The Refutation of the Tripartite Definition of Knowledge by Edmund Gettier: A Critical Appraisal

Man is an inquisitive being, a curious animal possessing an intellect and endowed with an insatiable craving for knowledge. This incited Aristotle to declare that all men by nature desire to know. Thus most people often begin their speculations with the assumption that they have a great deal of knowledge. But as they further reflect upon what they presumably know, they discover that it is much less secure than they realized and indeed they come to think that many of what had been their firmest beliefs are dubious or even false. Such doubts arise from certain anomalies in our experience of the world. That is why; the skeptics came to the conclusion that knowledge is impossible. However this criticism played a vital role in seeking a definition of knowledge. Thus knowledge has been defined as justified true belief. Epistemologists for decades were contented with this tripartite definition of knowledge until Edmund L. Gettier in his article “Is justified true belief knowledge?” cast doubt on the certainty of this traditional conception of knowledge. He argued that these three conditions postulated by the traditional definition are not sufficient for there to be knowledge. Hence this essay we will try to estimate the muscles and the flaws in the Gettier problem with a vision to evaluate the impact fashioned by this refutation on epistemology. This study we adopted the analytic and evaluative method.