on the relation between fallibilism and closure. The main concern in Holliday’s work is to show that most major fallibilistic theories of knowledge inherently suffer from at least one problem among a set of problems and that there are essential assumptions that must be added to the models representing this family of theories to solve the problem. I first review the epistemologic theories which are the basis of the study, and later discuss their formalizations and how Holliday’s theory identifies and solves the problem. At the end I evaluate Holliday’s formalization of one of these theories of knowledge, namely Lewis’s theory, and argues that the model presented by Holliday is not entirely faithful to Lewis’s theory and needs to undergo certain changes.

Name thesis:degree_name

Master of Arts (MA)

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Philosophy

Grantor dc:publisher.institution

Graduate Studies

Year dc:date.issued

2017

Author dc:creator

• Ahmadianhosseini, Zahra

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Zach, Richard

Committee members dc:contributor.committeemember

• Fantl, Jeremy
• Wyatt, Nicole

• Philosophy

Statement dc:rights

• University of Calgary graduate students retain copyright ownership and moral rights for their thesis. You may use this material in any way that is permitted by the Copyright Act or through licensing that has been assigned to the document. For uses that are not allowable under copyright legislation or licensing, you are required to seek permission.

Language dc:language.iso

eng

DOI

http://dx.doi.org/10.11575/PRISM/26213

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:ucalgary.scholaris.ca:11023/3942