ABSTRACT
Any epistemology worthy of its name must be able to solve or at least address the problem of the idiot savant. The question, rather than the answer to the question, 'how many angels can dance on the head of a pin?' reveals an important epistemological truth: that there are at least two separate and epistemically independent sources of knowledge. To discharge its proper responsibility, epistemology must consider whether knowledge is possible and how it is possible. What then of the knowledge of the idiot savant? Can the idiot savant know without knowing that or how she or he knows? The fact that such knowledge does exist itself possesses enormous significance. The second question is how is it possible to possess knowledge without knowing the manner by which such a possession has come about? The only conceivable answer is that the knowledge that one possesses is somehow built into the subject knower as pre-reflective knowledge.
