Quine’s Naturalized Epistemology, Epistemic Normativity and the
Gettier Problem
Dr. Qilin Li
(liqilin@gmail.com; liqilin@pku.edu.cn)
The Department of Philosophy, Peking University
Beiijing, P. R. China 100871
W. V. Quine is one of the most prominent advocates of the naturalistic approach to
epistemology and he argues that epistemology should be naturalized and transformed
into a sub-discipline of psychology and hence a chapter in science. In his famous
paper “Epistemology Naturalized,” Quine starts to compare epistemology with the
logical and set-theoretical studies of the foundations of mathematics.
Similar to the studies of the foundations of mathematics, as Quine suggests,
epistemological studies, which are “concerned with the foundation of science” (Quine
1968, p. 69), can be divided into two sorts— one is conceptual and the other is
doctrinal. Quine further argues that the conceptual ones are concerned with meaning
of our material object concepts, which are clarified by reducing them into sense
experience concepts; and, on the other hand, the doctrinal ones are concerned with
truth of our material object beliefs, which are established by deducing them from the
premises about observations. According to Quine, both sorts of studies in traditional
epistemology are doomed, since traditional epistemology shows no real advantages
over sciences, especially psychology. Thus, Quine advocates that we should abandon
this traditional epistemology; but this does not imply the death of epistemology per
se, since epistemology can still go on “in a new setting and a clarified status” (Quine
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1968, p.82). We should embrace this new epistemology, i.e., naturalized
epistemology, which “falls into place as a chapter of psychology and hence of natural
science” (Quine 1968, p.82), in other words, unlike traditional epistemology, new
epistemology “is contained in natural science, as a chapter of psychology” (Quine
1968, p.83). Quine thinks the change from old epistemology to new one is significant,
because the relations between science and its foundations can only be more
productively investigated in a scientific, causal way, because scientific theories are
based upon the evidence that is the totality of our sensory simulations. When the
evidence is understood in the above way, it seems quite reasonable for Quine to
“make free use of empirical psychology” (Quine 1968, p.83) to provide
epistemologists with reliable, causal analyses of human sensory simulations.
With respect to naturalism in philosophy, there is always one prominent
challenge— the problem of normativity, viz., how it is possible for a fully naturalized
philosophical theory to save some room for the concept of normativity. If a fully
naturalized philosophical theory only provides us with some descriptions of the causal
mechanism without solving the problem concerning “whether we ought to …,” it
seems that such a philosophical theory is philosophically less attractive. For instance,
in ethics, it is quite common to suggest that scientific theories concerning emotional
engagement and moral judgment are philosophically uninteresting if they only
provide us with more detailed account of the relations between emotional engagement
and moral judgment 1 without any further specification of whether we ought to
1
For instance, Greene, et al (2001) provide a scientific discussion about the influential role of emotional
engagement in moral judgment.
2
perform certain acts under some moral situations. Similarly, some philosophers
suggest that Quine, as an important advocate of naturalized epistemology, has to
confront with a similar difficulty. For instance, Jaegwon Kim (1988) suggests that
Quine’s proposal of naturalized epistemology in untenable, since it requires us to
dispense with the normativity in epistemology. According to Kim, evidence as well as
rationality plays important roles in Quine’s naturalized epistemology and yet both of
them are normative concepts. Kim acknowledges that scientific theories provide us
with more detailed accounts of our sensory simulations, causation, natural laws, etc.,
which definitely deepen our understanding of the concepts of them; however,
scientific theories do not tell us when and where simulations, causation, natural laws,
etc., can be taken as evidence— the concept of evidence is distinct from and therefore
irreducible to the above naturalist concepts. Siding with Davidson (1973, 1974, 1975),
Kim argues that Quine cannot plausibly talk about belief attribution, belief
identification and belief classification within Quine’s fully naturalized epistemology,
because belief attribution, belief identification and belief classification presuppose
subjects’ rationality that in turn is a normative concept in epistemological studies.
According to Kim, if epistemology is fully naturalized in the way that Quine suggests,
we have to completely abandon the concept of epistemic normativity and the ensuing
new Quinean “epistemology” would be radically different and therefore
philosophically unattractive.
The defenders of Quinean naturalistic approach to epistemology, however,
disagree with Kim. They think Kim’s objection to Quine’s proposal of naturalized
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epistemology is based upon certain misunderstanding, viz., that Quine’s naturalized
epistemology save no room at all for the concept of epistemic normativity. These
defenders (for instance, Hilary Kornblith 1980, 1994, 2002) suggest that Quine’s
naturalistic approach to epistemology should be interpreted seriously. Re-consider
Quine’s famous remark as follows:
Epistemology still goes on, though in a new setting and a clarified status.
Epistemology, or something like it, simply falls into place as a chapter of
psychology and hence of natural science. It studies a natural phenomenon,
viz., a physical human subject. This human subject is accorded a certain
experimentally controlled input-certain patterns of irradiation in assorted
frequencies, for instance-and in the fullness of time the subject delivers as
output a description of the three dimensional external world and its history.
The relation between the meager input and the torrential output is a relation
that we are prompted to study for some what the same reasons that always
prompted epistemology; namely, in order to see how evidence relates to
theory, and in what ways one’s theory of nature transcends any available
evidence. (Quine 1968, pp. 82-83.)
According to Kornblith, Quine does not suggest that we have to completely abandon
the concept of epistemic normativity— what Quine does is to undermine
foundationalist program in epistemology. Kornblith suggests that there are two crucial
questions in epistemology (cf. Kornblith 1994, p. 1):
Question 1: How ought we to arrive at our belief?
Question 2: How do we arrive at our belief?
In Knornblith’s words, Quine shows us that “the only genuine questions there are to
ask about the relation between theory and evidence and about the acquisition of belief
are psychological questions” (Kornblith 1994, p. 4). What Quine reveals is that
foundationalist program in epistemology fails to engage with the genuine
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epistemological question, which concerns the relevance and relation between
questions 1 and 2. In other words, Quine’s paper establishes that “question 2 is
relevant to question 1 because it holds all the content that is left in question1”
(Kornblith 1994, p. 4) and therefore the plausible answer to question 1 cannot be
rationally developed independently from plausible answer to question 2.
Thus, it seems that Quine’s naturalistic approach to epistemology can not only
save enough room for the concept of epistemic normativity but also provide us with
rectification of certain misconceptions concerning epistemic normativity. Thus,
scientific, natural theories can help philosophers with some hints of the solutions to
some philosophical puzzles. Take epistemic skepticism for example. As some
philosophers suggest (Bernard Williams 2005, for instance), epistemic skeptics
assume certain normative view of the criterion for one to tell whether the state of
affairs S is obtaining. Epistemic skeptics think that, in order for one to tell whether S,
she/he has to satisfy both conditions as follows:
(a) One can tell that S when S; and
(b) One can tell that not-S when not-S. (Williams 2005, p.298.)
According to epistemic skeptics, one cannot have knowledge of the external world
because she/he cannot tell whether she/he is suffering from some skeptical situations,
say, being a brain in a vat (hereafter, BIV for short). Since one has no criterion for
telling whether she/he is a BIV, since she/he cannot tell that she/he is a BIV when the
BIV situation obtains (and hence she/he cannot satisfy the conjunction of (a) and (b)
simultaneously). Williams argues, however, that the above view of criterion is
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falsified by the scientific studies of “the symptoms of anoxia (lack of oxygen), against
which high-altitude pilots have to be on their guard” (Williams 2005, p. 299). As
scientific theories reveal, there are two crucial symptoms of anoxia: one is blue
finger-nails and the other is over-confidence that makes one neglect such things as
blue finger-nails. But Williams goes on to remark:
On a rather idealized version of this phenomenon, it might well be that A
could not tell that he was anoxic when he was; but it would surely be
paradoxical to suggest that therefore A could not tell that he was not anoxic
when he was not (for instance, A is you, now). (Williams 2005, p. 299)
In this view, the supposed view of criterion that is held by epistemic skeptics is
falsified and therefore rejected by the scientific considerations. In other words, the
scientific studies of the symptoms of anoxia reveals to epistemologists that a plausible
account of criterion should engage more with condition (b) rather than the conjunction
of (a) and (b). If epistemic skeptics’ view of criterion is abandoned, epistemologists
need not seriously treat those skeptical puzzles that come with the assumption of
epistemic skeptics’ view of criterion.
It seems that Quine’s insight of the relation between the answer to question1 and
the answer to question 2 is nicely illustrated by the above example. In this sense,
Kim’s objection to Quine’s proposal becomes less challenging, since the concept of
epistemic normativity still survive in Quine’s naturalized epistemology. It probably
can be further argued that Quine’s naturalized epistemology is able to help
philosophers in developing reasonable, robust account of epistemic normativity.
Quine’s naturalistic proposal can also fit into the causal theories of knowing (for
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instance, Goldman 1967). Quine’s naturalistic proposal can also be cashed out within
a “knowledge-first” framework. As some epistemologists suggest (Williamson 2000,
for example), knowing is a factive state of mind. Quinean naturalized epistemology,
with the assistance of scientific studies, is able to provide us with a causal theory of
knowing, which scientifically specifies how the very state of mind (i.e., knowing) is
caused by the perceptual simulations from the objects. If the epistemic normativity
that is implied by knowing is explainable from Quinean naturalist perspective, Kim’s
worries concerning evidence and rationality would be resolved respectively within the
“knowledge-first” framework. 2 Bearing the above consideration in mind, we may be
tempted to conclude that Quine’s naturalized epistemology is sufficient for the
concept of epistemic normativity.
It is to be shown, however, that the above optimistic view of Quine’s naturalized
epistemology neglects some crucial tension between naturalism and normativity of
knowing, which is revealed by the consideration of the Gettier problem (cf. Gettier,
1963). Alvin L. Goldman’s fake barn case is a perfect example for the current
purpose. Let us compare two situations as follows:
(Situation 1) Henry is driving through a normal countryside and sees a barn
on his left side. The barn is fully in view. Since he has excellent eyesight
and has no doubt about the identity of the barn, Henry says, “That is a
barn.”
(Situation 2) Henry is driving through the countryside and sees a barn on his
left side. The barn is fully in view. Since he has excellent eyesight and
has no doubt about the identity of the barn, Henry says, “That is a barn.”
But unknown to Henry, this countryside is full of cleverly constructed
fake barn facades, which make travelers invariably fail to tell them from
2
For instance, Williamson’s “E=K” can be used to resolve Kim’s objection from the consideration of normative
elements in the concept of evidence.
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real barns. But, fortunately, Henry has not encountered any fake barn
facades and the object that he sees is the only genuine barn in the
district.
Evidently, Henry in situation 2 is gettiered and therefore has no knowledge that the
object he sees is a barn. Given the same type of the causal simulations in both
situations, Henry in situation 1 should have the same type of the state of mind with
the one in situation 2. In both situation, the relevant causal mechanism and causal
interaction between the subject and the object should also be identical in type. As
Goldman concedes, such a comparison between the above two situations cannot be
handled merely by a causal theory of knowing (cf. Goldman 1976, p. 773), no matter
how detailed the causal story is developed.
If the above argument is correct, the Gettier problem would in turn reveal certain
inefficiency of Quinean naturalized epistemology— it fails to account for the most
crucial concept, viz., knowing, in epistemology. The normativity involved in the
concept of knowing cannot be fully captured by the naturalized, causal theory of
knowing. And any naturalized epistemology that fails to provide us with a satisfactory
account of the Gettier problem is definitely considered as unattractive. For many
philosophers (for instance, DeRose, 1995, Goldman 1976, Nozick 1981, Sosa 1999),
the normativity involved in the concept of knowing can only be handled by the
counterfactual analysis of the subjunctive conditionals, which is purely a
philosophical investigation that cannot be naturalized by a scientific, causal theory. 3
The crucial point revealed by the Gettier problem is that there is certain normative
3
It should be clarified that my argument neither concerns the debate between the sensitivity condition and safety
condition on knowing nor depends upon any specific philosophical theory of counterfactual analysis.
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element in the concept of knowing that is missing in Quinean naturalized
epistemology. If a fully naturalized “epistemology” cannot provide us with a plausible
theory of knowing that is able to handle the normative element in the concept of
knowing with respect to the Gettier problem, I think, we should side with Kim and
suggest that the supposed naturalized “epistemology” is no longer genuine
epistemology.
The above observation, however, implies that we have to be cautious when we
consider the prospect of epistemology, which may be probably a hybrid of certain
Quinean naturalist insight on the relation and relevance of the answers to both
question 1 and question 2 as well as philosophical (i.e., non-naturalized) studies of the
normative elements in the concept of knowing. In this sense, when epistemologists
investigate epistemic normativity, they would concern both naturalistic and
philosophical factors— on the one hand, naturalistic factors cast some significant
constraints upon philosophical construction concerning the concept of epistemic
normativity and help epistemologist in resisting some misleading temptation (for
instance, the skeptics’ view of criterion); on the other hand, the philosophical studies
of the concept of epistemic normativity cannot be exhausted by scientific results and
therefore cannot be completely naturalized (or replaced by psychological studies).
The complexity concerning the normativity in epistemological studies in turn reveals
the uniqueness of the concept of epistemic normativity, which is distinct from the
normativity in the ethical studies.
Reference
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