Ryle vs. intellectualism: a case study in philosophical method

Abstract I compare Gilbert Ryle’s anti-intellectualist account of knowledge how with the influential intellectualist alternative defended by Jason Stanley and Timothy Williamson (in Stanley & Williamson, 2001). I argue that the contrast between these positions is not as clear as is commonly assumed. I trace this unclarity to a failure on the part of Stanley and Williamson to provide a clear and meaningful account of knowledge how. I attribute this failure to their approach to philosophical analysis, an approach Ryle shared earlier in his career but had abandoned at the time he wrote about knowledge how. I conclude with a few more general remarks about when the kind of philosophical analysis Stanley and Williamson are practicing is useful and when it is not.