An Invariantist's Treatment of Stake Intuitions

Master Thesis Paper

An Invariantist’s Treatment of Stake Intuitions

Copenhagen UniversityPhilosophy Department

Date: March 3, 2014

Author: Jasper F.J. Witjes

Student ID: nhm883

Phone: 0045 52406560

E-mail: [email protected]

Supervisor: Søren Overgaard

Summary:In this paper, I give an invariantist’s treatment of the intuitions concerning knowledge ascriptions in situations with a difference in stakes. The purpose is to show that contextualism does not have an advantage with its treatment of the intuitions provided by DeRose (1992). In my invariantist’s treatment, I focus on the influence of the belief formation for both the subject and the ascriber. The main argument is twofolded. For one thing, the invariantist can explain that it’s more difficult to form the right belief in high stake situations. If a subject forms a false belief, or no belief at all, invariantism can accommodate our intuitions concerning high stake situations. For another, the ascriber may not form the right beliefs about the subject’s knowledge. The invariantist can explain that, in high stake situations, a knowledge ascription may be incorrect, but conversationally appropriate. In this way, the invariantist is able to properly explain our intuitions concerning situations with a difference in stakes.

Number of standard pages: 38

Introduction

In everyday life, we make knowledge ascriptions without thinking about

the meaning of ‘know’ or the conditions for knowledge. We easily follow

our intuitions about what is correct to claim. Keith DeRose (1992) defends

contextualism by showing that it can accommodate these pretheoretic

intuitions.

In this paper I want to defend invariantism by investigating its treatment

of these intuitions. I will argue that a proper treatment of intuitions

doesn’t need to accommodate them. It is more important to provide an

explanation of our intuitions and, if they are incorrect, why this is the case.

I will show how invariantism can explain this. I focus on intuitions

concerning situations with a difference in stakes. My explanation will be

centered around the influence of belief formation on making knowledge

ascriptions. In high stake situations, we make incorrect knowledge

ascriptions, because we’re not able to produce the belief that the subject

knows, with the confidence that is necessary to make this claim. I will

explain why this is the case.

It is not my purpose to show that invariantism is better at explaining the

intuitions than contextualism. I want to defend invariantism, by showing

that it has a proper treatment of the intuitions. This provides us with the

modest argument that contextualism does not have an advantage over

invariantism with its treatment of our pretheoretic intuitions.

First, I will explain what both contextualism and invariantism entail. Then,

I will make clear what our intuitions are concerning knowledge

ascriptions in situations with different stakes. I will argue that an

accommodation of our intuitions is not an advantage in a proper treatment

of intuitions. A theory of knowledge ascription needs to provide a good

explanation of our intuitions. The third chapter provides my invariantist’s

treatment of the intuitions. I rely heavily on the concepts and arguments

from Jennifer Nagel (2008), Kent Bach (2005) and Jessica Brown (2005b).

Chapter 1: Invariantism and Contextualism

I will defend a moderate (that is: non-skeptical), classic version of

invariantism. In this first chapter I will describe what this position in

detail entails and how it relates to the opposed theory of knowledge

ascription: contextualism. First we will need a basic understanding of a

theory of knowledge and what a knowledge ascription entails. I will start

with that, then describe contextualism and finally explore invariantism. At

the end of this chapter, it should be clear what, in particular, classic

moderate invariantism entails and how it relates to contextualism.

Jasper Witjes - An Invariantist’s Treatment of Stake Intuitions | p. 3

1.1 Propositional knowledge

Before we go into theories of knowledge ascription, we need to have a

basic understanding of a theory of knowledge. In the epistemological

tradition, there is mainly a distinction between three kinds of knowledge:

knowledge-who, knowledge-how and propositional knowledge .1

Knowledge-who concerns our recognition of other people.

Knowledge-how concerns our knowledge of how to do things, like riding a

bike or playing chess. I will leave these kind of knowledge completely

aside in this paper, so when I use the term ‘knowledge’, I mean to refer to

propositional knowledge. Basically, propositional knowledge is

knowledge of facts in the world. For example, someone can know that the

Eiffel Tower is in Paris or that Nelson Mandela died in December 2013.

These facts are described in the proposition that - in its most standard

form - follows after the ‘that’-clause. Propositional knowledge is more

than merely a fact stated in a proposition. We need a particular subject (S)

who knows a proposition (p), so when we talk about propositional

knowledge, it concerns a statement of the kind ‘S knows that p’.

A theory of knowledge needs to explain what the necessary and sufficient

conditions are for S to know that p. Since the ancient Greek philosophers,

for a very long time it has been generally accepted that knowledge should

be understood as a justified true belief (JTB). This theory entails that the

conditions for knowledge are that:

1) p needs to be true,

2) S needs to belief that p and

3) S needs to have a justification for his belief that p.

According to this theory, whenever these conditions are satisfied, it is

correct that S knows that p. However, Edmund Gettier (1963) showed that

these three conditions are not satisfactory for a definition of knowledge,

because they ‘do not constitute a sufficient condition for the truth of the

proposition that S knows that P’ (Gettier 1963, p. 192. Italics in the

original). Gettier supports his claim with two hypothetical cases that

describe a subject who has JTB, but of whom we cannot say that he knows.

Since Gettier’s paper, there have been numerous attempts to solve what

came to be known as ‘the Gettier Problem’ with the purpose of defining

necessary and sufficient conditions for knowledge. The main line of

response was to propose an extra condition in addition to JTB that would

establish necessary and sufficient conditions. This strategy has been

unsuccessful so far, since there has always been a counterexample in

response that wasn’t covered by JTB and the extra condition. Other lines

of response have been to reject JTB as a theory of knowledge altogether.

Jonathan Jenkins Ichikawa and Matthias Steup (2001) mention in this

1 For an extensive introduction in different kinds of knowledge, see Fantl, J. (2012)

‘Knowledge How’ and Ichikawa, J.J. and Steup, M. (2001), ‘The Analysis of Knowledge’.


respect the causal theory of knowledge that “includes a clause requiring

that the belief that p be caused by the fact that p.” A last resort has been to

conclude that knowledge is unanalyzable. The most important conclusion

that we take from this discussion is that there is no consensus about the

correct theory of knowledge or if JTB should be maintained as a condition

for knowledge. Nevertheless, I will adopt the orthodox view that JTB

provides us with necessary conditions for knowledge, leaving open how

sufficient conditions should be fully defined.

1.2 Knowledge ascription

First and foremost, for a knowledge ascription to be true, the subject

actually needs to know that p. For this to be the case, as I assume, the

subject needs to have JTB. Besides that, an ascriber needs to claim that S

knows that p. Whereas S can know that p without anyone claiming that he

does, an ascriber can only make a knowledge ascription by making the

claim in a knowledge-ascribing sentence. The most common way of

ascribing knowledge is in a conversational context by saying that S knows

that p, but we can also ascribe knowledge by thinking something along the

lines of ‘S knows that p’. It’s not directly the assertion that makes it a

knowledge ascription, but rather the meaning that the ascriber has in

mind with the knowledge-ascribing sentence.

The ascriber can be the same person as the subject. We regularly

self-ascribe knowledge in a conversation, often for practical purposes.

Imagine for example that you want to decide if you should go to the

supermarket, because you’re hungry and you don’t have anything in the

fridge. Your partner questions if the supermarket is open at that time,

since it’s 19:00 on a Saturday. When you claim: “I know that the

supermarket is open. It’s open every day until 21:00”, you use this

self-ascription to convey the message that you can go to the supermarket

without the disappointment of it being closed.

It could also be that you’re not sure if the supermarket is open every day

until 21:00 or perhaps only on weekdays. In that case you might make the

knowledge ascription: “I don’t know if the supermarket is open.”

Knowledge ascriptions include both cases of ascribing and denying

knowledge to a subject, but in the case of a denial, we can also speak of a

knowledge denial to be more specific. For clarity, I will use ‘(making a)

knowledge ascription’ for the general cases where it can turn out to be an

ascription or a denial and ‘ascribing knowledge’ when it concerns a

positive ascription of knowledge or ‘denying knowledge’ when it concerns

a denial of knowledge.

An important element in a theory of knowledge ascription is how the

epistemic standard should be defined. The epistemic standard defines


whether the evidence is sufficient for the subject to have knowledge. A

low standard implies that relatively little evidence suffices to have

knowledge. A high standard implies that strong evidence is required to

have knowledge. I will focus on two ways of defining the epistemic

standard. One way of defining the epistemic standard is by having it vary

with the context. In that case, in some contexts we apply a low standard

and in others we apply a high standard. Contextualism adopts this

strategy. In the next chapter I will describe what this entails for the view.

The other way is to use a fixed standard that doesn’t vary with the context.

In that case, we need to define how high or low of a standard we want to

apply, regardless of the context in which we use it. Invariantism adopts

this way of defining the epistemic standard. I will discuss this in more

detail when I analyse invariantism. First I will provide a detailed

description of contextualism.

1.3 Contextualism

Keith DeRose is a prominent advocate of contextualism in its most common

understanding, so I will mainly be referring to his work. To describe

contextualism as a theory of knowledge ascription, we should start by

mentioning Peter Unger, who proposed the use of the terms

‘contextualism’ and ‘invariantism’. DeRose adopts Unger’s terminology

when he states the following central claim for contextualism: “It’s a theory

according to which the truth conditions of sentences of the form ‘S knows

that p’ or ‘S does not know that p’ vary in certain ways according to the

context in which they are uttered” (DeRose 1992, p. 914).2

Now, the truth conditions of a knowledge-ascribing sentence depend on

the meaning of that sentence. A common way to explain this is that: “They

[meaningful sentences] are so in virtue of having constituents in the

world, which are brought together in the right way. There are many

complications about the nature of meaning, but at a minimum, this tells us

what the truth conditions associated with a proposition are.” (Glanzberg

2006, online). If we know the meaning of a sentence, a theory of knowledge

ascription can explain how the truth conditions lead to the truth-value

‘true’ or ‘false’.

To understand the meaning of a sentence of the form ‘S knows that p’, we

need to understand its parts and how they are related. In the case of

knowledge-ascribing sentences, the meaning depends on the existence of

both S and the fact stated in p, and on how ‘know’ establishes the relation

between S and the fact stated in p. We can define the existence of S and p,

by their constituents in the world. To define the right way in which S

2 DeRose calls sentences of the form ‘S knows that p’ or ‘S does not know that p’

‘knowledge attributions’, which is the same as ‘knowledge ascriptions’. These terms can

be used interchangingly, although I prefer to use ‘knowledge ascriptions’.


needs to be related to p to have knowledge, we need to define an

epistemic standard.

According to contextualism, “the standard is determined (somehow) by

the context” (Bach 2005, p. 9). As Bach proceeds: “[...] ‘knows’ does not

express a fixed two-term relation. It expresses either a contextually

variable two-term relation or a fixed three-term relation whose third

term, the operative standard, varies with context. And, as the

contextualist stresses, ‘there is no context independent correct standard’

(Cohen 1999: 59)” (Bach 2005, p. 9). The epistemic standard defines if a

knowledge ascription is true or false: there’s nothing in between. A

justification comes in degrees, but this is not the case for knowledge. To

define if a justification is good enough to provide us with knowledge, we

set an epistemic standard that demarcates the shift between knowledge

or not.

The epistemic standard has an important role in connecting the meaning of

a knowledge ascription to the context in which it is made. What

contextualism therefore entails is that the meaning of ‘S knows that p’ can

vary according to changes in the context. All other things being equal, the

same knowledge-ascribing sentence can be true in one context and false in

another context. This can only be correct, because ‘know’ means

something different in these contexts. In one case it refers to knowledge

defined by a low epistemic standard. In the other case it refers to

knowledge defined by a high epistemic standard. Therefore, when we

describe two cases in which the same subject has the same evidence and

the same true belief, the contextualist can claim that the evidence might

be sufficient for knowledge in one case, but not in the other.

1.3.1 DeRose’s Bank Cases

DeRose constructs two cases at the beginning of his influential article

‘Contextualism and Knowledge Attributions’ (1992) to explain and defend

contextualism. I will introduce his Bank Cases here in a slightly different

form to emphasize the important elements. The point of these two cases is

to show that only a difference in context changes the truth-value of the

knowledge ascription. The description will help us understand which

contextual factors make the difference for the change in knowledge

ascription.

In Bank Case Low, DeRose is driving home with his wife on a Friday

afternoon and they plan to stop at the bank to deposit their paychecks (as

people did in the nineties). They notice that the lines inside are very long

and since, in this case, it’s not especially important to deposit the

paychecks as soon as possible, DeRose suggests to his wife to go home and

deposit them on Saturday morning. His wife says: “Maybe the bank won’t


be open tomorrow. Lots of banks are closed on Saturdays.” DeRose

replies: “No, I know it will be open. I was just there two weeks ago on

Saturday. It’s open until noon.” (DeRose 1992, p. 913)

In Bank Case High, DeRose and his wife are in the same situation, but there

are two important differences. For one thing, the stakes are high. They

have just written a very large and important check that needs to be paid.

If their paychecks are not deposited into their account before Monday

morning, the important check will bounce, leaving them in a very (as

DeRose also emphasizes) bad situation. If the bank is closed on Saturday,

they cannot deposit their checks in time, because the bank is not open on

Sunday. So one difference with Bank Case Low is that it’s very important

that DeRose is right in claiming that the bank will be open on Saturday.

Another difference is that DeRose’s wife reminds him of these facts and

mentions a relevant alternative: “Banks do change their hours. Do you

know the bank will be open tomorrow?” DeRose remains as confident as he

was before, which I will interpret as that he still has the belief that the

bank will be open, but then replies: “Well, no. I’d better go in and make

sure.” (DeRose 1992, p. 913)

DeRose provides us with the additional information that p is true (the

bank will be open on Saturday) and there is nothing unusual about the

cases that has been left out.

According to DeRose, In Bank Case Low we intuitively would ascribe

knowledge to S, whereas in Bank Case High we intuitively would deny that

S knows. Contextualism can explain that these intuitions are right,3

because ‘S knows that p’ means something different in both cases. In Bank

Case Low, it is correct to say that S knows that the bank will be open on

Saturday, because we would apply a low epistemic standard. His

evidence, that the bank was open when he was just there two weeks ago,

is sufficient for knowledge. In Bank Case High it is false to say that S knows

that the bank will be open on Saturday, because we apply a high epistemic

standard. The same evidence (that he was just there two weeks ago) is not

sufficient in this case.

DeRose adds to say: “Yet I seem to be in no better position to know in Case

A [Bank Case Low] than in Case B [Bank Case High]. It’s quite natural to say

that (3) If I know that the bank will be open on Saturday in Case A, then I

also know that it will be in Case B” (DeRose 1992, p. 914). DeRose adds a

third intuition here, that seems to be incompatible with the first two. This

is not the case though, because in the third intuition he uses ‘know’ two

3 Questions have been raised about these intuitions. In experimental philosophy it has

been claimed that people actually do not have these intuitions (see e.g. DeRose, K.

(2011), ‘Contextualism, contrastivism, and X-Phi surveys’ in Philos Stud 156, p. 81 - 110).

In this paper, we’ll grant the contextualist that we do have these intuitions.


times with the same low epistemic standard. ‘Know’ means the same here

as in the first intuition, but not the same as in the second intuition.

These three intuitions are not compatible with another claim that looks

quite similar to the third intuition: “(4) If what I say in Case A in claiming to

know that the bank will be open on Saturday is true, then what I say in

Case B in conceding that I don’t know that the bank will be open on

Saturday is false” (DeRose 1992, p. 914). The contextualist can deny that

this fourth claim is correct, because ‘know’ has different meaning from

when it’s being used in Bank Case Low in claiming to know than when it’s

being used in Bank Case High in claiming not to know. The subject is in the

same epistemic position to know in Bank Case Low and Bank Case High, but

the ascriber applies a different epistemic standard when he claims that

the subject knows or not. We will come back to these intuitions in the

second chapter.

We should distinguish between two contextual elements that influence

the epistemic standard. The first element is a difference in stakes. In Bank

Case High the stakes are high. It’s very important for DeRose and his wife

to deposit their paychecks in time. If DeRose is right in claiming that the

bank will be open on Saturday, it’s no problem to go home and deposit the

paychecks on Saturday, but if he’s not, they are in serious trouble. Since it

is so important, we ascribe knowledge according to a high standard. In

Bank Case Low it would not be so problematic if DeRose was wrong in

claiming that he knows, so the stakes are low. We ascribe knowledge in a

low stake situation according to a low epistemic standard. According to

the contextualist, a difference in stakes influences the epistemic standard

we apply in making a knowledge ascription.

The second contextual difference is that his wife mentions the possibility

that the bank changed its hours since the last time DeRose was at the bank

two weeks ago. This implies the alternative to p that the bank will not be

open on Saturday. When DeRose makes his knowledge ascription, he is in

the same epistemic position to know that p as in Bank Case Low; his

evidence doesn’t change and he has a true belief. Even though, he cannot

just disregard the alternative as irrelevant for his knowledge ascription.

DeRose: “Since my wife raised the possibility of the bank changing its

hours in Case B [Bank Case High], I have that possibility in mind when I

utter my sentence.” (DeRose 1992, p. 915). This means that DeRose perhaps

has to be able to rule out the alternative. I say ‘perhaps’, because it may

be that he can’t rule it out with his current evidence and information. But

even if he can’t rule out the alternative to p, his evidence in favour of p

may be good enough to ascribe knowledge that p.

Contextualism entails that the alternative becomes relevant in Bank Case

High, merely because it's mentioned. Relevance is not defined by the


likelihood of the alternative. In Bank Case Low the alternative is not

mentioned and therefore does not change the epistemic standard. In Bank

Case High, since it’s on the mind of the ascriber, the epistemic standard is

raised, even when it’s a far-fetched alternative.

1.3.2 Ascriber’s context

The contextualist distinguishes between a low context in which there are

low stakes and no mentioned alternatives and a high context in which

there are high stakes and mentioned alternatives (or at least one). The

contextualist refers to the context as the context in which the knowledge

ascription is being made, so this is the ascriber’s context. It is very

important to understand that the contextualist refers to the ascriber’s

context and not to the subject’s context. This may sound confusing at first,

because the subject is in a high stake situation and the alternative is

mentioned to the subject. What makes it even more confusing, is that the

Bank Cases are first-person cases: the subject is self-ascribing knowledge,

so DeRose is subject and ascriber at the same time.

How to understand the relation between the subject and the ascriber

when it comes to the context of a knowledge ascription? We need to make

a distinction between ascriber factors and subject factors in the ascriber’s

context. The ascriber factors determine the epistemic standard that the

ascriber sets for what counts as knowledge, or in DeRose’s words: “They

affect how good an epistemic position the putative knower must be in to count

as knowing” (DeRose 1992, p. 921. Italics in the original). The subject

factors determine whether or not the subject is able to live up to this

standard, or: “They affect how good an epistemic position the putative

knower actually is in” (DeRose 1992, p. 922. Italics in the original).

If we first look at the mentioning of relevant alternatives, we can see that

this is an ascriber factor, because it affects the standard the ascriber sets

for the subject to live up to. If a relevant alternative is mentioned, this

will raise the bar for what the ascriber can count as knowledge. In such a

case, the subject’s evidence needs to be better, to live up to the standard

for a knowledge ascription. We should understand this as follows. Before

the alternative was mentioned, the question was if S knows that the bank

will be open on Saturday, because many banks are closed on Saturdays. S has

a valid reply: “This bank is not closed on Saturdays, because I was there

two weeks ago”. After the alternative is mentioned, the standard has been

changed and the question is if S knows that the bank will be open on

Saturday, because banks do change their hours. S does not have a valid reply

to the addition, because he doesn’t know if this bank changed its hours

since two weeks ago.

The mentioning of relevant alternatives is not a subject factor, because it


does not affect whether the subject is able to live up to the standard that

is set by the ascriber. Say that DeRose, as the subject, is aware that banks

do change their hours, because his wife mentioned it to him. If the ascriber

doesn’t know that this relevant alternative has been mentioned, the

question still is if S knows that the bank will be open on Saturday, because

many banks are closed on Saturdays. The alternative may be relevant for

the subject, but is not relevant in relation to the knowledge ascription.

The subject will still live up to the standard set by the ascriber, because

the ascriber demands a justification that the subject can live up to.

Remember that it’s not important if the subject is able to self-ascribe

knowledge. Even when a subject doesn’t claim to know, the ascriber can

ascribe knowledge to him. Note also that we are talking about a subject

factor in the ascriber’s context and not in the subject’s context. The

question is if the ascriber is aware of an alternative that has been

mentioned.

Now let’s see if the difference in stakes is an ascriber and/or subject

factor. An important observation should be that, at this point, we are only

talking about the stakes for the subject. We’re not yet discussing the

stakes for the ascriber that may have an affect on the knowledge

ascription. We will come back to this in chapter 3.

According to the contextualist, a difference in stakes is an ascriber factor,

because it affects the standard that the ascriber sets for what counts as

knowledge. When S is in a high stake situation, we apply a more demanding

notion of ‘know’ than when S is in a low stake situation. We do this, because

it’s more important to be correct. The better the evidence, the more

certain we can be that someone knows. In a high stake situation we need to

be absolutely certain, so we only say that someone knows if the evidence

is really good. High stakes raises the epistemic standard.

Finally, the stakes for S are not a subject factor, since it doesn’t say

anything about how good of an epistemic position the subject is in. If S is in

a high stake situation, this doesn’t mean that he is in a better or worse

position to know that p, than when he is in a low stake situation. His

epistemic position remains the same, while the epistemic standard

changes.

An important conclusion then is that both relevant alternatives and stakes

for S are ascriber factors and not subject factors in the ascriber’s context.

The subject factors are those that answer the question if S knows that p,

so it is up to a theory of knowledge to define what the subject factors are.

If we hold on to JTB, then these conditions are (at least) whether the

subject believes that p, whether p is true and whether he has a

justification for p. These are the conditions that define the epistemic

position of the subject.


1.3.3 Advantages and challenges for contextualism

We’ll conclude this part on contextualism with some advantages and

challenges for the theory. Contextualism is attractive mainly for two

reasons. For one thing, it provides a good response to skepticism. The

skeptic tries to show that we hardly know anything, if anything at all, by

bringing in a skeptical argument when someone claims to know something.

Since there always is a skeptical argument to defy the claim that we know

something, the skeptic claim that we do not know in any case. An

often-used example that has been introduced by G.E. Moore is the

ascription ‘I know that I have hands’. We clearly seem to know that we

have hands, but the common skeptical arguments against it, are that there

could be an evil demon deceiving us or that we may just be a (bodiless)

brain in a vat or that we could be living in the Matrix and a supercomputer

is controlling our minds. If we take these arguments seriously, we need to

accept that we don’t know that we have hands, which is quite absurd. The

contextualist responds that when the skeptic raises his skeptical

argument, he changes the standard for what we mean when we say n we

use ‘knowledge’. In this skeptical context that is created we know indeed

very little or next to nothing, but that doesn’t generalize to all contexts.

Usually we do know a lot, because we can easily meet the regular

standards that apply to ordinary situations. David Lewis described this

way of dealing with skepticism by referring to what he calls a ‘sotto voce

proviso’: “S knows that P iff [if and only if] S’s evidence eliminates every

possibility in which not-P - Psst! - except for those possibilities that we

are properly ignoring” (Lewis 1996, p. 694. Italics in the original). So in

most contexts we are properly ignoring skeptical arguments, simply

because they are are not being raised. Lewis jokingly uses the ‘Psst!’,

because we’re supposed to be silent about possible alternatives. The

moment we mention a sceptical argument, we lose our knowledge of p.

Another - closely related - reason why contextualism is attractive, is that

it supports our intuition that most of our everyday knowledge claims are

actually correct. A theory that would claim that most of our knowledge

ascriptions are wrong, will have a hard time explaining this and gaining

support. A theory of knowledge ascription needs to provide us with

insight in our way of ascribing knowledge. Contextualism does this by

showing that a knowledge ascription depends on context. We have seen in

the Bank Cases that contextualism is compatible with the knowledge

ascription being correct in Bank Case Low (low stakes and no mentioning

of alternatives) and with the knowledge denial being correct in Bank Case

High (high stakes and mentioning of alternatives). This fits particularly

well with our intuitions about knowledge ascriptions.

A common resistance against contextualism is that it’s hard to accept that


changes in context immediately have an effect on knowledge ascriptions.

So we can imagine a Bank Case where DeRose in the end says: “I knew that

the bank is open on Saturday just before, but now that it became so

important that it will be open, I don’t know anymore”. In this sentence he

first uses ‘knew’ according to a low standard and later ‘know’ according to

a high standard. Can what we mean when we use ‘know’ vary so easily from

one moment to the other? As the critic may reply, a more reasonable

response for DeRose would be to say that he actually didn’t know that p

just before, but that response is not compatible with contextualism.

Another objection against contextualism is that it seems odd from a

subject’s point of view that the ascriber’s context has anything to do with a

claim about what the subject knows. Imagine a case where S knows that p

and self-ascribes knowledge, but another ascriber is aware of a relevant

alternative that has been mentioned to him and therefore claims that S

doesn’t know that p. According to contextualism, both the subject and the

other ascriber are right in their knowledge ascription. The subject will

find it difficult to accept though that someone else is right in denying that

he knows something that he correctly claims to know himself. There is a

tension between two contexts, when they apply to the same subject in the

same situation.

1.4 Invariantism

By now we have a good overview of DeRose’s contextualism. Although

there are some differences in contextualist views, we can take DeRose’s

version as a mainstream standard. Invariantism, on the other hand, is a

view that we will need to flesh out in more detail. In broad lines,

invariantism is the epistemic view that claims that the truth-value of a

knowledge ascription does not vary with the ascriber’s context. Unlike the

contextualist, the invariantist applies a fixed epistemic standard that

cannot change according to the ascriber’s context. This means that

‘knowledge’ and ‘know’ have a fixed meaning.

Stephen Jacobson (2010) explains this by comparing ‘know’ to natural

terms like ‘gold’, ‘water’ or ‘aluminium’. There is a strict meaning for these

terms: they refer to their natural constituent in the world. Nonetheless,

people use these terms more or less loosely across contexts. But this

doesn’t mean that the meaning of these terms also varies across contexts.

For example, we can use the term ‘water’ in more or less precise ways.

When we use murky rainwater to water the plants we can refer to it as

‘water’. When we ask for a glass of water to drink, the rainwater doesn’t

qualify. We are more demanding when it comes to the water we drink; in

many countries even tap water is unacceptable for that purpose. Even

more, when water is being used in a laboratory under extremely tight

tolerances, it needs to be pure H2O. Officially, ‘water’ refers to its


chemical constitution H2O, but when we speak of ‘water’, we rarely mean

pure H2O.

Usually when we speak of ‘water’, it is clear how tolerant we are with

what we mean. The context defines the use of a term. In a garden, it is clear

that we mean rainwater and at home it is clear that we mean tap water. It’s

even clear that you get served bottled water and not tap water, when you

ask for water in a restaurant. The use of the term is variable across

contexts, but the meaning of the term is fixed. The invariantist claims that

this is the same for ‘knowledge’ or ‘know’. The meaning is fixed by one

epistemic standard that applies to any context. So when we make a

knowledge ascription, the truth-value depends on the subject’s epistemic

position and the epistemic standard. Say that a subject forms a belief

based on his evidence and the belief is true, then the epistemic standard

will define if the evidence suffices for knowledge and if it’s correct to

ascribe knowledge or to deny knowledge to the subject.

Invariantism is divided over two main issues that I will discuss more

extensively in the remainder of this part of the chapter. The first

disagreement is about the definition of the epistemic standard. This result

in the divide between skeptical invariantism and moderate invariantism.

The second disagreement is about how strict the invariantist should be in

claiming that the context has no influence on the truth-value of a

knowledge ascription. This results in the divide between classic

invariantism and subject-sensitive invariantism. I will discuss these

differences, so that we eventually clearly understand what classic

moderate invariantism entails and why I choose to defend this view.

1.4.1 Moderate and skeptical invariantism

One aspect that divides different versions of invariantism is the question

how moderate or skeptical we need to be in ascribing knowledge. This

depends on how the fixed epistemic standard is defined. We can explain

this by using DeRose’s Bank Cases as an example. Remember that the

contextualist says that a knowledge ascription is correct in the low

context and a knowledge denial is correct in the high context, because we

apply a different epistemic standard. The invariantist, on the other hand,

has two options. Either a knowledge ascription is correct in both cases or

a knowledge denial is correct in both cases. Since the subject’s epistemic

position is the same in both cases, it is not possible for the invariantist to

make a shift from ascription to denial or vice versa between the cases. The

fixed epistemic standard defines whether we should ascribe or deny

knowledge to the subject.

Skeptical invariantism entails that we need to apply a high epistemic

standard when we speak of knowledge. In the Bank Cases, according to a


high epistemic standard, we should deny that the subject knows that the

bank will be open on Saturday. His evidence is not sufficient, because he

can’t rule out the alternative that the bank would be closed on Saturday.

The subject doesn’t know if the bank changed its hours since two weeks

ago. It is not likely that the bank did, but since we’re applying a high

epistemic standard, the alternative is sufficiently relevant. Notice that the

alternative is relevant in both Bank Case Low and High, even though it is

not mentioned in Bank Case Low. According to invariantism, if a relevant

alternative exists, it needs to be taken into account, whether it’s

mentioned or not.

Moderate invariantism entails that we need to apply a low epistemic

standard when we speak of knowledge. According to a low epistemic

standard, the evidence is good enough to ascribe knowledge to the

subject in the Bank Cases. This means that the alternative to p that the

bank could be closed on Saturday, is not relevant for the moderate

invariantist. It is so unlikely that the bank changed its opening hours since

two weeks ago, that we can properly ignore the alternative and claim that

S knows that p. Of course this knowledge ascription is only true, because

the subject also believes that p and p is true. The fact that the alternative

is mentioned in Bank Case High, doesn’t make it relevant. In both cases it

can be properly ignored.

Jennifer Nagel and Kent Bach, who will have a prominent role in the last

chapter, are both moderate invariantists. As Bach admits, their position

leaves open how to define a ‘meetably low’ epistemic standard. He4

writes: “[...] I will assume that much of what passes for knowledge really

is, including perceptual knowledge, such as that you are sitting and that

there are lines of print in front of you, and knowledge about simple facts,

e.g. that California is a state and that chickens lay eggs” (Bach 2005, p. 25).

These are quite obvious cases of knowledge that the skeptical invariantist

also might agree on. The Bank Cases are therefore a better example to

show the difference between skeptical and moderate invariantism. The

moderate invariantist does ascribe knowledge to S in both Bank Cases,

whereas the skeptical invariantist denies that S knows in both Bank Cases.

For the purpose of this paper, I will not be more specific about the

difference in epistemic standard between skeptical and moderate

invariantism. Moderate invariantism just accepts a more loose justification

for knowledge, whereas skeptical invariantism is more strict about the

justification. I will leave open how loose or strict a justification needs to

be according to these views.

I will follow Nagel and Bach in adopting a moderate invariantist’s view.

One reason for this, is that in everyday situations people quite easily claim

4 Bach cites DeRose who defined moderate invariantism as a theory that keeps the

epistemic standard ‘meetably low’ (Bach 2005, p. 25).


to know things. Everyday knowledge ascriptions are more common than

knowledge ascriptions in situations with special concerns and I believe

that we shouldn’t claim that most of our knowledge ascriptions are

actually false. When we try to explain our use of knowledge ascriptions,

first and foremost, we need to look at the knowledge ascriptions that we

actually make and provide a good explanation for them. My second reason

for adopting moderate invariantism is that it has the burden of explaining

why our intuitions about knowledge ascriptions in situations with high

stakes are wrong. I believe we can explain this particularly well by

looking at the process of belief formation that is involved. We will get to

this in my treatment of the stake intuitions in chapter 3.

1.4.2 Classic and subject-sensitive invariantism

The second distinction we can make is between classic invariantism and

subject-sensitive invariantism (SSI). Classic invariantism is most radical in

that the context has no influence on the truth-value of a knowledge

ascription. SSI accepts that contextual factors do have an influence, but

only the subject’s context and not the ascriber’s context. Classic

invariantism rejects this idea and is therefore most radically opposed to

contextualism. It may be helpful to visualize schematically the difference

between classic invariantism and contextualism :5

Figure 1.1

Figure 1.1 shows that the ascriber makes a knowledge ascription based on

the truth of the proposition, the justification that follows from the

5 SSI will not be displayed in the scheme, because my focus is on contextualism and

classic invariantism. A brief description of SSI will follow shortly.


evidence, the subject’s believe that p and an epistemic standard. The

contextualist claims that the truth-value of the knowledge ascription

depends on a standard that follows from the context. The classic

invariantist claims that the standard follows from the theory he supports.

He either supports skeptical invariantism and applies a high standard or

moderate invariantism and applies a low standard. Anyway, the context

has no influence on the standard and therefore on the truth-value of the

knowledge ascription. Jessica Brown summarizes classic invariantism as

follows: “[The theory] denies that the truth-value of attributions of

knowledge depends on whether, in either the attributor’s or the subject’s

context, the issue is important and error has been raised” (Brown 2005b,

p. 137).

The last theory we need to review is SSI . I will only mention it briefly. It6

differs from classic invariantism, because it assigns a special role for the

subject’s context. Brown explicitly notes that neither the ascriber’s

context nor the subject’s context matters. We have seen that

contextualism claims that the ascriber’s context does matter. SSI on the

other hand claims that the subject’s context has an influence on the

truth-value of a knowledge ascription. The view accepts that “knowledge

depends on a larger range of factors than is traditionally thought” (Brown

and Gerken 2012, p. 2). So it combines the invariantist’s claim that the

truth-value of knowledge ascriptions does not depend on the ascriber’s

context with the contextualist claim that it does depend on contextual

factors, albeit only the subject’s context.

1.4.3 The Airport Case

The differences in the views have important consequences for the

truth-value of knowledge ascriptions. To understand the consequences

for SSI, contextualism and classic invariantism, I’ll introduce an example

that John Hawthorne (2003) uses to support SSI. He describes what we

will call the ‘Airport Case’, originally introduced by Stewart Cohen (1999).

This case is particularly useful, because - unlike in the Bank Case - we

have several persons who act like the ascriber and the subject in the case.

Mary and John are at L.A. airport to take a flight to New York. They need to

know if the flight has a layover in Chicago, because they have to meet a

very important business contact there, so this is a high stake situation for

them. They overhear someone ask Smith, who is also flying to New York, if

he knows whether the flight stops in Chicago. Smith looks at his flight

itinerary and responds: “Yes I know, the flight stops in Chicago”. This is a

self-ascription of knowledge. Mary and John discuss the situation. Since

the stakes are high for Mary and John, Mary raises the alternative that the

6 SSI has also been referred to as interest-relative invariantism (IRI) or sensitive

moderate invariantism, but we’ll only use the term ‘SSI’.


itinerary may not be trustworthy: it may contain a misprint or the

schedule could have been changed. Mary and John then agree that Smith

does not know that the plane will stop in Chicago and they decide to check

further. So Smith self-ascribes knowledge that the flight stops in Chicago,

but Mary and John deny that he knows this. (Cohen 1999, p. 58).

We can distinguish three knowledge ascriptions:

1) Smith self-ascribing knowledge that p,

2) Mary and John denying that Smith knows that p and

3) Mary and John implicitly denying that they themselves know that p.

I will for our present purposes assume that all these knowledge

ascriptions intuitively are correct. We can evaluate for the three theories

of knowledge ascription how they judge the truth-value of the knowledge

ascriptions that are being made.

Contextualism is compatible with all knowledge ascriptions and therefore

our intuitions about knowledge ascriptions. It can accommodate the

difference in these three knowledge ascriptions by explaining that the

different contexts in which these ascriptions have been made ask for

different epistemic standards to be applied. Mary and John apply a high

standard for what ‘know’ means, because of the high stakes and the

mentioned alternative in the ascriber’s context. Smith applies a low

standard for what ‘know’ means, since there are no high stakes or

mentioned alternative involved in his context (as an ascriber). According

to contextualism, they are both right in their own contexts.

SSI entails that only the subject’s context can influence the truth-value of

a knowledge ascription, so concerning 1): Smith (as ascriber) rightly

asserts that he (as the subject) knows, since he (as the subject) is in a low

stake context. Concerning 3), Mary and John correctly deny knowledge to

themselves, because they (as subjects) are in a high stake context. Finally,

concerning 2), Mary and John should ascribe knowledge to Smith (as the

subject), who is in a low stake context, but they incorrectly deny that

Smith knows. SSI entails therefore that one of our intuitions is false.

Invariantism claims that context has no influence on the truth of the7

knowledge ascription and that the standard needs to be meetably low, so

Smith’s knowledge ascription is correct and Mary and John should ascribe

knowledge to Smith and themselves, so their denial in both 2) and 3) is

incorrect. So the invariantist claims that in the latter two cases our

intuitions are false.

Our intuitions are quite important when we value a theory of knowledge

ascription. Contextualism is fully compatible with the intuitive knowledge

7 From now on, I will simply use ‘invariantism’ for what fully entails the position ‘classic

moderate invariantism’.


ascriptions and denials that follow from the Airport Case. SSI is

compatible with two of them and invariantism is compatible with only one.

Contextualism seems to have an advantage in accommodating intuitions, so

in our defence of invariantism we need to show that this is not an

advantage and therefore doesn’t exclude invariantism as a good candidate

for a theory of knowledge ascription. In the next chapter we will have a

closer look at the intuitions that are involved in making knowledge

ascriptions and how to deal with them.

Chapter 2: Intuitions, knowledge ascriptions and stakes

Contextualism can accommodate the knowledge ascriptions that we

intuitively would say are correct to make in the Bank Cases and the

Airport Case. There are other relevant intuitions though and there is more

to say about them. To properly assess the treatment of the intuitions by

the invariantist, we need to specify the relevant intuitions and be clear

about what it means to accommodate and/or explain them. Our focus will

be on the difference in intuitions that arise from situations with low

stakes as compared to high stakes.

DeRose is quite explicit about the intuitions that concern his Bank Cases

and that support his contextualist view. Therefore, I will take these

intuitions as a starting point. If invariantism has a good treatment of these

intuitions, the contextualist treatment can not be considered an advantage

for the theory. In this chapter I will have a closer look at the intuitions

from DeRose’s Bank Cases. Since these intuitions only apply to that

particular case, I will show that they can be generalized to apply to other

cases with changing stakes. First, I will say more about how intuitions are

used in philosophy and how they should be used.

2.1 Using intuitions in philosophy

Spicer (2006) distinguishes three senses in which we can use the concept

‘intuition’. In the first sense, if we have the intuition that p (where p is for

example one of the four intuitions that we are assessing), it means that we

are “disposed to endorse, affirm or assert [p] in that situation; the second

way is by our being disposed to think that [p] would be a natural thing for

a subject to endorse or assert in that situation; a third way would be by8

our thinking that a subject is correct to endorse or assert [p] in that

situation”. (Spicer 2006, p. 373. Italics in the original.) So the latter two

senses entail that we would expect from other people that they share our

intuition. It’s not just something that we merely endorse ourselves (as in

the first sense), but something we assume others naturally (second

sense) or correctly (third sense) endorse as well.

8 Note that with ‘subject’, Spicer refers to any subject, not - as we have been doing in this

paper - in particular to a subject that features in a knowledge ascription.


Neither DeRose (1992) nor Nagel (2008) are very explicit about their use

of intuitions. They don’t mention literally that they appeal to the reader’s

intuitions, they hardly use the term ‘intuition’ and whereas DeRose at

least explicitly mentions and numbers them, Nagel does not flesh out the

separate intuitions in any detail. Nonetheless, we can get an idea of their

use of intuitions. First and foremost they appeal to intuitions in the first

sense, because they invite the reader to form their own intuitions about

the Bank Case. DeRose seems to be most clear in using intuitions in the

first sense: the reader is disposed to endorse or affirm the claims about

knowledge ascriptions that he makes. With the reader on his side, the

attraction of contextualism is immediately clear. Nagel is not merely

appealing to the reader’s intuition, but also affirms that other people have

these intuitions (at least most contemporary epistemologists). Since she

refers to the claims about the knowledge ascriptions as ‘natural

inclinations’, it seems that she commits to the second sense of ‘intuition’. In

this paper, we will also adopt ‘intuition’ in the second sense. We assume

that people have the proposed intuitions and that it’s a natural thing to

endorse them. We are also aware though, that our intuitions may be false,

so it is not always correct to endorse our intuitions about knowledge

ascriptions.

2.1.1 Accommodation and explanation of intuitions

A theory of knowledge ascription can accommodate intuitions, explain why

we have intuitions and why an intuition is (in)correct. It may seem that

accommodating intuitions is always preferable to not being able to

accommodate intuitions, even when a theory is able to explain why

particular intuitions are wrong. When a theory of knowledge ascription

can accommodate our intuitions, we don’t need to change our pretheoretic

views. The theory will immediately make sense, because it is in

accordance with the intuitions we already developed. A theory that

disregards our intuitions as incorrect demands that we revise our

pretheoretical framework, which is something we are hesitant to do. We

have to be careful though, not to rely on accommodating intuitions too

easily. Our intuitions are not always correct, so a theory cannot be

justified simply because it accommodates our intuitions. As Spicer (2006)

remarks: “It is usually counted as a point in favour of a theory that it

accommodates our pretheoretic intuitions [...]. It is also usually thought

that a theory has a burden to explain just those intuitions that it fails to

accommodate. It is not clear, though, that either common thought is true.

Both thoughts become less plausible in a case where we have reason to

suspect that the method by which our pretheoretic intuitive judgements

are made is not truth-conducive” (Spicer 2006, p. 371). So although it

speaks in favour of a theory if it does accommodate our intuitions, this

only is an advantage if the intuitions follow from a reliable,


truth-conducive cognitive process.

Nagel (2007) compares intuitions with visual perception. We do not

actively have to use cognitive effort to produce intuitions, in the same way

that visual perception appears to us with a certain immediacy. Intuitions

are established by a subconscious process. We experience things and

learn to see patterns that we can apply to new experiences without

consciously processing them. ”The [intuitive] judgments flow

spontaneously from the situations that engender them, rather than from

any process of explicit reasoning.” (Gopnik and Schwitzgebel 1998, p. 77.)

We cannot explain our intuitive judgements, because we can’t observe the

cognitive process that leads to them. Comparably, we can’t explain why

we see things; we simply see them. But what we see is not always correct.

A perceptual observation can be in conflict with empirical theory.

Likewise, our intuitions can be in conflict with our theory of knowledge

ascription.

Good examples of our perception being incorrect are optical illusions like

the Müller-Lyer illusion and the Ebbinghaus Illusion (see figures 2.1 and

2.2). In the Müller-Lyer illusion, we see the lines as having a different size,

although they are of the same size. In the Ebbinghaus illusion one circle

seems smaller than the other, but both circles are equal in size. Even

though we know that this is the case, we keep perceiving the two identical

objects as of a different size. Nonetheless, in general we still trust our

perception. The point is similar for intuitions. We can use our intuitions as

a guidance, but we can’t rely on them without a proper explanation. Nagel

confirms: “Many epistemologists take epistemic intuitions to yield prima

facie rather than conclusive evidence about the nature of knowledge or

justification, subject to correction in the light of a systematic theory, or

perhaps subject to outright rejection in cases where there is something

problematic about the conditions in which the relevant intuitions have

arisen.” (Nagel 2007, p. 794. Italics in the original.)

Figure 2.1: Müller-Lyer illussion Figure 2.2: Ebbinghaus illusion

A common way of using intuitions in philosophy is as a source for forming a


working hypothesis. We shape theories by testing our intuitions,

investigating where they come from and see if they prove to be correct.

Theories of knowledge ascription have in this respect a disadvantage in

comparison to theories about perceptual experience. In the latter case we

can easily gather independent evidence of the facts. In the case of the

illusions, we can measure the lines and the circles to find out what is

correct and then propose a theory that explains why our perception is

wrong. In the case of our epistemic intuitions we can ‘measure’ our

intuitions against a theory of knowledge ascription, but the theory

provides no objective evidence. That is, when two theories disagree on

whether an intuition is correct or not, we have no objective evidence of

what theory provides us with the right answer. Bottom line, a theory of

knowledge ascription may accommodate intuitions or not, but anyway has

to explain why we have the intuitions and why they are correct or not.

2.2 The four stake intuitions

It needs to be clear what intuitions we’re working with. DeRose mentions

the following intuitions that concern his Bank Cases:

1) “[W]hen I claim to know that the bank will be open on Saturday in

Case A [Low], I am saying something true.”

2) “I am saying something true in Case B [High] when I concede that I

don’t know that the bank will be open on Saturday.”

3) “If I know that the bank will be open on Saturday in Case A [Low],

then I also know that it will be in Case B [High].”

4) “If what I say in case A [Low] in claiming to know that the bank will be

open on Saturday is true, then what I say in Case B [High] in conceding

that I don’t know that the bank will be open on Saturday is false.”

(DeRose 1992, p. 914)

The description of DeRose’s Bank Cases and the intuitions that follow from

them have some characteristics that makes them very suitable to explain

contextualism, but they can be quite confusing. First of all, as mentioned

before, DeRose features as the subject and the ascriber of knowledge,

which can make it difficult to understand what role he is referring to. He

also introduces both stakes and the mentioning of alternatives as

contextual factors, whereas I want to focus merely on a difference in

stakes. Finally, he emphasizes that the subject in Bank Case High still

believes that p (‘remaining as confident as he was before’), whereas it may

be more realistic to leave open if he still believes that p. Bach (2005)

agrees on the last point by mentioning: “It seems to me that unless he’s

trying to placate his wife, his belief would have to be shaken at least

somewhat” (Bach 2005, p. 26).

Nagel (2008) rewrote the Bank Cases to the following version that suits

the purpose of this paper better, since I focus on invariantism, a


difference in stakes and on the process of belief formation:

“It’s late on a Friday afternoon, and raining hard. Lo and her next-door neighbour

Hi are thinking about going to the bank, but wondering whether the trip could be

postponed until tomorrow. Both of them can remember a recent Saturday visit to

the bank, but neither of them has any further information relevant to the question

of whether the bank will be open tomorrow. Nothing much is at stake for Lo - her

bank errand could be done any time in the next week - but for Hi the question has

burning practical importance. Hi knows he must deposit his paycheck before

Monday, or he will default on his mortgage and lose his home. Does Lo know that

the bank is open tomorrow? Does Hi?

If you are like most contemporary epistemologists, you find it easier to ascribe

knowledge that the bank will be open on Saturday to Lo than to Hi, despite the

fact that the two subjects are relying on the same information in trying to settle

that question.” (Nagel 2008, p. 279.)

In this case description, the subject has the same evidence as in DeRose’s

Bank Cases and p is also true, but Nagel deliberately leaves out any

information about the subject’s belief. By leaving open if Lo and Hi believe

that p or not, we are able to explore the possibility that they didn’t (yet)

form a belief or a false belief. Concerning the contextual elements, there’s

only a difference in stakes and no mentioning of alternatives. Additionally,

we gain clarity by the distinction between the ascriber and the subject,

because the ascriber is not the same person as the subject, but the reader

of the case.

We assume that Nagel is right (following the intuitions from DeRose’s

Bank Cases) and the reader/ascriber - like most contemporary

epistemologist - indeed finds it easier to ascribe knowledge to Lo than to

Hi. So we can formulate a definition of the intuitions that follow from

Nagel’s Bank Case based on DeRose’s intuitions:

1) An ascription of knowledge to Lo is correct.

2) A denial of knowledge to Hi is correct.

3) If Lo knows that p, then Hi also knows that p.

4) If it’s correct to ascribe knowledge to Lo, then it must be false to

deny knowledge to Hi.

It needs to be noted that the first two intuitions are pretheoretic

intuitions. This means that they are shaped without any exposure to the

framework of a theory of knowledge. Any person can have these intuitions,

because everybody has an idea of what it means to know something. The

last two intuitions are not pretheoretic, because they assume some

understanding of a theory of knowledge. They entail that we understand

that, to our best information, Lo and Hi are in the same epistemic position

to know that p. The average person that is not trained in epistemology will

not have very established intuitions concerning the last two.

Contextualism relies most on the pretheoretic intuitions, but for


completeness I will assess all four stake intuitions.

2.1.1 Generalizing Nagel’s Bank Case intuitions

Before we start analysing the stake intuitions, I will show that they can be

generalized. This is important, because I want to show that the

invariantist’s treatment does not only apply to the Bank Cases, but in

general to cases with a difference in stakes. I will show that this is the

case, by comparing them to the intuitions that Finn Spicer (2006) mentions

in his article ‘Epistemic Intuitions and Epistemic Contextualism’.

First of all, Spicer says: “Let O be some ordinary proposition about the

external world that is obvious to normal subjects and which typically we

take ourselves to know (such as the proposition that one has hands), and

let H be a proposition detailing a sceptical hypothesis, one that we

typically take ourselves not to know not to obtain (such as the proposition

that one is a handless brain in a vat being stimulated to have handish

experiences)” (Spicer 2006, p. 367. Italics in the original). Then, he

mentions the following claims about knowledge ascriptions we intuitively

would make:

1) S knows that O

2) S does not know that not-H

And later he adds the following two additional more general intuitions,

where p is any proposition:

3) “If A and B [two subjects] possess the same evidence for p, then A

knows that p if and only if B knows that p. [...]

4) If A [one ascriber] says ‘S knows that p’ and B [another ascriber] says ‘S

does not know that p’, then A contradicts B” (Spicer 2006, p. 372. Italics

removed).

The first intuition concerns a low stake situation for the subject: O is a

proposition that we typically take ourselves to know. Typically, we are in

situations with low stakes. This intuition therefore means that we would

ascribe knowledge to a low stake subject, and that is a general version of

intuition 1) from Nagel’s Bank Case. To compare Spicer’s second intuition

with intuition 2) from Nagel’s Bank Case, we need to understand that, if we

can’t ascribe to S that he knows that not-H, neither can we ascribe to S that

he knows that O, because H is an alternative to O. To put it differently:

Spicer’s description of the third intuition entails that we should claim that

S does not know that he has hands (O), because we can’t exclude the

possibility that he is a handless brain in a vat (H). Since this alternative has

been mentioned, we’re in a high context. So the intuition means that in a

high context a denial of knowledge to S is correct, like Nagel’s second

intuition. Spicer’s descriptions of the third and fourth intuitions are

simply generalized versions of the last two intuitions from Nagel’s Bank

Case, so we can conclude that the four intuitions do not just apply to


particular cases, but are general intuitions about knowledge ascriptions

in situations with different stakes.

2.2.2 A contextualist treatment of intuitions

Before we move to an invariantist treatment of the stake intuitions, we

will develop a rough understanding of how contextualism accommodates

and explains them based on the theory as explained in chapter 1.

Contextualism accommodates the first three intuitions:

1) An ascription of knowledge to Lo is correct.

2) A denial of knowledge to Hi is correct.

3) If Lo knows that p, then Hi also knows that p.

It can accommodate them, because of the core principle that the

truth-value of a knowledge ascription varies with the ascriber’s context.

Both subjects Lo and Hi are in the same epistemic position to know, but

the context is different. In Lo’s case, there’s a low stake context which

makes us intuitively ascribe knowledge and in Hi’s case there is a high

stake context, which makes us intuitively deny knowledge. The

contextualist’s explanation for this difference in knowledge ascription is

that the ascriber means something different with ‘know’ in each case. The

contextualist cannot accommodate the fourth intuition:

4) Since Lo and Hi possess the same initial information, it’s a

contradiction to claim that Lo knows and Hi doesn’t know.

We see that the same explanation applies. Contextualism entails that it’s

not a contradiction to claim that Lo knows and Hi doesn’t, because we don’t

mean the same thing with ‘know’ in these two cases. Let me clarify the

difference in meaning with a notation that I borrow from Spicer (2006). We

say that Lo knowslow that the bank will be open and that Hi does not

knowhigh that the bank will be open. Although the concepts knowlow and

knowhigh are similar in many respect, they also differ in the respect that

we put the bar for what counts as knowledge higher when we use

knowhigh than in cases where we use knowslow. This is in broad terms the

main explanation for the stake intuitions that contextualism provides.

Since this is the central claim of contextualism, it looks like the theory is

developed with the purpose to accommodate the two first intuitions that

show how we intuitively ascribe knowledge in high and low stake

situations.

The invariantist does not accept the explanation and the contextualist’s

claim that ‘know’ can mean different things in different contexts.

Therefore invariantism needs to present another explanation. The last

chapter will be devoted to an extensive description of how invariantism

accommodates and explains the stake intuitions.

Chapter 3: An invariantist’s treatment of the stake intuitions


In my invariantist’s treatment of the stake intuitions, we focus on the

process of belief formation. The stake intuitions involve beliefs in two

ways. First of all, there’s the subject forming a belief about p. The subject

needs to believe that p to know that p, so this is one of the

truth-conducive factors of a knowledge ascription. It would be false to

ascribe knowledge to a subject that doesn’t believe that p. Since Nagel’s

Bank Case doesn’t say anything about the beliefs of Lo and Hi, we need to

analyse the belief formation of Lo and Hi, to understand the influence on

the truth-value of the knowledge ascriptions. I will analyse belief

formation according to the concept of ‘need for closure’, which I will

explain in the next part of this chapter. Secondly, the stake intuitions

involve the ascriber’s belief that S knows that p or that S doesn't know

that p. A particular knowledge ascription can be correct, but if the

ascriber doesn’t believe this to be the case, it would not be

conversationally appropriate to claim so. I will explain more extensively

what it means for a knowledge ascription to be conversationally

appropriate later in this chapter, when I analyse the belief formation for

the ascriber. The concept of ‘need for closure’ applies to the belief

formation for both the subject and the ascriber, so I will start with that.

3.1 Need for closure in belief formation

Nagel (2008) adopts a psychological concept called ‘need for closure’. It

proves to be a highly relevant factor when it comes to knowledge

ascriptions. The concept has been introduced by psychologist Arie

Kruglanski. ‘Closure’ refers to the moment where a subject settles on a

belief and when the formation of a belief turns into the possession of a

belief. Kruglanski and Webster (1996): “The need for cognitive closure

refers to individuals’ desire for a firm answer to a question and an

aversion toward ambiguity” (Kruglanski and Webster 1996, p. 264).

We can imagine many reasons why reaching closure is something

desirable, like the benefit of being able to act or decide in time. Imagine

that you need to catch a train and you see one on a track. You don’t know if

that’s is the train you need to catch though. If you don’t settle on your

belief fast, the train may leave before you made a decision to take it or

leave it. This example is a case of a high need for closure. A subject can

have different levels of need for closure, where a high need for closure

means that a subject wants to settle on a belief fast and a low need for

closure means that a subject does not experience pressure in forming his

belief and is willing to spend more time and effort on forming his belief.

Low need for closure arises typically in situations where it’s very

important to form a true belief. So when the stakes are high, a subject is

usually willing to spend more time and cognitive effort on forming a

belief.


There’s a general correlation between need for closure and the accuracy

of a judgement. When there’s a high need for closure, the formed belief is

normally less accurate and when there’s a low need for closure we can

expect it to be more accurate. As Nagel (2008) describes the difference:

“Kruglanski dubs the compromised thinking under elevated

need-for-closure ‘seizing and freezing’: in this condition we pounce on

information to form a belief and then become resistant to evidence

contrary to the conclusion first attained. By contrast, in low

need-for-closure we delay judgement and explore evidence more

thoroughly (and typically with greater accuracy)” (Nagel 2008, p. 289). A

greater accuracy follows from the amount of time and cognitive effort

spent on forming the belief when the need for closure is low. We can be

more sure that we collect all important evidence and value it properly.

Consequently, the accuracy drops when the need for closure is raised. It

means that we don’t take the time and cognitive effort that is necessary to

reach a correct belief. In that case, we settle on a belief before we

collected all the evidence or we process the information poorly.

When a subject initially experiences a low need for closure, there can be

several factors raising his need for closure. Some factors that Kruglanski

and Webster (1996) mention are: time pressure, peer pressure, difficulty

of forming a belief and being bored or distracted. These factors can raise

the need for closure so that eventually there’s a much lower accuracy

than the subject initially desired. Often the accuracy is even lower when

there’s a raised need for closure than when a subject experiences a

neutral or high need for closure. Imagine a subject in a high stake

situation. He will initially experience a low need for closure and spend

time and effort on collecting alternatives to p. If he wants to claim that he

knows p, he has to rule out these alternatives. If he is in a position to know

that p, he will be able to do this, but only if he takes the time and effort for

it. When his need for closure is raised, he needs to settle on a belief,

before ruling out the alternative with the consequence that he will say

that he doesn’t know that p. If he would have experienced a high need for

closure initially, he would not have been aware of the alternative and

simply settled on the belief that he does know that p.

Interestingly, when there’s a high need for closure (and therefore a lower

accuracy than when there’s a low need for closure), subjects nonetheless

tend to be more convinced that they made the correct judgement. They

will seize on early information and freeze, not taking any new information

into account. Therefore they are not aware of any possible alternatives,

which makes their judgement the only available plausible answer, making

them feel very assured that it must be correct.

I will apply the concept of need for closure to the belief formation that is

involved in a knowledge ascription. This way, I will be able to provide an


invariantist explanation for the stake intuitions and why invariantism can

accommodate them or not. I will divide my explanation in an analysis of the

belief formation for the subject and the belief formation for the ascriber,

because a knowledge ascription involves both the subject’s belief that p

and the ascriber’s belief that S knows that p. How they form their beliefs

plays a crucial role in the invariantist’s explanation of the stake intuitions.

3.2 Belief formation for the subject of a knowledge ascription

The belief formation for the subject of a knowledge ascription is highly

influenced by the experienced need for closure. This has important

consequences for the accommodation and explanation of the stake

intuitions. We can only ascribe knowledge to a subject that believes that

p, because the subject’s belief is one of the conditions for knowledge. It is

therefore important to define how the subject will form his belief, when

he settles on a belief and what the chance is that he forms a correct belief.

The first stake intuition concerns a low stake subject; an ascription of

knowledge to Lo is correct. We can expect a low stake subject to be in a

neutral or high need for closure. It’s not particularly important for her to

be correct, so she will not spend more time or cognitive effort on

evaluating alternatives. Since Lo has good evidence that the bank will be

open, in a normal situation like this, she will easily form the belief that p.

When we read Nagel’s Bank Cases carefully, we find no information on

whether Lo actually believes that p. When you’re familiar with a theory of

knowledge (like JTB), you might notice that this information is left out, but

the average reader who trusts his intuitions is not aware of this and has no

reason to doubt that S believes and knows that p. So far we can

accommodate and explain the intuition that an ascription of knowledge to

Lo is correct.

The second stake intuition entails that we would intuitively say that a

denial of knowledge to Hi is correct. This stake intuition concerns a high

stake subject. Initially a high stake subject will experience a low need for

closure. This means that he should be willing to spend more time and

cognitive effort on forming his belief than a subject in a low context. It is -

for whatever practical reason - more important for the subject to be

correct in a high stake context. In relation to this, Nagel (2008) mentions

the results from two research papers in psychology; one by Ziva Kunda,

the other by Jennifer Lerner and Philip Tetlock: “In general, high-stakes

subjects think more systematically and less heuristically, relying more on

deliberate and controlled cognition and less on first impressions and

automatic responses” (Nagel 2008, p. 281). A low need for closure results

in more accurate beliefs, but we can expect Hi to be less confident. To

form his belief, he went through ‘a state in which the assessment of

evidence has not yet solidified into belief’ (Nagel 2008, p. 286). The


assessment of evidence entails coming up with possible alternatives and,

as already mentioned, since Hi is aware of alternatives, this lowers his

confidence in the correctness of his belief.

Hi will refrain from settling on a belief for as long as possible or

necessary, which makes the timeframe in which we cannot yet ascribe

knowledge larger. So one possibility is that, as long as he doesn’t settle on

a belief, he doesn’t have knowledge, and during this process of belief

formation a denial of knowledge to Hi would be correct. In that case, the

second intuition is accommodated. Since in Nagel’s Bank Case, there is no

information about the belief formation for either Lo or Hi, we don’t know if

Hi comes to believe that p.

Another possibility is that, when Hi (with a low need for closure),

eventually settles on a belief and correctly believes that p, he also knows

that p. If that is the case, the invariantist cannot accommodate the second

intuition, because ascribing knowledge to Hi would be correct. Although,

in this case, we cannot accommodate the second intuition, we will be able

to provide an explanation why our intuitive knowledge ascription would

be incorrect, when we analyse the belief formation for the ascriber later.

High stakes only entail a higher accuracy in forming a correct belief when

the subject experiences a low need for closure. When the subject

experiences a raised need for closure - for example because of time or

peer pressure - the accuracy is lower and the chance bigger that Hi

settles on a false belief. Raised need for closure means that he desires to

settle on a belief before assessing all the evidence properly. He is already

aware of alternatives, because he started with a low need for closure in

which he used more cognitive effort to assess alternatives. Due to the

raised need for closure, he might make a wrong assessment and

overestimate the relevance of the alternative. This leads to settling on the

false belief that p is not correct. In this case the second intuition is

accommodated. When the subject doesn’t believe that p, he doesn’t have

knowledge and a denial of knowledge would be correct.

The third stake intuition entails that if Lo knows, then Hi knows as well.

This can be accommodated and explained. The invariantist would say that

this intuition is correct, because Lo and Hi are both in the same epistemic

position. Only the context is different, but that doesn’t influence their

knowledge. ‘Know’ always has a fixed meaning, so two subjects in the same

epistemic position must both have the same knowledge.

This does imply that Hi went through the process of belief formation with

a low need for closure and correctly believes that p. If Hi experiences a

raised need for closure he might settle on a false belief or, with a low

need for closure, he might not yet settle on any belief, while Lo does


believe that p. This would not be in line with the third stake intuition. If

this is the case, the invariantist will of course explain that the belief

condition for knowledge is not satisfied for Hi, whereas it is for Lo. Then,

Lo and Hi are not in the same epistemic position and in that case, Hi does

noy know that p, whereas Lo knows. This is an explanation for not

accommodating the intuition, without resorting to contextual elements.

The fourth stake intuition also entails that both Lo and Hi are in the same

epistemic position to know, but it focuses more on the ascriber’s role.

When it comes to the influence of the belief formation for the subject, it is

quite like the third intuition. If Hi (like Lo) does know that p, we should

ascribe knowledge to both subjects and the intuition is accommodated. If

something goes wrong in Hi’s belief formation and he falsely doesn’t know

that p, it would be correct to deny knowledge to Hi. We can again explain

why the intuition is not accommodated in this case, because the belief

condition for knowledge is not satisfied for Hi.

3.3 Belief formation for the ascriber of a knowledge ascription

The belief formation for the ascriber gives us insight in the knowledge

ascription that the ascriber is prepared to make. Most importantly, it

might be that a particular knowledge ascription would be correct to

make, but that the ascriber’s belief formation withholds him from doing

so. In such a case it would be incorrect, but conversationally appropriate

for the ascriber to make a false knowledge ascription. I will first explain

more extensively what it means for a knowledge ascription to be

incorrect, but conversationally appropriate. Afterwards, I will apply the

concept in the treatment of the stake intuitions.

Remember Jacobson’s (2010) comparison of ‘know’ with the term ‘water’:

depending on the context, we can speak of water in more or less loose

ways. This doesn’t mean that the meaning of the word ‘water’ changes, but

just that - for the sake of the situation and conversation - we use the word

incorrectly to convey our message. The invariantist claims that the same

applies to our conversational use of ‘know’. Brown (2005) calls this use

the term ‘know’ incorrect, but conversationally appropriate.

She explains that we can only use ‘know’ conversationally appropriate, if

we actually believe that our knowledge ascription is correct. Brown

(2005): “Of course, the conditions for an utterance to be conversationally

appropriate may include epistemic conditions. [...] DeRose claims that S is

warranted in asserting p only if S knows that p” (Brown 2005b, p. 266).

DeRose’s claim is called the ‘knowledge rule for assertion’, which is

commonly endorsed in philosophy. The belief condition is one condition

for knowledge, so the knowledge rule for assertion entails that S is only

warranted in asserting p, if S believes that p. Applied to the ascriber, this


means that the ascriber is only warranted in claiming that S knows that p,

if he believes that S knows that p. He cannot believe that S knows that p, if

he doesn’t believe that p is true, because that’s a condition for S to know

that p. We can conclude therefore that the ascriber is only warranted in

claiming that S knows that p, if he believes that p himself. Otherwise, he

would violate the knowledge rule of assertion in claiming something he

doesn’t believe to be true.

We can imagine cases in which S knows that p, but the ascriber doesn’t

believe that S does. An ascription of knowledge would be correct, but it

would not be conversationally appropriate, because he would claim

something he believes to be false. An example would be when you say that

your friend knows that there still is one beer in the fridge, whereas you

don’t believe that there’s any beers left. This in not conversationally

appropriate. At best you can say that your friend believes that there’s a

beer in the fridge, because his belief can be false. You would be meaning

to say that he has a false belief. Knowledge can’t be false, so you can only

say that he knows, if you actually believe that he knows or you’re

undermining your own beliefs. In case that there actually is a beer left in

the fridge, your belief was false and an ascription of knowledge would

have been correct. Your denial of knowledge was incorrect, but

conversationally appropriate, because you didn’t believe that p.

The ascriber and the subject may have different beliefs that p, because

they have different evidence. It is also possible that they have the same

evidence, but still have different beliefs. This might be, because S is in a

high stake situation. S will experience a low need for closure, so it’s more

difficult (cognitively more demanding) for him to form the belief that p

and therefore to know that p. The ascriber is aware that it’s more difficult

to know that p. He does not experience a low need for closure himself

though, because he is not in a high stake situation. The difference in need

for closure will result in the subject correctly believing that p, because

the evidence is sufficient, but the ascriber will not believe that p, because

he finds it too difficult to know (that p or that S knows that p). Either the

ascriber doesn’t believe that p or he doesn’t believe that the evidence is

sufficient for S to know that p.

Remember that the high stakes doesn’t mean that S needs more evidence

to know that p. The epistemic standard is fixed. But a high stake situation

can influence the ascriber in such a way that he applies an incorrect,

skeptically high epistemic standard instead of a correct meetably low

epistemic standard. Bach (2005): “What is decisive here is not the

attributor’s lack of belief but her raised threshold for (confidently)

believing. By this I mean that before believing the proposition in question,

at least with the confidence and freedom from doubt necessary for

knowing [...], the attributor demands more evidence than knowledge


requires” (Back 2005, p. 27).

I will now look again at the stake intuitions in the light of the belief

formation for the ascriber. In Nagel’s Bank Case the ascriber is always in a

low stake situation. It is not important if we are right in claiming that Lo

and Hi have knowledge or not. This entails that we are in a high or neutral

need for closure. We have seen in the Airport Case that the ascriber can

also be in a high stake situation. The consequence is a low or raised need

for closure. My main thesis is about our general, everyday intuitions

concerning subjects with different stakes, so I will focus on an ascriber in

a low stake situation. To emphasize the influence that a difference in

stakes can have, in some cases I will also mention the belief formation for a

high stake ascriber.

The first intuition concerns a low stake subject. When the ascriber is also

in a low stake situation, invariantism simply accommodates the intuition.

Lo knows that p, a low stake ascriber would believe so and therefore

claim that S knows that p. We can explain the process of belief formation

for the ascriber again with the concept of need for closure. A low stake

ascriber experiences a neutral or high need for closure in forming the

belief that Lo knows that p. It means that he will be fast in forming his

belief with a bigger chance of being wrong, but with a high confidence. The

evidence is sufficient for knowledge and for the ascriber to believe that

Lo knows that p, so the first intuition is easily accommodated.

When the ascriber experiences high stakes, the situation is different. The

Airport Case shows that Smith knows that p, but the high stakes ascribers

Mary and John are not in a position to ascribe knowledge to him. In this

case, their knowledge ascription is incorrect, but conversationally

appropriate. They initially experience a low need for closure and will

therefore spend more time and cognitive effort on forming the belief that

Smith knows that p. Mary and John become aware of possible alternatives

(the itinerary may be wrong), which lowers their confidence in believing

that p and therefore claiming that Smith knows that p. Although the

alternative is not relevant, Mary and John demand more evidence than

knowledge requires. They do not believe that p, so they cannot ascribe

knowledge to Smith. The invariantist can explain that, in this exceptional

case, the first stake intuition would be wrong. A high stake ascriber can

make an incorrect, but conversationally appropriate knowledge

ascription to a low stake subject.

The second stake intuition concerns Hi, a high stake subject that does

know that p. Intuitively we would say that a denial of knowledge to Hi is

correct. According to invariantism, Hi does know that p, so a denial is

actually false. We need to explain why our intuition is wrong. In Nagel’s

Bank case, the ascriber is in a low stake situation, so he experiences a


neutral or high need for closure. This means that he will take less time and

cognitive effort to form a belief with the result that his belief is less

accurate. Special circumstances can more easily lead to a false belief. The

high stakes for the subject have an impact on the ascriber’s belief

formation. As Bach (2005) describes: “In high-standards Airport and Bank

cases, a special interest gives the attributor reservations about the truth

of the proposition in question and, accordingly, raises her bar for

attributing knowledge to someone else. Even so, the subject knows” (Bach

2005, p. 28). So the ascriber’s confidence regarding p changes with the

information about the subject’s high stakes. The ascriber interprets the

high stakes as entailing that it’s more difficult to form the belief that p.

This is indeed the case, because high stakes lead to a low need for closure,

which raises the cognitive effort to form a correct belief. But the ascriber

does not experience a low need for closure, so instead of using more

cognitive effort to reach a correct belief, he misjudges the amount of

evidence than knowledge requires and reaches a false belief. The ascriber

is not confident in his belief that S knows that p and not in a position to

value the evidence correctly.

The situation would be worse if there also was mentioned an alternative.

In DeRose’s Bank Case High the alternative is mentioned that the bank

could have changed its hours. The low stake ascriber is then aware of the

alternative, but doesn’t take the cognitive effort to properly evaluate it.

The chance that the bank changed its hours in the last two weeks is so

small, that we can reasonably ignore it. It is likely that the ascriber

overrates the alternative though, because it seems more likely since it’s

mentioned and in the focus of attention. Mikkel Gerken coined this

phenomenon an epistemic focal bias . A low stake ascriber is in a high or9

neutral need for closure, so any special circumstances, whether practical

(high stakes) or skeptical (a mentioned alternative) will bias his

judgement. In the case of the second stake intuition, it means that the

ascriber loses confidence that Hi knows. Although this is incorrect, a

denial of knowledge to Hi is conversationally appropriate. In any situation

that matches the second stake intuition, the invariantist can claim that

either ascribing knowledge to Hi would be correct or a denial would be

false, but conversationally appropriate.

The third stake intuition is about the subject’s epistemic position. The

ascriber’s situation is therefore irrelevant. Two subjects are in as good of

an epistemic position to know when they have the same initial information

and the belief formation for the ascriber doesn’t affect their epistemic

position. There’s nothing to say about the belief formation for the ascriber

in relation to the third stake intuition.

9 See Gerken, M. (2011), ‘Epistemic Focal Bias’. In Australasian Journal of Philosophy,

Volume 91, Issue 1 (2013), p. 41 - 61.


Finally we need to define what the belief formation for the ascriber can

mean for the fourth stake intuition. We’ve seen that the intuition is

accommodated by invariantism when both Hi and Lo correctly form the

belief that p and therefore both know that p, because it would be a

contradiction to claim that Lo knows, but Hi doesn’t. Nagel remarks

however, that from the ascriber’s point of view, in general we do find it

easier to ascribe knowledge to Lo than to Hi. Again, we can explain when

the ascriber incorrectly judges that Lo knows, but Hi doesn’t, that he

makes this mistake because it is conversationally appropriate. As a reader

of Nagel’s Bank Case, we are in a low stake situation and therefore

experience a high need for closure. After all, Nagel presents her Bank

Case in the beginning of her article, so as a reader we don’t want to spend

more time than necessary on forming the belief that Lo and Hi know that p

or not. We see that the only difference between Lo and Hi is the level of

stakes. It makes sense to claim that it is more difficult for Hi to know than

for Lo, because in high stake situations, people demand more evidence

than necessary for knowledge to have enough confidence. Hi has a low

need for closure and will therefore spend more time and cognitive effort

on forming his belief. We should though not mistake this claim (that it’s

more difficult for Hi to know) for the claim that Hi doesn’t know. This

mistake is more likely to happen when we, as ascribers, are in a low stake

situation, because it takes some extra consideration to separate these

claims. The high need for closure makes us settle to easily on the false

belief that Hi doesn’t know, instead of claiming that it is only more difficult

for him to know. With a low need for closure, we should be able to see this

difference and settle on the belief that both Lo and Hi know and that,

indeed, it would be a contradiction to claim that one knows but not the

other.

Altogether, the belief formation for the ascriber means a lot for the

invariantist’s treatment of the stake intuitions. In cases when a subject has

knowledge, but the ascriber is not willing to ascribe knowledge to the

subject, we can assume that the ascriber simply doesn’t belief that S

knows that p. It’s a general rule of conversation that you can’t claim that

something is the case, if you don’t believe it to be the case. The ascriber

may form a false belief about the subject’s knowledge, because he

experiences a high/neutral or raised need for closure. It is not likely that

he forms a false belief when he experiences a low need for closure,

because it means that he makes a good assessment before he makes his

judgement. A high/neutral or raised need for closure has the consequence

that the ascriber settles on a belief too fast without a proper assessment

of all the relevant information. This could mean that he gives too much

weight to an alternative that has been mentioned or that he misjudges

what the subject believes. Anyway, when the ascriber doesn’t believe that

S knows that p, he cannot properly claim that S knows that p. It is not

conversationally appropriate to do so. This explains why, according to


invariantism, an intuition may turn out to be false in situations with special

circumstances like high stakes.

Conclusion

All together, contextualism does not have an advantage as a theory of

knowledge ascription on the grounds of its treatment of the stake

intuitions. A proper treatment of intuitions explains why the theory can or

cannot accommodate the intuitions. An accommodation is not per

definition favourable, because our intuitions can be wrong. If this is the

case, a theory needs to include in its explanation why an intuition is not

correct.

The stake intuitions concern a case in which the evidence is good enough

to meet a low epistemic standard, but not a high epistemic standard. In

such a case, intuitively we would ascribe knowledge in a low stake

situation, but deny knowledge in a high stake situation. Contextualism can

accommodate these pretheoretic stake intuitions. It explains why, by

claiming that the meaning of ‘know’ is variable according to the context. In

a high stake situation we apply a higher epistemic standard than in a low

stake situation. Consequently, the same evidence can lead to an ascription

of knowledge in a low stake situation and a denial of knowledge in a high

stake situation. According to the contextualist, both knowledge

ascriptions are correct.

Invariantism cannot always accommodate both pretheoretic stake

intuitions, because it entails that the epistemic standard is fixed and

‘know’ has the same meaning in every context. The moderate version of

invariantism claims that we have to apply a low epistemic standard, which

means that we should ascribe knowledge in both the low and the high

stakes situation, given that the subject has a true belief that p. My

invariantist treatment of the stake intuitions first notes, based on Nagel’s

(2008) argument, that the subject’s belief that p is not a given and if S

doesn’t believe that p, neither does he know that p and should we claim

that he knows. A high stake subject experiences a low need for closure in

his belief formation, which means that he takes more time and cognitive

effort to form a belief. As long as he doesn’t form a belief, he doesn’t know

yet. If he, during the process, experiences a raised need for closure, most

likely, he will form a false belief. Overall, the chance that the subject

forms a true belief - and therefore that he knows - is smaller when the

stakes are high. When he doesn’t, a denial of knowledge would be correct

and the intuition is accommodated.

When the subject forms a true belief, a denial of knowledge would be

incorrect. We can explain, mainly based on Bach (2005) and Brown (2005b)

why the ascriber would make an incorrect knowledge ascription, because


this might be conversationally appropriate. The ascriber cannot

coherently claim that S knows that p, if he doesn’t believe this to be the

case. Either, the ascriber doesn’t believe that p or he doesn’t believe that

S knows that p. When S is in a high stake situation, he will settle on a

correct belief, if he experiences a low need for closure during the whole

process of belief formation. The ascriber mistakenly will settle on a false

belief, when he experiences a high need for closure and doesn’t assess the

evidence correctly. He will demand more evidence than knowledge

requires, which will lead to an incorrect, but conversationally

appropriate denial of knowledge.

In this paper, I tried to make clear that invariantism has a proper

treatment of the stake intuitions. It can coherently explain why our

intuitions are correct in some cases, but false in other cases by referring

to process of belief formation for the subject and the ascriber.

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An Invariantist's Treatment of Stake Intuitions

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