Editing Belief (section)

==Epistemology==
{{Main|Epistemology}}
[[File:Classical_definition_of_Kno.svg|thumb|236px<!--(approx Sidebar/Infobox)-->|A [[Venn diagram]] illustrating the traditional [[definition of knowledge]] as justified true belief (represented by the yellow circle). The Gettier problem gives us reason to think that not all justified true beliefs constitute knowledge.]]
Epistemology is concerned with delineating the boundary between justified belief and [[opinion]],<ref>Oxford Dictionaries – [http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/epistemology definition] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160906221037/http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/epistemology |date=6 September 2016 }} published by [[OUP]] [Retrieved 2015-08-09]</ref> and involved generally with a theoretical [[philosophical]] study of [[knowledge]]. The primary problem in epistemology is to understand what is needed to have knowledge. In a notion derived from [[Plato]]'s dialogue ''[[Theaetetus (dialogue)|Theaetetus]]'', where the epistemology of [[Socrates]] most clearly departs from that of the [[sophist]]s, who appear to have defined knowledge as "[[justified true belief]]". The tendency to base knowledge (''[[episteme]]'') on common opinion (''[[doxa]]'') Socrates dismisses, results from failing to distinguish a [[dispositive]] belief (''doxa'') from knowledge (''episteme'') when the opinion is regarded correct (n.b., ''orthé'' not ''[[alethia]]''), in terms of right, and juristically so (according to the premises of the dialogue), which was the task of the [[rhetor]]s to prove. Plato dismisses this possibility of an affirmative relation between opinion and knowledge even when the one who opines grounds his belief on the rule and is able to add justification (''[[logos]]'': reasonable and necessarily plausible assertions/evidence/guidance) to it.{{Citation needed |date=February 2024}} A belief can be based fully or partially on [[intuition]].<ref>{{Citation |last=Pust |first=Joel |title=Intuition |date=2019 |url=https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/sum2019/entries/intuition/ |encyclopedia=The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy |editor-last=Zalta |editor-first=Edward N. |edition=Summer 2019 |publisher=Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University |access-date=2022-09-27}}</ref>

Plato has been credited for the ''justified true belief'' theory of knowledge, even though Plato in the ''Theaetetus'' elegantly dismisses it, and even posits this argument of Socrates as a cause for his death penalty. The epistemologists, [[Edmund Gettier|Gettier]]<ref>{{cite journal|last=Gettier|first=E.L.|year=1963|title=Is justified true belief knowledge?|url=https://halshs.archives-ouvertes.fr/halshs-01439314/file/2013%20Gettier%20Conocimiento.pdf|journal=[[Analysis (journal)|Analysis]]|volume=23|issue=6|pages=121–123|doi=10.1093/analys/23.6.121|jstor=3326922|access-date=24 September 2019|archive-date=2 September 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190902025339/https://halshs.archives-ouvertes.fr/halshs-01439314/file/2013%2520Gettier%2520Conocimiento.pdf|url-status=live}}</ref> and [[Alvin Goldman|Goldman]],<ref>{{cite journal|last=Goldman|first=A.I.|s2cid=53049561|year=1967|title=A causal theory of knowing|journal=[[The Journal of Philosophy]]|volume=64|issue=12|pages=357–372|doi=10.2307/2024268|jstor=2024268}}</ref> have questioned the "justified true belief" definition.

===Justified true belief<!--Justified true belief' redirects here-->===
{{See also|Definitions of knowledge#Justified true belief}}
'''Justified true belief'''<!--boldface per WP:R#PLA--> is a definition of [[knowledge]] that gained approval during the [[Age of Enlightenment|Enlightenment]], "justified" standing in contrast to "revealed". There have been attempts to trace it back to [[Plato]] and his dialogues, more specifically in the ''[[Theaetetus (dialogue)|Theaetetus]],<ref>The received view holds it that Plato's theory presents knowledge as remembering eternal truths and justification reawakens memory, see {{cite book|title=Plato on Knowledge and Forms: Selected Essays|last=Fine|first=G.|publisher=Oxford University Press|year=2003|isbn=978-0199245581|location=New York|pages=5–7|chapter=Introduction}}</ref>'' and the ''[[Meno]]''. The concept of justified true belief states that in order to know that a given proposition is true, one must not only believe the relevant true proposition but also have justification for doing so. In more formal terms, an agent <math>S</math> knows that a proposition <math>P</math> is true [[if and only if]]:
* <math>P</math> is true
* <math>S</math> believes that <math>P</math> is true, and
* <math>S</math> is justified in believing that <math>P</math> is true

That theory of knowledge suffered a significant setback with the discovery of [[Gettier problem]]s, situations in which the above conditions were seemingly met but where many philosophers deny that anything is known.<ref>{{cite book|title=The Foundations of Knowing|last=Chisholm|first=Roderick|publisher=University of Minnesota Press|year=1982|isbn=978-0816611034|location=Minneapolis|chapter=Knowledge as Justified True Belief|author-link=Roderick Chisholm}}</ref> [[Robert Nozick]] suggested a [[Gettier problems#Fred Dretske's conclusive reasons and Robert Nozick's truth-tracking|clarification]] of "justification" which he believed eliminates the problem: the justification has to be such that were the justification false, the knowledge would be false.<ref>{{Cite book|url=https://archive.org/details/isbn_9780674664791|title=Philosophical explanations|last=Nozick, Robert.|date=1981|publisher=Harvard University Press|isbn=0674664485|location=Cambridge, Mass.|oclc=7283862}}</ref> Bernecker and Dretske (2000) argue that "no epistemologist since Gettier has seriously and successfully defended the traditional view."<ref>{{cite book|title=Knowledge. Readings in contemporary epistemology|last1=Bernecker|first1=Sven|last2=Dretske|first2=Fred|date=2000|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=978-0198752615|location=Oxford|page=3}}</ref>{{rp|3}} On the other hand, [[Paul Boghossian]] argues that the justified true belief account is the "standard, widely accepted" definition of knowledge.<ref name="Boghossian on Justification">{{Citation|author=Paul Boghossian|title=Fear of Knowledge: Against relativism and constructivism|date=2007|url=https://global.oup.com/academic/product/fear-of-knowledge-9780199230419?cc=us&lang=en&|location=Oxford, UK|publisher=Clarendon Press|isbn=978-0199230419|access-date=20 April 2017|archive-date=7 October 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171007022310/https://global.oup.com/academic/product/fear-of-knowledge-9780199230419?cc=us&lang=en&|url-status=live}}, Chapter 2, p. 15.</ref>

===Belief systems===
A '''belief system''' comprises a set of mutually supportive beliefs. The beliefs of any such system can be [[Religious belief|religious]], [[Philosophy|philosophical]], [[politics|political]], [[Ideology|ideological]], or a combination of these.<ref name= meadows2008 >"A system is an interconnected set of elements that is coherently organized in a way that achieves something." —[[Donella Meadows]] (2008) ''[https://wtf.tw/ref/meadows.pdf Thinking in Systems: A Primer] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210502081905/https://wtf.tw/ref/meadows.pdf |date=2 May 2021 }}'' p.11, as quoted by [https://medium.com/intercultural-mindset/belief-systems-what-they-are-and-how-they-affect-you-1cd87aa775ff Tim Rettig (2017) Belief Systems: what they are and how they affect you] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210516171438/https://medium.com/intercultural-mindset/belief-systems-what-they-are-and-how-they-affect-you-1cd87aa775ff |date=16 May 2021 }}</ref>

====Glover's view====
The British philosopher [[Jonathan Glover]], following Meadows (2008), says that beliefs are always part of a belief system, and that tenanted belief systems are difficult for the tenants to completely revise or reject.<ref name=BitesGlover>{{Cite web |url=http://philosophybites.com/2011/10/jonathan-glover-on-systems-of-belief.html |title="Jonathan Glover on systems of belief", Philosophy Bites Podcast, Oct 9 2011 |access-date=5 July 2014 |archive-date=14 October 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111014052132/http://philosophybites.com/2011/10/jonathan-glover-on-systems-of-belief.html |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite book|author= Elizabeth A. Minton, Lynn R. Khale|title= Belief Systems, Religion, and Behavioral Economics|year= 2014|location= New York|publisher= Business Expert Press LLC|isbn= 978-1606497043|url= https://books.google.com/books?id=hk5pngEACAAJ|access-date= 30 April 2019|archive-date= 22 December 2019|archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20191222011727/https://books.google.com/books?id=hk5pngEACAAJ|url-status= live}}</ref> He suggests that beliefs have to be considered [[holistically]], and that no belief exists in isolation in the mind of the believer. Each belief always implicates and relates to other beliefs.<ref name=BitesGlover/> Glover provides the example of a patient with an illness who returns to a doctor, but the doctor says that the prescribed medicine is not working. At that point, the patient has a great deal of flexibility in choosing what beliefs to keep or reject: the patient could believe that the doctor is incompetent, that the doctor's assistants made a mistake, that the patient's own body is unique in some unexpected way, that Western medicine is ineffective, or even that Western science is entirely unable to discover truths about ailments.<ref name=BitesGlover/>

This insight has relevance for [[inquisitor]]s, [[missionaries]], [[agitprop]] groups and [[wikt:thought police|thought-police]]. The British philosopher [[Stephen Law]] has described some belief systems (including belief in [[homeopathy]], [[psychic powers]], and [[alien abduction]]) as [[wikt:claptrap|"claptrap"]] and says that such belief-systems can "draw people in and hold them captive so they become willing slaves of claptrap ... if you get sucked in, it can be extremely difficult to think your way clear again".<ref>''[[New Scientist]]'' (magazine), 11 June 2011 [https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg21028160.200-a-field-guide-to-bullshit.html A field guide to bullshit | New Scientist] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150616042330/http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg21028160.200-a-field-guide-to-bullshit.html |date=16 June 2015 }} - "Intellectual black holes are belief systems that draw people in and hold them captive so they become willing slaves of claptrap. Belief in homeopathy, psychic powers, alien abductions—these are examples of intellectual black holes. As you approach them, you need to be on your guard because if you get sucked in, it can be extremely difficult to think your way clear again."</ref>