Online research in philosophy

We know a lot about the world and our place in it. We have come to this knowledge in a variety of ways. And one central way that we, both as individuals and as a society, have come to know what we do is through communication with others. Much of what we know, we know on the basis of testimony. In Knowledge on Trust, Paul Faulkner presents an epistemological theory of testimony, or a theory that explains how it is that (...) we acquire knowledge and warranted belief from testimony. -/- The key questions addressed in this book are: what makes it reasonable to accept a piece of testimony? And what warrants belief formed on this testimonial basis? Faulkner argues that existing theories of testimony largely fail because they do not recognise how issues of practical rationality motivate the first question, and this is what makes testimony distinctive as a source of knowledge. At the heart of the theory this book presents is the idea that trust is central to answering these two questions. An attitude of trust can make it reasonable to depend on another's testimony, but what warrants testimonial belief is not trust but the body of evidence the testimony originates from. Testimonial knowledge and testimonially warranted belief are formed on trust. Faulkner goes on to argue that our having a way of life wherein testimony is such a source of knowledge then depends on a certain kind of trust being possible. (shrink)

A conversation is more than a series of disconnected remarks because it is conducted against a background presumption of cooperation. But what makes it reasonable to presume that one is engaged in a conversation? What makes it reasonable to presume cooperation? This paper considers Grice’s two ways ofanswering this question and argues for the one he discarded. It does so by means of considering a certain problem and analysis of trust.

In trusting a speaker we adopt a credulous attitude, and this attitude is basic: it cannot be reduced to the belief that the speaker is trustworthy or reliable. However, like this belief, the attitude of trust provides a reason for accepting what a speaker says. Similarly, this reason can be good or bad; it is likewise epistemically evaluable. This paper aims to present these claims and offer a genealogical justification of them.

A key debate in the epistemology of testimony concerns when it is reasonable to acquire belief through accepting what a speaker says. This debate has been largely understood as the debate over how much, or little, assessment and monitoring an audience must engage in. When it is understood in this way the debate simply ignores the relationship speaker and audience can have. Interlocutors rarely adopt the detached approach to communication implied by talk of assessment and monitoring. Audiences trust speakers to (...) be truthful and demonstrate certain reactive attitudes if they are not. Trust and the accompanying willingness to these reactive attitudes can then provide speakers with a reason to be trustworthy. So through ignoring interlocutors' engagement with the communicative process, the existing debate misses the possibility that it is an audience's trusting a speaker that makes it reasonable for the audience to accept what the speaker says. (shrink)

One thing wrong with lying is that it can be manipulative. Understanding why lying can be a form of manipulation involves understanding how our telling someone something can give them a reason to believe it, and understanding this requires seeing both how our telling things can invite trust and how trust can be a reason to believe someone. This paper aims to outline the mechanism by means of which lies can be manipulative and through doing so identify a unique reason (...) for accepting testimony; a reason based on trusting a speaker’s telling. (shrink)

We must allow that knowledge can be transmitted. But to allow this is to allow that an individual can know a proposition despite lacking any evidence for it and reaching belief by an unreliable means. So some explanation is required as to how knowledge rather than belief is transmitted. This paper considers two non-individualistic explanations: one in terms of knowledge existing autonomously, the other in terms of it existing as a property of communities. And it attempts to decide what is (...) at issue between these explanations. (shrink)

As sources of knowledge, perception and testimony are both vulnerable to sceptical arguments. To both arguments a Moorean response is possible: both can be refuted by reference to particular things known by perception and testimony. However, lies and dreams are different possibilities and they are different in a way that undercuts the plausibility of a Moorean response to a scepticism of testimony. The condition placed on testimonial knowledge cannot be trivially satisfi ed in the way the Moorean would suggest. This (...) has substantial implications for any non-sceptical epistemological theory of testimony. (shrink)

We depend upon the community for justified belief in scientific theory. This dependence can suggest that our individual belief in scientific theory is justified because the community believes it to be justified. This idea is at the heart of an anti-realist epistemology according to which there are no facts about justification that transcend a community's judgement thereof. Ultimately, knowledge and justified belief are simply social statuses. When conjoined with the lemma that communities can differ in what they accept as justified, (...) epistemological anti-realism entails epistemological relativism. Further, this lemma can also be used to generate an argument for relativism and, thereby, for anti-realism. So if an epistemologically realist account of our justification for belief in scientific theory is to be given, then it must be possible, first, to defend a realist interpretation of the idea that individual belief can be community-justified and second, to defend it in a way that is compatible with the fact of possible community diversity. This paper tries to meet these challenges. (shrink)

Through communication, we form beliefs about the world, its history, others and ourselves. A vast proportion of these beliefs we count as knowledge. We seem to possess this knowledge only because it has been communicated. If those justifications that depended on communication were outlawed, all that would remain would be body of illsupported prejudice. The recognition of our ineradicable dependence on testimony for much of what we take ourselves to know has suggested to many that an epistemological account of testimony (...) should be essentially similar to accounts of perception and memory. This premise I want to dispute. (shrink)

In Conspiracies and Lyes I aim to provide an epistemological account of testimony as one of our faculties of knowledge. I compare testimony to perception and memory. Its similarity to both these faculties is recognised. A fundamental difference is stressed: it can be rational to not accept testimony even if testimony is fulfilling its proper epistemic function because it can be rational for a speaker to not express a belief; or, as I say, it can be rational for a speaker (...) to lye. This difference in epistemic function provides the basis for a sceptical argument against testimony. Scepticism is presented as a method rather than a problem: considering how to refute the sceptical argument is taken to be a means of evaluating theories as to how testimonial beliefs are warranted. I consider two strategies for refuting scepticism and, correlatively, two accounts of how testimonial beliefs are warranted. I show these accounts to be neutral across all theories of justification that entertain the project of investigating our faculties of knowledge. A reductionist account explains the warrant supporting our testimonial beliefs in terms of our inductive ground for accepting testimony. An anti-reductionist account explains the warrant supporting our testimonial beliefs in terms of our possessing an entitlement to accept testimony. I show how both positions can be intuitively motivated. In presenting reductionism I appeal to probability theory, empirical psychology and invoke David Hume. In presenting anti-reductionism I invoke John McDowell and Tyler Burge. A refutation of scepticism is provided by a hybrid of reductionism and anti-reductionism. The hybrid is conceived as part social externalism and part individual internalism. In developing this account I provide a means of conceptualising the dynamic that exists between individual knowers and communities of knowledge. (shrink)

David Hume advances a reductionist epistemology of testimony: testimonial beliefs are justified on the basis of beliefs formed from other sources. This reduction, however, has been misunderstood. Testimonial beliefs are not justified in a manner identical to ordinary empirical beliefs; it is true, they are justified by observation of the conjunction between testimony and its truth, it is the nature of the conjunctions that has been misunderstood. The observation of these conjunctions provides us with our knowledge of human nature and (...) it is this knowledge which justifies our testimonial beliefs. Hume gives a naturalistic rather than sceptical account of testimony. (shrink)