Dretske's Response to Scepticism: Contextualism + Relevant Alternative

Relevant Alternatives theory of knowledge (RA)

Modest Contextualism:

Whether S who believes P knows P depends on conditions in which S comes to believe P.

FAKE/REAL COOKIES: sometimes S's cookies are fake; mine always real. Evidentially in the same positions, both have true beliefs, but in S's case, there are conflicting possibilities they cannot rule out.

Externalist: we don't have to know that we know.

Radical Contextualism:

Depends on context of attributor too. The attribution of knowledge depends on the standards of the attributor; thus I might give myself knowledge while the sceptic may deny it.

Relevant Alternatives:

Relativises knowledge, as relevance depends on context... For sceptics, sceptical scenarios are always relevant alternatives. For example: in an ordinary context, I need to eliminate only the tangerine possiblity; in a sceptical context, the wax possibility.

Rejecting Closure:

I am asked if I know that the oranges are not made of wax. Once the possibility is raised, the context is one where S does not know something implied by something he formally knew.

Closure means, he must deny he knows they are oranges - so he must deny ever having beein a position to know they were.

So closure is problematic - it means contextualism is only a solution to those who do not think about scepticism.

So…