Hugo Hellström, A puzzle for descriptivist theories of knowledge attributions

The Research Seminar Series in Philosophy invites you to a seminar with Hugo Hellström, ”A puzzle for descriptivist theories of knowledge attributions".

Abstract: According to descriptivist views on knowledge attributions, utterances of the form ‘S knows that p’ attributes a mental state to S (namely knowledge that p). Such views, I argue, face a problem accounting for certain attributions of knowledge to non-human animals and objects, as in e.g. “The birds know when to fly south in autumn.” Such utterances seem proper; yet, descriptivist views interpret these – if true – as genuinely attributing the mental state of knowledge to e.g. birds. But, on the assumption that knowledge is a rather complex mental state with rather strong cognitive demands, such an interpretation seems to be the wrong one. As a response, the descriptivist can either claim that such knowledge attributions are best understood as non-literal, or opt for a weaker notion of knowledge on which e.g. birds genuinely have knowledge. In this talk, I will explore the former alternative only. I will examine the most plausible candidates for a non-literal interpretation of such sentences (ambiguity, metaphor, and loose talk) and argue that they are wrong (ambiguity, metaphor) or fall short of being satisfactory (loose talk). If I have time, I will discuss whether these considerations favor a non-descriptive account of knowledge attributions, (e.g. expressivism).

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