Traditional Analysis

A traditional account of the concept of knowledge was as follows:

• knowledge = justified, true belief

In other words, person A knows that X meant that:

1. X is true;
2. A believes that X;
3. A is justified in believing that X.

So we can see here that there must be three conditions satisfied if person A is to know X. Firstly, person A must believe that X is the case. Secondly, X must be true; it must be the case that X is true. Lastly, person A must be justified in believing that X is the case.

For example, let us use the existence of a secretary. Mrs. Knull knows that her secretary is in the office. Let us suppose that she looked into the office and saw a figure that looked like exactly like her secretary. We may suppose that she would completely be justified in believing that her secretary was in the office.