Online research in philosophy

: In this paper I argue that Kant's distinction in the Inaugural Dissertation between the sensible and the intelligible arises in part out of certain open questions left open by his comparison between mathematics and metaphysics in the Prize Essay. This distinction provides a philosophical justification for his distinction between the respective methods of mathematics and metaphysics and his claim that mathematics admits of a greater degree of certainty. More generally, this illustrates the importance of Kant's reflections on mathematics for the development of his Critical philosophy.

The teleological/deontological distinction was introduced in 1930 by C.D. Broad] and since then it has come to be accepted as the fundamental classificatory distinction for moral philosophy. I shall argue that the presupposition that there is a single fundamental classificatory distinction is false. There are too many features of moral theories that matter for that to be so. I shall argue furthermore that as it is usually drawn the teleological/deontological distinction is not even a fundamental distinction. Another distinction, that between theories that make the right depend solely on considerations of goodness (axiological theories) and those that do not, is significantly more important.

Most attempts at separating out those consequences of an empirical theory which play a purely linguistic role (i.e., the "analytic" consequences) from the rest have assumed a distinction between the observation and theoretical terms in the language of the theory. Since there has been much debate concerning this distinction and since there do not seem to be any intrinsic reasons why "analyticity" should be tied to it, we propose in this paper an explication of "theoretical analyticity" which does not rely upon the distinction.

Internalism in epistemology is the view that all the factors relevant to the justification of a belief are importantly internal to the believer, while externalism is the view that at least some of those factors are external. This extremely modest first approximation cries out for refinement (which we undertake below), but is enough to orient us in the right direction, namely that the debate between internalism and externalism is bound up with the controversy over the correct account of the distinction between justified beliefs and unjustified beliefs.1 Understanding that distinction has occasionally been obscured by attention to the analysis of knowledge and to the Gettier problem, but our view is that these problems, while interesting, should not completely seduce philosophers away from central questions about epistemic justification. A plausible starting point in the discussion of justification is that the distinction between justified beliefs and unjustified beliefs is not the same as the distinction between true beliefs and false beliefs. This follows from the mundane observation that it is possible to rationally believe..

The distinction between hard and soft facts has been used by compatibilists to argue that God's divine foreknowledge is not incompatible with human free will. The debate over this distinction has ignored the question of the justification of divine knowledge. I argue that the distinction between hard and soft facts is illusory because the existence of soft facts presupposes that justification exists. Moreover, if the hard fact /soft fact distinction collapses, then God justifiably knows all future events, and human beings cannot possess free will.

Hare shares with other critics an objection to the use of moral judgments in the method of reflective equilibrium. However, the reasoning behind his criticismdistinguishes it from the more common criticisms that the use of moral judgments is unwarranted because of their suspect origin. While these objections challenge the epistemic worth of moral beliefs, Hare’s objection goes beyond to also critique the deeper theoretical commitments of the method. Hare’s acceptance of a strict differentiation between the meaning and applications of words and consequent rejection of holistic justification follow from his acceptance of the analytic/synthetic distinction, while Rawls’s holistic method of theory justification requires a rejection of the analytic/synthetic distinction. In this essay, I explain how Hare’s criticism of the method of reflective equilibrium and his acceptance of the meaning/application distinction result from his acceptance of the analytic/synthetic distinction and draw from this specific discussion more general conclusions regarding the implications of accepting or rejecting the analytic/synthetic distinction for the use of moral judgments in moral theory justification. I conclude that an acceptance of the distinction precludes the use of moral judgments, while its rejection leaves open the possibility that they could be used, if the issue of their epistemic status can be successfully resolved.

Reichenbach's well-known distinction between the context of discovery and the context of justification has recently come under attack from several quarters. In this paper I attempt to reconsider the distinction and evaluate various recent criticisms of it. These criticisms fall into two main groups: those which directly challenge Reichenbach's distinction; and those which (I argue) indirectly but no less seriously challenge that distinction by rejecting the related distinction between psychology and epistemology, and defending the "naturalizing" of epistemology. I argue that these recent criticisms fail, and that the distinction remains an important conceptual tool necessary for an adequate understanding of the way in which scientific claims purport to appropriately portray our natural environment.

We attack the SSK's rejection of the distinction between discovery and justification (the DJ distinction), famously introduced by Hans Reichenbach and here defended in a "lean" version. Some critics claim that the DJ distinction cannot be drawn precisely, or that it cannot be drawn prior to the actual analysis of scientific knowledge. Others, instead of trying to blur or to reject the distinction, claim that we need an even more fine-grained distinction (e.g. between discovery, invention, prior assessment, test and justification). Adherents of the SSK, however, maintain that the distinction is useless and perhaps nonexistent. We first argue against the assumption that the SSK's objection to the DJ distinction is just the same as Thomas Kuhn's. Second, we point out general weaknesses of the SSK's arguments against the DJ distinction. Finally, we argue that the distinction is useful not only in order to explicate what is meant by an evaluation but even for the empirical explanation of knowledge. We use two case studies from the history of cognitive science to support this point.

Two of W. V. Quine''s most familiar doctrines are his endorsement of the distinction between underdetermination and indeterminacy, and his rejection of the distinction between analytic and synthetic truths. The author argues that these two doctrines are incompatible. In terms wholly acceptable to Quine, and based on the underdetermination/indeterminacy distinction, the author draws an exhaustive and exclusive distinction between two kinds of true sentences, and then argues that this corresponds to the traditional analytic/synthetic distinction. In an appendix the author expands on one aspect of the underdetermination/indeterminacy distinction, as construed here, and discusses, in passing, some of Quine''s more general views on truth.

The author argues that the concept of justification is viewed best through elucidation of the processes of ethical and epistemic justification, with specific attention paid to what has been dubbed the "internalist/externalist" distinction in such justification. The first part of the argument clarifies the nature of the distinction as it occurs in ethics and then epistemic justification, noting that there is a parallel between the uses of the distinction, but that it is the way in which the uses are not parallel that is most salient for conceptual purposes. The author then claims that there is an analogous distinction, frequently made in ethical justification, and that is the alleged normative/descriptive distinction. A look at the intersection of that distinction with the internalist/externalist juncture yields the notion that epistemic justification, in particular, could benefit from an externalist/ descriptive approach. Finally, the author argues that we would do well to apply some of the work of the social sciences to epistemic justification theory. The author concludes that the concept of justification includes all four components (internalist, externalist, nor mative, and descriptive) and that clarification of justification simpliciter involves an examination of justification in its various modes.