ABSTRACT
What is it for a person to know something? Questions like this one make up the subject matter of epistemology, the philosophical study of knowledge. Giving a detailed answer to our question is tricky, but there are some general points we can be fairly sure of. Consider Tony. He might say he knows there are weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, but he does not know this unless there are weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. Tony’s case suggests that knowledge requires true belief, but true belief is not enough for knowledge. Suppose that Nick is convinced that Sunderland won yesterday’s football match. And they did win. But Nick believes this because he glanced at the ‘Mighty Sunderland Triumphant!’ headline from last week’s paper, thinking it was today’s. Nick’s belief is true, but its truth is, in some sense, an accident; he has been lucky. So knowledge is true belief, whose truth is non-accidental.
