Answers given at end.

True/False (True=A; False=B)

1. Epistemology is the study of the origin, structure, and extent of reality.

2. Empiricism is the study of the nature, extent, origin, and justification of knowledge.

3. Empiricism is not a legitimate "epistemological" approach, because it is not really concerned with the study of the nature, sources, and limits of knowledge.

4. When I say I know something, I do not always have to believe what I claim to know.

5. Even though only true propositions can be known, it is possible to believe a proposition that is false.

6. According to Plato, the eternal Forms or Ideas are the universal characteristics by which things are what they are and are known as what they are.

 7. According to Plato, our knowledge about things in the sensible world is not based on sense experience but on our a priori apprehension of the Forms.

 8. In Plato's Allegory of the Cave, the figures that cast shadows on the back wall of the cave are supposed to be understood as the Forms in terms of which things outside of the Cave are intelligible.

 9. According to Plato, the Form of the Good is the ultimate cause or rationale for every meaningful or intelligible thing.

 10. Because rationalism does not rely on sense experience for knowledge, it is inappropriate to speak of a "rationalist epistemology."

11. Because rationalism does not rely on sense experience, it cannot account for how we know anything.

12. For Plato, all knowledge (as opposed to opinion) is innate insofar as it is based on reasoning that cannot have been obtained through sense experience.

13. According to Plato, to understand a thing means being able to conceive the thing in terms of the concept or logos by which it is intelligible.

14. According to Descartes, we cannot say that we know things about the world based on sense experience because we can be deceived by our senses or might simply be dreaming.

15.  An a priori statement is one whose truth/falsity is known without having to appeal to experience.

16.  The point of Descartes' appeal to an "evil genius" is to raise doubts about his knowledge of a posteriori propositions.

17.  The point of Descartes' appeal to an "evil genius" is to raise doubts about his knowledge of a priori propositions.

18.  Descartes uses the methodic doubt to show that there is at least one thing that can be known with absolute certainty, namely, that he exists.

19. By means of his "methodic doubt," Descartes is able to show that there is one thing we can know with absolute certainty--namely, that we cannot know anything with certainty.

20.  Dualists (like Descartes) argue that human beings are composed of immaterial bodies and material souls or minds.

21. In order for the self to exist, Descartes argues, there must be an infinite being (God) as the background that makes possible the cogito's knowledge of itself as a finite existence.

22. In order to know that he exists, Descartes first has to prove that his bodily senses can be trusted when they reveal to him that he is behaving in a thinking manner.

23. The methodic doubt by which Descartes hopes to achieve certainty and a foundation for claims of knowledge is, for him, both a real and reasonable doubt about the existence of things.

24. Descartes' "methodic doubt" is intended to raise doubts about illusions, dreams, and occasionally sense experiences--but not about beliefs concerning the self, God, or one's own body.

25. According to Descartes, since sense experience is sometimes deceiving, it cannot be the ultimate and indubitable (undoubtable) basis for knowledge.

26. By means of his wax example Descartes wants to show how our ideas of substance and identity are not based on sense experience.

27. Philosophical skepticism claims that nothing exists.

28. Epistemology does not consider skepticism as a legitimate theory because skepticism claims that we can never be completely justified in our beliefs.

29. A solipsist is someone who doubts whether anything else exists other than his or her own mind.

30. According to Descartes, no all-good God would permit us ever to make mistakes about what we claim to know about the world using our senses.

31. According to Descartes, the criteria or principles for determining whether a claim is true are clarity and distinctness.

32. By assuming that knowledge is possible by reasoning alone, rationalists conclude that the only things we ever know to exist are our minds and their ideas.

33. An a priori statement is one whose truth/falsity is known without having to appeal to experience.

34. An a posteriori statement is one whose truth/falsity is known without having to appeal to experience.

35. Even though a posteriori propositions can sometimes be universal, they are never necessary (that is, they are always contingent).

36. In place of Descartes' psychological criteria for determining truth and certainty, Leibniz substitutes logical criteria (such as whether most people believe a statement to be true).

37. Because supporters of extrasensory perception do not limit claims of knowledge to data provided by the five senses, they are considered rationalists, relying on reason alone for knowledge.

38. To say that Locke is a representational realist means that he believes that at least some of our ideas actually represent things outside of the mind.

39. In Locke's representationalist theory of perception, external objects in the world cause us to have ideas from which we infer the existence of things.

40. According to Locke, ideas of sensation and reflection are innate because they are based on primary rather than secondary qualities.

41. By referring to the mind as a tabula rasa, Locke emphasizes the empiricist position that prior to experience the mind is blank or empty.

42.  In Locke's causal theory of perception, external objects in the world cause us to have ideas from which we infer the existence of things.

43. According to Locke, we know about abstract general ideas like humanity or blueness because there are such general things in the world to which such ideas correspond.

44. Primary qualities, for Locke, are characteristics of things (e.g., being solid, taking up space, being in motion or at rest) which resemble the ideas we have of those characteristics.

45.  To distinguish primary and secondary qualities, Locke assumes that we can compare those characteristics of things that exist in objects themselves with characteristics that exist only in our minds.

46. According to Berkeley, because we can never know anything outside of our own minds, we must conclude that there is no such thing as a real world.

47. According to Berkeley, because we can never know anything outside of our own minds, the only defensible philosophic position is solipsism.

48. For Berkeley, "To be is to be perceived or to perceive" means that the only things that are real are ideas and the minds that have those ideas.

49. Berkeley recognizes that to his claim "to be is to be perceived" he has to add "or to perceive" in order to allow for the existence of minds (which are not perceived).

50. According to Berkeley, since only a mind can actually perceive ideas, and ideas are not real things, then only minds really exist.

51. According to Hume, because our ideas are copies of sense impressions, we cannot form ideas of anything (even imaginary creatures) without drawing ultimately on sense experiences.

52. "All human beings think clearly" is an example of a tautology.

53. For Hume causal relations are properly described by means of a posteriori statements.

54.  David Hume argues that, because things are nothing more than clusters of ideas, there is no meaningful way to talk about an external world which causes our ideas.

55. Mathematical propositions (e.g., 7+5=12) are known a priori because their truth or falsity can be known without having to appeal to sense experience.

56. According to Kant, all synthetic a priori judgments are false.

57. It is possible to believe something that is false and still do so rationally (i.e., with good reasons).

58. According to typically masculine ways of thinking, the proper way to philosophize is to defend one's beliefs against those of others by showing how other beliefs are wrong or contradictory.

59. Because feminist philosophy competes with, confronts, and criticizes masculine forms of reasoning, it claims to be the correct way to think, not just a strategy for appreciating alternative ways of thinking.

60.  A statement is true, according to the coherence theory of truth, if it is consistent with facts in the world that are independent of our beliefs.

61. Because they differ on what it means to say that a statement is true, a coherence theorist and a pragmatist would also differ on which statements are true and which are false.

62. According to James's pragmatism, a proposition is true if, when acted upon, it satisfies our expectations.

63. According to Francis Bacon, the task of science is to discover the hidden causes or "forms" of phenomena in order to be able to manipulate things to satisfy human needs.

64. In saying that scientific observations must conform to reason's own laws, Kant indicates how the experiments are really guided tests and not random or indifferent observations.

65. According to Popper's falsifiability criterion of science, theories proven to be false must not really have been scientific in the first place.

66. According to Kuhn, scientific progress is possible only because there is a growing base of theory-neutral data.

67. In Kuhn's account, the correctness of a scientific theory is ultimately determined by whether it describes nature, regardless of whether it is accepted by the scientific community.
 

Multiple Choice

68. Which of the following IS NOT a necessary characteristic for saying that Mary knows that today is Monday?
  (a) It must be, in fact, true that today is Monday.
  (b) Mary must be able to give a reason or justification for thinking that today is Monday.
  (c) Mary could not have been tricked into thinking that today is any day other than Monday.
  (d) Mary must believe that today is Monday.

69. To say that you know that there is life on other planets necessarily implies that you believe there is life on other planets, that you have reasons to back up your belief, and that:
  (a) life on other planets is perhaps vastly different from what we are used to.
  (b) you can trust your senses when you see extraterrestrial life forms.
  (c) you have experienced life on other planets personally.
  (d) there is, in fact, life on other planets.

70. In order for me to know that birds fly, it must be true that birds do fly, because:
  (a) if it were not the case that birds fly, then I would know that which is not true; in short, I would know no thing: I     would not know.
  (b) whenever I claim to know something, I have to rely on what I have been taught.
  (c) if it is true that birds fly (as it, in fact, is), then I cannot be mislead into thinking otherwise.
  (d) unless I have seen birds fly I will not believe others when they tell me that birds do, in fact, fly.

71. According to Descartes, illusions and dreams often appear as real as ordinary sense experience, but they obviously cannot provide us with any certainty about the world.  Because sense experience is also often mistaken, it too cannot provide a dependable ground for knowledge.  Given such a situation, he concludes, the most responsible thing that a true searcher for truth can do is to engage in methodic doubt--that is, a doubt about:
 (a) those things for which we have good reason to doubt.
 (b) only those things for which we have no good reason to doubt.
 (c) contingent but not necessary truths.
 (d) everything, even if such a doubt seems unreasonable.

72. Descartes' appeal to the device of the evil genius to make sure that we do not uncritically accept a priori propositions without first allowing for the remote possibility that we might be in error about them.  Why?
  (a) Unlike a posteriori propositions that depend for their truth or falsity on experience, a priori propositions are known as true or false prior to experience.
  (b) A priori propositions are both necessary and universal, whereas a posteriori propositions are not.
  (c) If there is the slightest possibility that we could be in error about the foundation of our knowledge, then everything based on that foundation is questionable.
  (d) The evil genius is Descartes' way of ensuring that he does not forget how his whole project of methodic doubt is itself prior to any experiences (and thus a priori).

73. As the product of his methodic doubt, the proposition "I think, therefore I am" provides Descartes with exactly what he as a rationalist needs to develop an epistemology, namely:
 (a) a criterion or rule by which to distinguish a priori from a posteriori propositions.
 (b) an indubitable, certain principle on which to ground all other claims of knowledge.
 (c) a way of distinguishing empiricist principles from rationalist principles of knowledge.
 (d) the basis for an a posteriori proof for the existence of God.

74. Descartes argues that the cogito is the necessary foundation for all subsequent knowledge insofar it:
  (a) provides an indubitable principle on which all other claims of knowledge can be based.
  (b) is the first step in Descartes' method of doubt.
  (c) is not really known to be true but is rather something that everyone believes.
  (d) can be doubted just as much as anything else we might claim to know.

75. According to the "epistemological turn" epitomized by Descartes' philosophy, epistemology takes precedence over metaphysics.  In other words, in Descartes' philosophy:
 (a) that which is real is more important than that which is imaginary.
 (b) before we can know what exists, we must know what we can know and what knowing means.
 (c) knowing something to be true comes after believing something to be true.
 (d) nothing exists without first being known by human beings to exist.

76. In order to know anything with certainty about the world or about whether he even has a body, Descartes first has to prove that God exists, because:
  (a) as the most important thing in the world, God is the first thing that must be shown to exist.
  (b) if God's existence is doubtful, so is Descartes' existence; so he has to prove that God exists.
  (c) if an all-good, all-powerful God exists, He would not allow us to be mistaken when we have clear and distinct ideas of the world.
  (d) without God there is no reasonable hope for an afterlife and thus no reason to act morally.

77. Descartes' wax example indicates how we can know what a thing (e.g., wax) is:
 (a) in purely mathematical terms, without having to rely on what our senses tell us about it.
 (b) only after it has changed into something which it originally is not.
 (c) in terms about which even the evil genius could not have tricked us.
 (d) without having to relate scientific truth to religious belief.

78. Descartes' wax example is intended to show that the wax is the same substance before and after it is melted, and this observation indicates how:
  (a) our senses portray the physical characteristics of wax in purely non-sensible ways.
  (b) our knowledge of sensible objects is based on what reason (not sense) identifies as wax.
  (c) without sense experiences, we would not know whether the wax before and after melting is the same.
  (d) knowing that something is wax is the same thing as sensibly experiencing something as wax.

79. Descartes would say that empiricists confuse the criteria of truth with the sources of knowledge when they claim that sense experience should be the means for determining whether a statement is true or false.  Descartes rejects this way of thinking because (as he notes):
  (a) any sense experience may itself be mistaken, so sensation cannot be used to judge truth.
  (b) the criteria for deciding whether a statement is true are based on sense experience.
  (c) what we know (i.e., what our knowledge is about) is given to us by reason; sense experience provides us with the justification for claiming that we know.
  (d) though sensation cannot be trusted to provide knowledge, it is all we have for knowing.

80.  Both Plato and Descartes are often identified as rationalists because they agree generally on a series of beliefs that distinguish them from empiricists.  Which of the following IS NOT a typical rationalist claim?
 (a) Sense experience cannot be trusted to provide knowledge.
 (b) There is a constant, intelligible order underlying the changes in the world we experience.
 (c) Knowledge is based ultimately on innate ideas and a priori principles.
 (d) Though sense experience is sometimes deceptive, it is necessary for true knowledge.

81. Leibniz claims that some propositions (what he calls "truths of reason") can be known to be true or false without having to appeal to sense experience.  Knowledge about them is based on two laws or principles:
  (a) the law of divine explanation and the principle of sufficient reason.
  (b) the principle of sufficient reason and the principle of harmony.
  (c) the principle of doubt and the law of methodic doubt.
  (d) the law of contradiction and the law of excluded middle.

82. Which of the following is a contingent proposition?
  (a) Something cannot exist and not-exist at the same time in the same respect.
  (b) A whole is always greater than any one of its parts.
  (c) If A = B, and B = C, then A = C.
  (d) All cultures agree fundamentally on what is true or false.

83. Which of the following is an a priori proposition?
  (a) All material objects are extended (that is, they take up space).
  (b) Some material objects are heavier than others.
  (c) All physical objects are seen sometime or other by some human being.
  (d) Some material objects are living creatures.

84. According to critics of foundationalist epistemology (like Richard Rorty), evidence for one's beliefs can be conclusive without being necessarily conclusive or based on some indubitable (undoubtable) principle such as Descartes' cogito.  That is, it is sometimes legitimate to say that we "know" something even when:
 (a) we don't believe it.
 (b) what we know is not based on any evidence.
 (c) all evidence contradicts our belief.
 (d) we might still be wrong.

85. Empiricists charge that if claims of knowledge are limited to things we know with logical certainty, we will never be able to know anything about existing things in the world, because:
 (a) the actual existence of things in the world is known only through experience, not reason.
 (b) simply by thinking or reasoning we can know specifically which things exist and how.
 (c) things in the world cannot be known to exist unless they exist previously in some mind.
 (d) the existence of things depends on their having been created by some prior cause, God.

86. According to empiricists, though the kind of information provided by analytic a priori propositions is indubitable, it is not very useful in expanding our knowledge about the world, because:
  (a) the world is nothing other than what we experience it to be.
  (b) such propositions are concerned with the world as it is in itself, not with how we experience the world.
  (c) any information provided by such propositions is ultimately based on someone's personal experience.
  (d) such propositions are true (or false) by definition and do not describe any facts about the world.

87. Rationalists (like Descartes) and empiricists (like Locke and Berkeley) differ on what they see as the primary topic with which epistemology should be concerned, in that rationalists:
  (a) doubt that there is anything that can be known with certainty; whereas empiricists doubt we can ever make mistakes when we appeal to the senses.
  (b) emphasize the origin and extent of knowledge, and empiricists emphasize its nature and justification.
  (c) emphasize the nature and justification of knowledge; empiricists emphasize its origin and extent.
  (d) say that reasoning is based on sense experience; empiricists say that sense experience is based on reasoning.

88. In his assault on innate ideas, Locke notes that some thinkers argue that maybe all people (including children) have such innate ideas but simply are not aware of knowing such truths.  To this particular point Locke responds:
 (a) it makes no sense to say that we know something that we do not know.
 (b) even children know what they know only by means of experience.
 (c) even if all people agreed about a belief, that would not necessarily make it innate.
 (d) because we should limit our assent to the evidence, we should believe in innate ideas only to the extent that we have evidence for them.

89. In calling the mind a "tabula rasa," Locke wants to emphasize that all knowledge, even knowledge of mathematical truths, is based on solely on:
 (a) innate ideas.                                 (b) experience.
 (c) formal training or education.          (d) language.

90. "The particular bulk, number, figure, and motion of the parts of fire or snow are really in them, whether anyone's senses perceive them or not; and therefore they may be called real qualities, because they really exist in those bodies.  But light, heat, whiteness, or coldness, are no more really in them than sickness or pain is in manna [bread]."  In this passage Locke locates the distinction between primary and secondary qualities in the difference between:
  (a) the parts of bodies that we cannot sense and the parts that we can sense.
  (b) qualities of bodies that exist independently of sensation and qualities that rely on sensation.
  (c) the power to perceive things in our own bodies and the power to perceive things in other bodies.
  (d) those qualities that no one ever perceives and those qualities that we always perceive.

91. Substance, Locke claims, is that "I know not what" in which the primary qualities of a thing inhere.  Without assuming the existence of substance and primary qualities, Locke would not be able to conclude that his knowledge is in any way:
 (a) the same as the knowledge that God has in coordinating events in the universe.
 (b) the same as the knowledge that God has in ordering our sense data into specific things.
 (c) the same as other people have when they have his experiences.
 (d) based or grounded in a reality apart from experience.

92. In his critique of Locke, Berkeley notes that primary qualities cannot legitimately be distinguished from secondary qualities, because:
  (a) primary qualities exist in the mind of God, whereas secondary qualities exist only in human minds.
  (b) neither primary nor secondary qualities can be known except insofar as they exist outside of or beyond all minds (finite or infinite).
  (c) primary qualities depend as much on the mind's perspective as do secondary qualities.
  (d) the primary qualities of things (such as solidity, extension, motion/rest) are different from secondary qualities (such as colors, scents, sounds).

93. Berkeley suggests that his theory prevents the skeptic from denying the existence of God, because in Berkeley's philosophy the existence of God is necessary to show why:
  (a) we feel that something external to us causes us to have particular perceptions.
  (b) the skeptical attitude towards knowledge undermines the doctrine of secondary qualities but not that of primary qualities.
  (c) the laws of nature are human generalizations of our experiences.
  (d) our interest in perception is one which has a religious or theological character.

94. According to Berkeley, even if you and I do not have the same mental experiences when we think "red," we are still able to agree on what red is because:
 (a) as a secondary quality, the color red is something that is purely private and individual.
 (b) we learn to associate our experiences with words that we agree upon intersubjectively.
 (c) we in fact do have the same mental experience, even if we don't know it.
 (d) red is a simple idea, whereas redness is an abstract idea.

95. Instead of saying that we often perceive what really exists, Berkeley argues that:
  (a) what really exists is what we or some other minds perceive.
  (b) that which really perceives is all that really exists.
  (c) that which is perceived is that which does the perceiving.
  (d) we seldom perceive what really exists; when we do, we do not recognize it as such.

96. Berkeley expands his definition of the meaning of real things to include perceivers as well as things perceived because:
 (a) we can perceive our own minds but not the minds of others.
 (b) God perceives those things which no other minds perceive.
 (c) we can perceive each others' minds but not our own.
 (d) nothing can be perceived without its being perceived by some mind(s).

97. Plato's objective idealism differs from Berkeley's subjective idealism in that:
  (a) for Plato, ideas or Forms are real; for Berkeley, ideas are mere fictions and therefore unreal.
  (b) for Plato, ideas or Forms exist outside of minds; for Berkeley, ideas exist only in minds.
  (c) for Plato, ideas or Forms are immaterial entities; for Berkeley, ideas are material entities.
  (d) for Plato, ideas or Forms are conceptual generalizations; for Berkeley, ideas are spiritual or immaterial copies of spiritual realities.

98. If all I ever know is that I exist and have ideas, but cannot be sure about whether those ideas refer to anything outside of myself, then I am trapped in my own consciousness.  Such a position is referred to as:
  (a) conceptualism.   (b) phenomenalism.
  (c) solipsism.           (d) representational realism.

99. "There is no question of importance whose decision is not comprised in the science of man; and there is none which can be decided with any certainty before we become acquainted with that science."  Here Hume notes that since everything is known through our ideas and reasoning, then:
  (a) an empiricist epistemology is better than a rationalist epistemology insofar as empiricism gives us knowledge of the world and rationalism gives us knowledge of ourselves.
  (b) by acknowledging that certainty is unachievable, we show the fruitlessness of trying to develop a philosophy of human nature.
  (c) to know anything about human nature with any certainty, we first have to know about the world apart from our ideas and processes of reasoning.
  (d) by understanding human nature (which includes how our ideas of things are ordered), we can understand everything that is knowable.

100. Hume points out that, if all our ideas are based on experience, then our idea that every event has a cause would likewise have to be based on experience of every event.  But we have not had experiences of future events, nor have we had experiences even of every past event.  So how can we be sure that all (even future) events have causes?  Hume's answer:
  (a) since past events are going to be like future events, we can be sure they will all have causes.
  (b) we can't be sure: all we do is "imagine" events will have causes, we develop that habit.
  (c) there is no such thing as a future event or (for that matter) a past event, only present events.
  (d) it is impossible even to imagine an event without imagining it as having had a cause.

101. According to Hume, I cannot know (or predict with any certainty or high probability) that things in the future will occur in particular ways, because:
  (a) I know that the future will not resemble the past: that is what distinguishes the future from the past.
  (b) to have an idea of the future, I would have to have an idea of my future self (which is impossible).
  (c) knowledge of the future would require an infinite intellect; for Hume, only God knows the future.
  (d) I have no experience on which to base the claim that the future will resemble the past.

102. Hume's analysis of cause and effect undermines any claim to know that our ideas are caused by things in the world, because (according to Hume):
  (a) even though we cannot know that our ideas are caused by things in the world, we can at least believe that things in the world cause our ideas.
  (b) the very notion of cause is unintelligible because it is not based on any sense experience.
  (c) we have no experience of any necessary connection between ideas and the things outside of our ideas that supposedly cause them.
  (d) even if I can know exactly what it is that I am experiencing at a particular moment, that does not mean that what I am experiencing actually exists in the world as the cause of that experience or idea.

103. According to Kant, the way to respond to Hume's critique of causality is to show that certainty about propositions like "every event has a cause" is possible in virtue of the fact that:
  (a) our experience of events itself is caused by something apart from all experience.
  (b) the "law" of causality (every event has a cause) is merely an inductive generalization.
  (c) even though every "effect" has a cause, not every "event" has a cause.
  (d) the mind (reason) structures all (even future) experiences in determinate, unchanging ways.

104. In order to avoid Hume's conclusion that we cannot know that things in the future will always have causes, Kant argues that we know that all events in the future will have causes because:
  (a) our belief that future events will have causes is so strong that it alone is sufficient to guarantee that future events will, in fact, have causes.
  (b) all minds are organized in such a way that, in order for events (including future events) to be experienced at all, they must always be experienced as having a cause.
  (c) cause-and-effect is a law of nature independent of human experience; regardless of whether we or any other minds experience them, events in the future will have causes.
  (d) future events themselves are caused by past and present events; so we know that if future events occur at all, they will have been caused by something.

105. According to Logical Positivists, only those statements that can be tested by experience or are true by definition are meaningful.  The most that one would be able to say about ethical or religious claims would be:
 (a) they report on how we feel about something, but they do not express any truth.
 (b) such claims may be true or false; it's just that we may not know whether our beliefs are justified.
 (c) they are purely logical truths--that is, truths of reason (or by definition), not matters of fact.
 (d) they have meaning insofar as they provide the hypothetical or theoretical bases for thought.

106. According to phenomenalism, the meaning of a sentence consists in its being either a tautology or understandable in terms of past or predicted sense experiences.  In other words, a sentence (like "God exists") is meaningful only if:
 (a) for the person who utters it, the sentence has meaning, regardless of what others think.
 (b) it represents the truth, even if we don't know which experiences to believe.
 (c) it is true by definition or is testable by appeal to sense experience.
 (d) it expresses a belief that is innate, known to all rational beings.

107. Phenomenalists claim that physical things are simply constructs of sense data that we talk about in ways different from those things that we identify as mental or spiritual things.  Specifically, to say that a thing is a physical object means that:
 (a) it is proper to speak about the thing in terms of dimensionality, size, and shape.
 (b) the thing's primary qualities (extension, shape, and solidity) do not depend on the mind.
 (c) appearances of the thing, even in hallucinations or dreams, must be accepted as real.
 (d) claims about it are ultimately understandable as being tautologies.

108. According to the psychological atomism implicit in phenomenalism, our knowledge of the world is built up from discrete sensory impressions.  However, as gestalt theorists point out, perceptions are not intelligible simply as isolated data but rather depend for their intelligibility on:
 (a) other equally isolated sense data that are themselves intelligible as innate ideas.
 (b) whether ideas are caused by substances in the world or by God directly.
 (c) logical constructs of neutral (neither mental nor physical) sense experiences.
 (d) the linguistic background or social field of expectations by which they are identified.

109. Rorty's critique of phenomenalism is based on his rejection of the presupposition that knowledge requires a foundation in either innate ideas or sense data.  Instead of thinking of knowledge as a relation between a belief and a fact about the world, we should think of knowledge (he claims) as a relation between:
  (a) what we think we know and what we actually do know.
  (b) a belief and the social, historical arguments given to support it.
  (c) our sense perceptions and our innate ideas.
  (d) the way the mind organizes experiences according to the surface grammar of language and the way that language itself is structured by the deep grammar of neurology.

110.  In the correspondence theory of truth, the proposition "There is a desk in this room" is true only if:
 (a) I think there is a desk in this room.
 (b) it is reasonable to think that there is a desk in this room.
 (c) there is a desk in this room.
 (d) if I try to sit on what I think is the desk, it will support me.

111. Some critics argue that, because the correspondence theory of truth assumes that facts are simply "out there" and uninterpreted, the correspondence theory makes it impossible to know whether a proposition is ever true or false, because:
  (a) regardless of what we may believe, there is something external to us serves as the criterion for whether our beliefs are true or false.
  (b) even though we cannot know uninterpreted facts, we must believe that they exist, because they are the means by which we generate interpreted facts.
  (c) as long as what we know about the world is limited to our beliefs, then we cannot compare those beliefs to some standard outside of us.
  (d) no proposition about the world can both be true and false without violating rules of logic that hold not only for what we believe but also for the structure of the world.

112. Critics charge that the coherence theory of truth is unable to explain falsehood, because if truth is defined as the coherence of a proposition or belief with other propositions or beliefs, then are not all coherent systems of belief true?  That is, if a belief is true because it is consistent with other beliefs in a system, then:
  (a) how do we tell whether a proposition is inconsistent with other beliefs in that same system?
  (b) can't a belief be false and yet the whole system with which it is consistent still be true?
  (c) why can't judgments that are consistent with many other beliefs still be false within the same system of beliefs?
  (d) couldn't the whole set of consistent beliefs be false?

113. Kierkegaard notes that the truth about the "objective uncertainties" of human existence is not knowable in the same way  as other facts about the world, because those "facts" do not concern things about which we really care.  What makes a belief true, though, is not only that we care about it but also that:
  (a) they are based on an objective, impersonal relation between the belief and the world.
  (b) even after adopting the belief we acknowledge that we still might be in error.
  (c) after adopting the belief we no longer worry that we could be in error.
  (d) faith in God allows us to believe anything we want and that will make it true.

114. Feminist epistemology denies that so-called objective "facts" (e.g., about atoms, genetic characteristics of illnesses, or even logical ways of reasoning ) are independent of personal and socio-political interests, because:
  (a) the only "facts" about the world and ourselves that are really objective are those that are discovered and confirmed by legitimate authorities and experts.
  (b) it is impossible for anyone to identify anything as a "fact" without first knowing which personal or socio-political interests are affecting his or her observations and reasoning.
  (c) by investigating things in certain ways, we use intuitions, emotions, and shared expectations to focus our attention, guide our thoughts, and influence our observations about "facts."
  (d) unlike "facts" relating to the physical world (e.g., atoms, illness), matters that concern psychological, social, and political relations are not really facts at all.

115. Masculine and feminine models of thinking differ about the importance of an individual's intuition.  In the masculine model, knowledge is abstract and universal: individual intuition is either merely an example of general knowledge or a threat to it.  But in the feminine model, individual intuition is necessary because knowledge is:
  (a) arrived at only after critically examining the facts and discarding irrelevant personal testimony.
  (b) inherently and unavoidably a product of insights and feelings shared by individuals with one another.
  (c) based on what an individual learns from authorities, tradition, or his or her society.
  (d) whatever an individual personally feels is correct, regardless of what others may say or feel.

116. Progress through the feminine stages of knowing described by Mary Field Belenky and others is marked, in part, by a movement from subjective experience and intuition through a stage of shared experience and empathy.  Though this latter stage includes intuition, it is considered just as objective as masculine proof strategies, since:
  (a) it relies on communication with others to determine whether one's personal feelings are justified.
  (b) it, like masculine strategies of reasoning, begins with accepting the testimony of experts as the truth.
  (c) it, like the masculine model, acknowledges that rationality and knowledge are ultimately subjective.
  (d) it emphasizes objective logic and reasoning instead of emotion, feeling, or personal experience.

117. Though they claim to be arguing rationally, supporters and opponents of creation science disagree about the limits of what science properly can say about the origin of the universe and life.  That difference can be summarized this way:
  (a) creation scientists explain the origin of the universe and life by explicit reference to the Bible, whereas their opponents claim that science rejects the teachings of the Bible.
  (b) in contrast to scientists, creationists do not really propose their position as a scientific theory but only as a religious attitude that one can adopt to complement scientific beliefs.
  (c) creation scientists argue that since science is limited to experiments and testing, no theory about creation can be properly called scientific.
  (d) creationists consider the creation of the universe and life as supernatural events that explain the natural world; opponents limit science to claims about natural events.
 

Short Essay: How do rationalism and empiricism--and epistemology in general--accept the Socratic claim that the intelligibility of anything requires that it be based on an ultimate foundation (or logos)?

Rationalism and empiricism assume that, without a basis for thinking (either in the ways we reason or in sense experience), we could not justify claims of knowledge--since justification must involve appeal to some foundation rather than simply a web of beliefs.