Peter D. Klein - Wikipedia





	
	

	
	

	Peter D. Klein

	
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			Peter D. Klein

	Born	1940
	Alma mater	Yale University, Colgate University
	
	Era	Contemporary philosophy
	Region	Western philosophy
	School	Analytic philosophy
	Main interests
	Epistemology
	
Influenced

	Michael Huemer





	



Peter David Klein (born September 17, 1940) is a philosopher specializing in issues in epistemology who spent most of his career at Rutgers University.


Contents


	1 Education and career
	2 Philosophical work
	3 See also
	4 References
	5 External links





Education and career[edit]

He received a BA at Earlham College (1962), and an MA (1964) and PhD from Yale University (1966).

He taught at Colgate University as an assistant professor from 1966 to 1970. Following that, he moved to Rutgers University, where he taught as an assistant professor from 1970 to 1973, an associate professor from 1973 to 1981, and a full professor from 1981 until retiring from Rutgers in 2016.[1]


Philosophical work[edit]

Klein is widely known for his work on skepticism. His most influential work, however, is on the nature of knowledge, where he has long defended the defeasibility theory. His recent work defends infinitism about justification. On this view, to be justified in believing P is to possess a reason R1 to believe P, and a reason R2 to believe R1, and a reason R3.....and so on, ad infinitum. Justification is, so to speak, "turtles all the way down." He has also recently advocated a picture of knowledge according to which one can have knowledge of p even if the justification for the belief of p is essentially based on false premises. Klein calls these "useful falsehoods".

Klein authored one book: Certainty: A Refutation of Skepticism (1982) (University of Minnesota Press), and co-edited Ad Infinitum: New Essays on Epistemological Infinitism (Oxford University Press) with John Turri. He has published a number of articles, chapters, and reviews in epistemology.


See also[edit]

	American philosophy
	List of American philosophers


References[edit]


	^ https://philosophy.rutgers.edu/docman-lister/cv/262-klein-cv/file





External links[edit]

	Peter Klein's homepage
	Klein's CV


	Authority control 	
	ISNI: 0000 0000 7887 7209
	LCCN: n81094586
	NKC: jo20191022897
	NTA: 069453152
	SUDOC: 181411032
	VIAF: 95507742
	 WorldCat Identities: lccn-n81094586











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Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Peter_D._Klein&oldid=989025988"


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		 This page was last edited on 16 November 2020, at 17:05 (UTC).
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