Jennifer Nagel

The book is good for what it intends to be: a quick, general introduction to the subject of knowing and related topics (e.g., truth, justification, testimony). Readers will come away with a conversational understanding of the subject and some sense of the philosophical shifts that pushed the topic along.

I was surprised that the focus of knowing was almost exclusively on individual knowers and on the pursuit of Truth. Such a focus leads to lines of argument questioning whether individuals can show more have unmediated access to Truth, whether our ability to perceive truly is warped by demons, or whether we are all just brains in vats and perception is an illusion. Those thought experiments can make understanding knowledge and knowing seem more esoteric than it really is.

I was hoping for more of a focus on social forms of knowing and pragmatic knowledge, which feels like a more familiar set of circumstances for knowing and acting on that knowledge That focus might have resonated more for the general reading audience that this book is trying to reach. That was a gap, I think, but the shortcoming is not really the author's fault. Nagel's writing is concise and clear, there is a clear intellectual narrative, and the thought experiments are varied and quite helpful. Rather, the fault may go to Oxford for trying to shoehorn millennia of intellectual investigation about knowing into a novelty format like the "very short introductions" series of books. Still worth a read. show less

If you would like a very short introduction to knowledge (epistemology) then this 116 page book is just perfect. Maybe someone with a deep philosophy background would have some reason to carp about it, I don’t know (haha). But as a lay reader it felt like this was a very clear explanation of various schools of thought over the centuries.

By the way, the author Jennifer Nagel (a philosophy professor and an engaging writer who can easily speak Plain English) is *not* related to Thomas Nagel, show more a very famous philosopher. show less

I can't imagine a better introduction, even if I was on an island presented with 100 fake knowledge books and luckily chose this one.

Finished on flight to Ketchikan, 2022.

Knowledge: A Very Short Introduction
Is Knowledge Possible?
The possibility of knowledge and the conditions one must observe in order to obtain it are examined in this book. Jennifer Nagel provides a good introduction to the subject, with emphasis in the skeptical tradition. A word about the presocratic conception of knowledge and some observations based on Plato and Aristotle ideas are provided, though the book could have given more attention to it. Descartes conception of knowledge and his show more response to skepticism is explained. This is an useful reading to understand crucial concepts of philosophy and a guide for future steps in the matter. show less