The Semantics of Knowledge Assignment

The Semantics of Knowledge Assignment
The Semantics of Knowledge Assignment
1. According to Hilary Putnam’s famous article “Brains in a Vat,” if you
experienced your life exactly as you normally would, but you were actually
a brain in a vat, .
(A) you would not be able to tell that you were a brain in a vat
(B) you would not be able to truthfully say, “I know that I am not a brain
in a vat”
(C) you would not be able to tell that you were not a brain in a vat,
even if you weren’t a brain in a vat
(D) you would not be able to truthfully say, “I am a brain in a vat”
(E) you would be able to tell that you were a brain in a vat
2. “If I know that I have hands and that having hands entails that I am not
just a brain in a vat, then I know I am not a brain in a vat. I don’t know
that I am not just a brain in a vat. Therefore, I don’t know that I have
hands.” This skeptical argument relies on which of the following
principles?
(A) The principle of sufficient reason
(B) The closure principle
(C) The principle of alternate possibilities
(D) The anthropic principle
(E) The principle of substitutivity
The Semantics of Knowledge Assignment
3. Pyrrhonian skepticism involves .
(A) denying that we know anything
(B) withholding assent from any nonevident claim
(C) denying that we know anything about the external world
(D) knowing that we know nothing
(E) methodological suspension of judgment until certainty is reached
4. Throughout the years, philosophers have suggested a variety of skeptical
scenarios. Which of the following is NOT considered a standard scenario
for raising the possibility of skepticism?
(A) The scenario wherein one is just a brain in a vat
(B) The scenario wherein one is dreaming
(C) The scenario wherein one is living in a Matrix-style virtual reality
(D) The scenario wherein one is merely a character in another person’s
dream
(E) The scenario wherein one is being deceived by a powerful demon
126 ❯ McGraw-Hill’s 500 Philosophy Questions
5. The claim that true belief never rises to the level of knowledge because
it is always possible to doubt the belief presumes .
(A) the infallibility of knowledge
(B) that knowledge is subjective
(C) the fallibility of knowledge
(D) that doubt is always rational
(E) the factivity of knowledge claims
6. According to Descartes, what is the one thing that I can know with
absolute certainty?
(A) I have a brain.
(B) God exists.
(C) I exist.
(D) The external world exists.
(E) 2 2 = 4.
The Semantics of Knowledge Assignment
7. According to David Lewis, in most ordinary contexts we can properly
ignore skeptical scenarios, and so ordinary knowledge claims are often true,
despite the possibility of skeptical scenarios. The rule that licenses this
“proper ignoring” is the rule of .
(A) propriety
(B) nonassent
(C) attention
(D) common sense
(E) ignorance
The Semantics of Knowledge
8. According to epistemic contextualism, the of a knowledge
claim partially depends on the context in which the knowledge claim
is uttered.
(A) assertability
(B) usefulness
(C) meaning
(D) possibility
(E) believability
Epistemology ❮ 127
9. Semantic theories of knowledge are concerned with .
(A) the metaphysics of knowledge
(B) the usefulness of knowledge
(C) the scope and limits of knowledge
(D) the meaning of the word know
(E) the phenomenology of knowledge
10. According to some ordinary language philosophers, such as Norman
Malcolm and Ludwig Wittgenstein, the meaning of the word know may
change depending on the particular use to which the word is put in
different situations. This claim can be seen as an early precursor to which
of the following views?
(A) Relativism
(B) Coherentism
(C) Contextualism
(D) Externalism
(E) Subject-sensitive invariantism
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