Epistemic Justification

Safe Testimonial Belief and the Transmission of Justification

by Stephen Wright

To be presented at "Subjectivity and the Social World", University of Hull.

Transmission theories of testimonial justification hold that where a listener takes a speaker's word for it that... more Transmission theories of testimonial justification hold that where a listener takes a speaker's word for it that things are as she says they are, the listener's resultant belief is justified by the speaker's justification being transmitted to the listener. Recently, various authors have sought to refute transmission theories by pointing out that a listener's acquired testimonial justification can outstrip a speaker's justification. A common thought is that a listener's belief can be safe, where a speaker's is not. In this paper, I suggest how transmission theorists might be able to respond to these challenges.

Evidentialism as Buck-Passing

by Kurt Sylvan

Draft only. Comments appreciated.

I argue that evidentialism can and should be framed as a second-order normative account in the same genre as the... more I argue that evidentialism can and should be framed as a second-order normative account in the same genre as the buck-passing account of value—i.e., as a theory of how normative facts of one type are grounded in normative facts of another. So understood, it can remain an interesting theory and help the cause of Reasons Basicness, the view that reasons are normatively fundamental. Not so understood, it is either false, trivial, or explanatorily idle. Having made these points in §2 and §3, I ask in §4 what it takes to support and to challenge evidentialism. Both take more than many assume, I argue. This has an important corollary. Setting aside hybrid theories, as in Comesaña (2010) and Goldman (2011), evidentialism sans phrase is often treated as a potential rival to reliabilism sans phrase. Even this treatment is, I argue, wrong. These views can conflict no more than a buck-passing account of value can conflict with a hedonist account of value.

The Problem of Aesthetic Deference

by Amir Konigsberg

Is deference on aesthetic issues ever rational? Can it be rational to defer to someone else’s belief on an aesthetic... more Is deference on aesthetic issues ever rational? Can it be rational to defer to someone else’s belief on an aesthetic matter? This is the question I address in this paper. It is, I believe, an important question that has not, as far as I am aware, been discussed in the literature . And I want to announce my own answer upfront: I believe it can, under certain conditions, indeed be rational to defer to another person’s belief on aesthetic matters. Moreover, I believe that it can be rational even if it entails dismissing one’s own aesthetic belief in doing so. This conclusion is not unproblematic. Nonetheless it is what I will be arguing for in the following paper.

L. Magnani (2012), Scientific Models Are Not Fictions. Model-Based Science as Epistemic Warfare

by Lorenzo Magnani

In L. Magnani and P. Li (eds.), Philosophy and Cognitive Science, Western and Eastern Studies, Springer, Heidelberg/Berlin, 2012, pp. 1-38.

In the current epistemological debate scientific models are not only considered as useful devices for explaining facts... more In the current epistemological debate scientific models are not only considered as useful devices for explaining facts or discovering new entities, laws, and theories, but also rubricated under various new labels: from the classical ones, as abstract entities and idealizations, to the more recent, as fictions, surrogates, credible worlds, missing systems, make-believe, parables, functional, epistemic actions, revealing capacities. The paper discusses these approaches showing some of their epistemological inadequacies, also taking advantage of recent results in cognitive science. The main aim is to revise and criticize fictionalism, also reframing the received idea of abstractness and ideality of models with the help of recent results coming from the area of distributed cognition (common coding) and abductive cognition (manipulative). The article also illustrates how scientific modeling activity can be better described taking advantage of the concept of “epistemic warfare”, which sees scientific enterprise as a complicated struggle for rational knowledge in which it is crucial to distinguish epistemic (for example scientific models) from non epistemic (for example fictions, falsities, propaganda) weapons. Finally I will illustrate that it is misleading to analyze models in science by adopting a confounding mixture of static and dynamic aspects of the scientific enterprise. Scientific models in a static perspective (for example when inserted in a textbook) certainly appear fictional to the epistemologist, but their fictional character disappears in case a dynamic perspective is adopted. A reference to the originative role of thought experiment in Galileo’s discoveries and to usefulness of Feyerabend’s counterinduction in criticizing the role of resemblance in model-based cognition is also provided, to further corroborate the thesis indicated by the article title

Justification as 'Would-Be' Knowledge

by Aidan McGlynn

Draft only. Final version forthcoming in Episteme.

In light of the failure of attempts to analyse knowledge as a species of justified belief, a number of epistemologists... more In light of the failure of attempts to analyse knowledge as a species of justified belief, a number of epistemologists have suggested that we should instead understand justification in terms of knowledge. This paper focuses on accounts of justification as a kind of ‘would-be’ knowledge. According to such accounts a belief is justified just in case any failure to know is due to uncooperative external circumstances. I argue against two recent accounts of this sort due to Alexander Bird and Martin Smith. A further aim is to defend a more traditional conception, according to which justification is a matter of sufficiently high evidential likelihood. In particular, I suggest that this conception of justification offers a plausible account of lottery cases: cases in which one believes a true proposition—for example that one’s lottery ticket will lose—on the basis of probabilistic evidence.

Justifying Rational Planning: on the indeterminacy of pragmatic considerations

by Bruno Verbeek

Internalism and Externalism In Semantics and Epistemology

by Sanford Goldberg

Anti-Individualism: Mind and Language, Knowledge and Justification

by Sanford Goldberg

Anti-individualism, content preservation, and discursive justification

by Sanford Goldberg

A simple (and surprising) argument against justification internalism

by Sanford Goldberg

What is the subject-matter of the theory of epistemic justification?

by Sanford Goldberg

Reliabilist Foundationalist Coherentism

by Sanford Goldberg

Evidentialism and skeptical arguments

by Dylan Dodd

Forthcoming in Synthese

Cartesian skepticism about epistemic justification (‘skepticism’) is the view that many of our beliefs about the... more Cartesian skepticism about epistemic justification (‘skepticism’) is the view that many of our beliefs about the external world – e.g., my current belief that I have hands – aren’t justified. I examine the two most influential arguments for skepticism – the Closure Argument and the Underdetermination Argument – from an evidentialist perspective. For both arguments it’s clear which premise the anti-skeptic must deny. The Closure Argument, I argue, is the better argument in that its key premise is weaker than the Underdetermination Argument’s key premise. Next I examine ways of motivating each argument’s key premise. I argue that attempts to motivate them which appeal to one’s having the same evidence in skeptical scenarios, to skeptical hypotheses’ alleged ability to explain our evidence just as well as real world hypotheses, or to the fact that if skeptical scenarios were true everything would appear just as it does all fail to provide any motivation for the premises or for skepticism. But I close by considering a different argument for the key premises and skepticism that lacks the central defect of these other arguments. Future work on skepticism should focus on this final argument at the expense of the others.

Evidence for false evidence

by Neil Mehta

Draft only.

Assuming that evidence is propositional, I defend the view that some false propositions can constitute evidence. I... more Assuming that evidence is propositional, I defend the view that some false propositions can constitute evidence. I begin by providing a theoretically neutral characterization of evidence: evidence is the proper basis for evidential beliefs, i.e., those beliefs which are justified at least partly in virtue of being properly based on something. I then motivate several constraints for a theory of evidence, including (i) intuitively grounded constraints concerning the presence or absence of justification in particular cases, and (ii) theoretical constraints concerning our access to evidential propositions. I argue that, if evidence is propositional, these constraints may be jointly satisfied only if some false propositions constitute evidence. Finally, I rebut recent objections by Littlejohn and Williamson against the existence of false propositional evidence.

Esperienze, linguaggio, giustificazione. Su "A Manual of Experimental Philosophy" di David Berman

by Daniele Bertini

Giornale di Metafisica, 33(3), 2011.

David Berman's work on experimental philosophy is a defence of a traditional approach to empiricism against both... more David Berman's work on experimental philosophy is a defence of a traditional approach to empiricism against both contemporary rationalism and logico-analytic philosophy. While his approach focuses on empirical evidence in support of theoretical claims, Berman distinguishes his position from the kind of experimentalism recently risen from the analytic world. After having highlighted the merit of Berman's approach to philosophy, I comment on his main views, addressing particularly the relationship between language, intuitions and experience from the standpoint of the epistemological topic of belief justification.

K R Westphal: Research in Theoretical Philosophy

by Kenneth R Westphal

Moore's Paradox and the Accessibility of Justification

by Declan Smithies

Forthcoming in Philosophy and Phenomenological Research

This paper argues that justification is accessible in the sense that one has justification to believe a proposition if... more This paper argues that justification is accessible in the sense that one has justification to believe a proposition if and only if one has higher-order justification to believe that one has justification to believe that proposition. I argue that the accessibility of justification is required for explaining what is wrong with believing Moorean conjunctions of the form, ‘p and I do not have justification to believe that p.’

Mentalism and Epistemic Transparency

by Declan Smithies

Forthcoming in The Australasian Journal of Philosophy

Questions about the transparency of evidence are central to debates between factive and non-factive versions of... more Questions about the transparency of evidence are central to debates between factive and non-factive versions of mentalism about evidence. If all evidence is transparent, then factive mentalism is false, since no factive mental states are transparent. However, Timothy Williamson has argued that transparency is a myth and that no conditions are transparent except trivial ones. This paper responds by drawing a distinction between doxastic and epistemic notions of transparency. Williamson’s argument may show that no conditions are doxastically transparent, but it fails to show that no conditions are epistemically transparent. Moreover, this reinstates the argument from the transparency of evidence against factive mentalism.

Why Justification Matters

by Declan Smithies

Forthcoming in Epistemic Evaluation: Point and Purpose in Epistemology, edited by D. Henderson & J. Greco, Oxford University Press.

This chapter is guided by the hypothesis that the point and purpose of using the concept of justification in epistemic... more This chapter is guided by the hypothesis that the point and purpose of using the concept of justification in epistemic evaluation is tied to its role in the practice of critical reflection. In section one, I propose an analysis of justification as the epistemic property in virtue of which a belief has the potential to survive ideal critical reflection. In section two, I use this analysis in arguing for a form of access internalism on which one has justification to believe a proposition if and only if one has higher-order justification to believe that one has justification to believe that proposition. In section three, I distinguish between propositional and doxastic versions of access internalism and argue that the propositional version avoids familiar objections to the doxastic version. In section four, I argue that the propositional version of access internalism also explains and vindicates internalist intuitions about cases. In section five, I conclude with some reflections on the relationship between critical reflection, responsibility and personhood.

Perception and Basic Beliefs: Zombies, Modules, and the Problem of the External World, by Jack C. Lyons. REVIEW.

by William E. S. McNeill

Mind 2012

I give a brief precis of some of the major themes in Lyons' book. I discuss a possible connection between the question... more I give a brief precis of some of the major themes in Lyons' book. I discuss a possible connection between the question of when to count a belief as basic and when to count a state as a belief.