What is it to have knowledge?

[chezlaw]

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In the nearest possible world at which P is still true, instead of groggily asking Emily what she is doing, Sam does not wake up. Emily then gets the idea that she will surprise Sam with breakfast in bed. So she cooks eggs, making P true, but because she is so excited about surprising Sam, she clumsily spills the eggs on the floor. She cleans up the mess so there is no evidence of eggs having been made, so she won’t be embarrassed. Sam now does not believe that P, even though P is true. This example shows that condition (4) is false for this case.

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I think I see your point but your nearest possible world seems a very long way away. Aren't there a lot of much closer worlds in which Sam still believes P?

I think Nozicks idea gives a feel for the robustness of a belief. The more the connection between the truth of P and belief in P correctly responds to small changes in the world, the 'better' the belief. This seems to grab hold of something important but I don't know if it can be made precise or amounts to knowledge.

chez