<P> Externalists hold that factors deemed "external", meaning outside of the psychological states of those who gain knowledge, can be conditions of justification . For example, an externalist response to the Gettier problem is to say that, in order for a justified true belief to count as knowledge, there must be a link or dependency between the belief and the state of the external world . Usually this is understood to be a causal link . Such causation, to the extent that it is "outside" the mind, would count as an external, knowledge - yielding condition . Internalists, on the other hand, assert that all knowledge - yielding conditions are within the psychological states of those who gain knowledge . </P> <P> Though unfamiliar with the internalist / externalist debate himself, many point to René Descartes as an early example of the internalist path to justification . He wrote that, because the only method by which we perceive the external world is through our senses, and that, because the senses are not infallible, we should not consider our concept of knowledge to be infallible . The only way to find anything that could be described as "indubitably true", he advocates, would be to see things "clearly and distinctly". He argued that if there is an omnipotent, good being who made the world, then it's reasonable to believe that people are made with the ability to know . However, this does not mean that man's ability to know is perfect . God gave man the ability to know, but not omniscience . Descartes said that man must use his capacities for knowledge correctly and carefully through methodological doubt . The dictum "Cogito ergo sum" (I think, therefore I am) is also commonly associated with Descartes' theory, because in his own methodological doubt, doubting everything he previously knew in order to start from a blank slate, the first thing that he could not logically bring himself to doubt was his own existence: "I do not exist" would be a contradiction in terms; the act of saying that one does not exist assumes that someone must be making the statement in the first place . Though Descartes could doubt his senses, his body and the world around him, he could not deny his own existence, because he was able to doubt and must exist in order to do so . Even if some "evil genius" were to be deceiving him, he would have to exist in order to be deceived . This one sure point provided him with what he would call his Archimedean point, in order to further develop his foundation for knowledge . Simply put, Descartes' epistemological justification depended upon his indubitable belief in his own existence and his clear and distinct knowledge of God . </P> <P> We generally assume that knowledge is more valuable than mere true belief . If so, what is the explanation? A formulation of the value problem in epistemology first occurs in Plato's Meno . Socrates points out to Meno that a man who knew the way to Larissa could lead others there correctly . But so, too, could a man who had true beliefs about how to get there, even if he had not gone there or had any knowledge of Larissa . Socrates says that it seems that both knowledge and true opinion can guide action . Meno then wonders why knowledge is valued more than true belief, and why knowledge and true belief are different . Socrates responds that knowledge is more valuable than mere true belief because it is tethered, or justified . Justification, or working out the reason for a true belief, locks down true belief . </P> <P> The problem is to identify what (if anything) makes knowledge more valuable than mere true belief, or that makes knowledge more valuable than a more minimal conjunction of its components, such as justification, safety, sensitivity, statistical likelihood, and anti-Gettier conditions, on a particular analysis of knowledge that conceives of knowledge as divided into components (to which knowledge - first epistemological theories, which posit knowledge as fundamental, are notable exceptions). The value problem reemerged in the philosophical literature on epistemology in the twenty - first century following the rise of virtue epistemology in the 1980s, partly because of the obvious link to the concept of value in ethics . </P>

Which german philosopher proposed there are different areas of knowledge