Abstract
1.1. JS’s Section 1. Motivating Contextualism The most direct argument for contextualism about know is “that it explains certain relatively clear intuitions about the truth-conditions of various knowledge-ascriptions” (JS, p. 120). (Scenarios: Mary and John and the flight itineraries; Hannah and her husband and the bank opening hours; Prof. X and the student in the philosophy classroom.) In core examples, we frequently see a contrast between an assertion “I know that P”, followed after some discussion of doubt-inducing factors by an assertion by the same speaker of “I guess I don’t really know that P.” Can both be true? And if so, on what basis? The contextualist argues, contrary to the skeptic, that both can be true in their respective contexts. The key feature of the contextualist account is said to be that the verb know has context-dependent content, is covertly indexical: “Relative to different contexts of use, it expresses different relations between persons and propositions” (JS, p. 120). The role of the adverbial really comes up for further discussion in JS’s next section, and in Section 4.2 of these comments.
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