1.
What
reasons did Descartes give to show that “there is not one of my former beliefs
about which a doubt may not be raised”?
Which of these reasons led him to doubt even so obvious a belief as
“2+3=5”?
2.
What
do you think about the sort of skeptical doubts Descartes raised?
3.
How
do you know you are not living in the Matrix?
4.
What
is empiricism?
5.
How
do the psychology experiments reported by Morton show that traditional
empiricism is mistaken?
6.
Explain
the difference between ‘a priori’ and ‘a posteriori’ knowledge.
7.
Explain
the difference between ‘analytic’ and ‘synthetic’ truths.
8.
What
is supposed to be the difference between inductive reasoning and deductive
reasoning?
9.
Morton
thinks that Nelson Goodman raised a very deep and difficult problem about
inductive reasoning. What is it?
10.
Explain
the difference between foundationalism and coherentism (or holism) as accounts
of the structure of beliefs?
11.
Why
might someone think that the concept of ‘explanation’ is essential to
understanding coherentism?
12.
What
does Morton mean by ‘informed fallibilism’?
How does it differ from what he calls ‘jungle falliblism’?
13.
Knowledge
is sometimes defined as “justified, true belief.” Why “justified”? Why not just
“true belief”?
14.
How
are so-called “Gettier examples” supposed to show that the “justified, true
belief” definition of knowledge is not a good one?
15.
What
reasons can be given for thinking that it will not work to define knowledge as
“true beliefs acquired by a reliable method”?
16.
What
is ‘folk psychology’ and why do some materialists think that it is false?
17.
What
are some ways that ordinary people don’t seem to reason in the way probability
theory would recommend?
18.
What
does it mean to take a ‘naturalistic’ approach to the theory of knowledge?
19.
What
is ‘inference to the best explanation’? (Explain by inventing your own
example.)