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Epistemology is the branch of philosophy that examines the nature, origin, and limits of knowledge.Also called theory of knowledge, it explores different types of knowledge, such as propositional knowledge about facts, practical knowledge in the form of skills, and knowledge by acquaintance as a familiarity through experience.
Virtue epistemology replaces formulaic expressions for apprehending knowledge, such as "S knows that p", by amending these formulas with virtue theory applied to intellect, where virtue then becomes the fulcrum for assessing [clarification needed] potential candidates of "knowledge". This amendation raises problems of its own, however.
Propositional knowledge, also termed factual knowledge or knowledge-that, is the most paradigmatic form of knowledge in analytic philosophy, and most definitions of knowledge in philosophy have this form in mind. [8] [7] [9] It refers to the possession of certain information.
The question of what constitutes "knowledge" is as old as philosophy itself. Early instances are found in Plato's dialogues , notably Meno (97a–98b) and Theaetetus . Gettier himself was not actually the first to raise the problem named after him; its existence was acknowledged by both Alexius Meinong and Bertrand Russell , the latter of which ...
In a few cases, knowledge may even have a negative value. For example, if a person's life depends on gathering the courage to jump over a ravine, then having a true belief about the involved dangers may hinder them from doing so. [130] The value of knowledge plays a key role in education for deciding which knowledge to pass on to the students.
Prior to Hume, Aristotelian philosophy maintained that all actions and causes were to be interpreted teleologically. This rendered all facts about human action examinable under a normative framework defined by cardinal virtues and capital vices. "Fact" in this sense was not value-free, and the fact-value distinction was an alien concept.
A priori and a posteriori knowledge – these terms are used with respect to reasoning (epistemology) to distinguish necessary conclusions from first premises.. A priori knowledge or justification – knowledge that is independent of experience, as with mathematics, tautologies ("All bachelors are unmarried"), and deduction from pure reason (e.g., ontological proofs).
Value theory, also known as axiology and theory of values, is the systematic study of values.As the branch of philosophy examining which things are good and what it means for something to be good, it distinguishes different types of values and explores how they can be measured and compared.