ABSTRACT
The rest of epistemology examines thesotto voce proviso. The possibility that actually obtains is never properly ignored; actuality is always a relevant alternative; nothing false may properly be presupposed. The rule is 'externalist' – the subject himself may not be able to tell what is properly ignored. A possibility may not be properly ignored if the subject gives it, or ought to give it, a degree of belief that is sufficiently high, and high not just because the possibility in question is unspecific. The jurors know that the accused is guilty only if his guilt has been proved beyond reasonable doubt. Disastrous though it would be to convict an innocent man, still the jurors may properly ignore the possibility that it was the dog, marvellously well-trained, that fired the fatal shot. Ascriptions of knowledge to yourself or others are a very sloppy way of conveying very incomplete information about the elimination of possibilities.
