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Innate knowledge

DOI
10.4324/9780415249126-P027-1
DOI: 10.4324/9780415249126-P027-1
Version: v1,  Published online: 1998
Retrieved March 19, 2024, from https://www.rep.routledge.com/articles/thematic/innate-knowledge/v-1

Article Summary

If innate knowledge exists, there must be innate beliefs and those beliefs must count as knowledge. In consequence, the problem of clarifying the concept of innate knowledge divides in two: to explain what it is for a belief to be innate and then to connect that account with a characterization of what knowledge is. Modern biology requires changes in traditional philosophical conceptions of innateness; and two quite different theories of knowledge entail that innate beliefs will often fail to count as knowledge.

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Citing this article:
Sober, Elliott. Innate knowledge, 1998, doi:10.4324/9780415249126-P027-1. Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Taylor and Francis, https://www.rep.routledge.com/articles/thematic/innate-knowledge/v-1.
Copyright © 1998-2024 Routledge.

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