ABSTRACT
Knowledge-that (knowledge of a fact or truth) has long been conceived of as a belief with epistemically propitious features—being at least true and (epistemically) justified. Knowledge is thereby a state of the person. But we might ask how a state like that could contribute to the person’s active life: how can knowledge ever—as it appears to do—motivate and guide her to act? This chapter outlines a knowledge-practicalism, whereby any instance of knowledge is a skilful power to act, a form of knowledge-how. In a given case, that skill might be complex, comprising sub-skills; which, in that given case, might—but need not—include belief-skills and justification-skills. (Thus, on practicalism, knowing does not entail having at least a justified belief.) This is a pragmatist conception of knowledge. It is also a heterodox metaphysics of knowledge: any case of knowledge is a bundle (of sub-skills), not a substance (the belief) with attributes (being true, being justified, etc.). This practicalism tells a powerful story about what should—but, on traditional conceptions of knowledge, will not—be a constitutively immediate linking of knowledge and action: many actions are expressions or manifestations of knowledge, which is itself the power to act in such ways.
