Knowledge and the State of Nature

`In a study full of lively, subtle, clever ideas Edward Craig gives fresh impetus to a debate which until lately had seemed stalled'A.C. Grayling, Times Literary Supplement

• Nature and motivation of project. Doubts answered. Plato, Pears, Hobbes, comparison with state-of-nature theory in political philosophy. Evolutionary epistemology; Derivation of first condition; the problem whether belief necessary. Necessary and sufficient conditions an unsuitable format. The prototypical case; Need for third condition. Discussion of the Nozick - Dretske analysis; Why causal theory, tracking, reliabilism all good approximations. Why justified true belief a good approximation. Comparison with Grice; Distinction between informant and source of information; its nature and point. Application to putative 'knowledge without belief' cases; and to comparitivism: Goldman; Being right by accident. All analyses insufficient. Blackburn: the Mirv/Pirv principle; Local v. global reliabilism. Discussion of McGinn; Externalist and internalist analyses. The first-person case. Knowing that one knows; Insufficiency of the various analyses. The 'No false lemma' principle. Its rationale -- and its effect; Objectivisation. The 'cart before the horse' objection -- and the response; Lotteries and multiple premises: the pull towards certainty. Knowledge and natural laws; Objectivisation and scepticism. Unger's first account; Two explanations of scepticism: the first-person approach, and the absolute perspective; Knowledge and involvement. What makes truth valuable?; Testimony and the transmission of knowledge. Welbourne: believing the speaker; Other locutions: Knowing Fred. Information v. acquaintance. Interacting with Fred. Knowing London -- and German; Other locutions: Knowing how to. The inquirier and the apprentice. 'Knows how to' compared with 'can' and with 'knows that'; Appendix Unger's semantic relativism; References; Index