Against Beliefless Knowledge

Abstract There is wide agreement on the entailment thesis, according to which if S knows that p, then S believes that p. Some philosophers, however, have attempted to present counterexamples to the entailment thesis, where subjects know that p without believing p. Proponents of the entailment thesis have typically responded to such cases by arguing that the subjects have the required prior beliefs, and therefore, the cases in question do not constitute genuine counterexamples. Unfortunately, this line of reply seems untenable when the counterexamples involve subjects who have clearly not formed the relevant beliefs, making it impossible for proponents to appeal to prior beliefs. I therefore propose a different approach by demonstrating the lack of knowledge rather than arguing for the presence of belief. My approach is based on KNA-Suff, which states that if S knows that p, then it is proper for S to assert p. By applying KNA-Suff, I show that the subjects in the putative counterexamples lack knowledge, since it would be improper for them to assert the relevant propositions. Hence, the putative counterexamples fail, and the entailment thesis survives the challenge.