Epistemological Theories

Defendendo a união entre a razão e a experiência como a possibilidade de instauração do desenvolvimento científico, Bacon se contrapõe à indução aristotélica enquanto procedimento que implica a enumeração de casos particulares tendo em vista o objetivo de encontrar o geral existente em todos e em cada um deles em um processo que se detém na soma de fatos, limitando-se à comunicação, na medida em que não tem capacidade de empreender a descoberta do conhecimento. Dessa forma, sobrepondo-se ao acúmulo de (...) fatos sem método, Bacon institui a indução por subtração enquanto processo baseado na eliminação sistemática de experiências inconclusivas, que converge para atribuir valor às experiências negativas e impede as generalizações prematuras, instaurando o experimento enquanto experiência guiada e disciplinada pelo intelecto na fundação do empirismo moderno. (shrink)

O referido trabalho de pesquisa se detém no desenvolvimento do pensamento científico através de uma construção teórico-conceitual baseada em Aristóteles, Bacon, Kant e Popper, convergindo para uma investigação que assinala desde a fundação da ciência em um processo que traz como perspectiva a ciência da substância (ou ciência das quatro causas) de Aristóteles, mostrando a contribuição de Bacon para a instauração da ciência moderna por intermédio da concepção de um novo método indutivo e da união entre ciência e técnica com (...) o objetivo de assegurar o domínio humano sobre a natureza. Dessa forma, o texto também se detém nas implicações epistemológicas da revolução copernicana de Immanuel Kant, cuja perspectiva, emergindo das fronteiras que inter-relacionam o racionalismo de Leibniz, o empirismo de Hume e a ciência positiva físico-matemática de Newton, instaura o horizonte do idealismo transcendental, estabelecendo a correlação fundamental envolvendo o sujeito e o objeto do conhecimento. Finalizando, a investigação sublinha que, se a leitura da epistemologia clássica e a perspectiva dos adeptos do "empirismo lógico" assinalam que a ciência demanda a exclusão de tudo aquilo que não se impõe ao horizonte que envolve a dedutibilidade analítica e a verificabilidade, Karl Popper defende que mais do que saber quando e em que condição uma teoria dialoga com a verdade a relevância não acena senão para a demarcação entre ciência e não ciência, particularmente no tocante às fronteiras que abrangem a ciência que carrega autenticidade (que emerge através da construção de Newton, submetida ao aperfeiçoamento e à correção de Einstein) e as ideologias (marxismo e psicanálise), tornando-se imprescindível a busca de uma resposta para a questão referente ao critério capaz de estabelecer o estatuto científico de um universo teórico ou de um enunciado. (shrink)

I argue against the Standard View of ignorance, according to which ignorance is defined as equivalent to lack of knowledge, that cases of environmental epistemic luck, though entailing lack of knowledge, do not necessarily entail ignorance. In support of my argument, I contend that in cases of environmental luck an agent retains what I call epistemic access to the relevant fact by successfully exercising her epistemic agency and that ignorance and non-ignorance, contrary to what the Standard View predicts, are not (...) modal in the sense that knowledge is. After responding to objections, I conclude by sketching an alternative account of ignorance centered on the notions of epistemic access and epistemic agency. (shrink)

Epistemic absolutism holds that knowledge‐that is ungradable, while epistemic gradualism argues the opposite. This paper purports to remodel the gradualism/absolutism debate. The current model initiated by Stephen Hetherington fails to capture the genuine divergence between the two views, which makes the debate equivocal, and the gradualist side lacks appeal. I propose that the remodeled debate should focus on whether knowledge‐that is a ‘threshold concept’ or a ‘spectrum concept’. That is, whether there is a threshold distinguishing knowledge from non‐knowledge. The reconstructed (...) model enjoys significant advantages as it enables the debate to be more balanced and philosophically interesting. (shrink)

Le livre se propose d'étudier la philosophie de Clarence I. Lewis (1883-1964), auteur méconnu dans l'histoire de la pensée. Toutefois, à son époque, il était un des philosophes les plus populaires aux Etats-Unis. Plusieurs des idées de ses disciples célèbres (Quine, Goodman, Sellars) sont déjà présentes dans ses écrits. Lors de leur arrivée en Amérique, les néopositivistes ne rencontrèrent pas seulement en sa personne un avocat du pragmatisme, mais aussi un interlocuteur intéressé par leurs sujets et versé dans leur méthodologie (...) logique. L'étude propose l'analyse détaillée de sa position épistémologique. La compréhension du donné dans le sens préépistémologique comme expérience immédiate (contre le mythe du donné), l'entente fonctionnaliste des a priori (nécessaires pragmatiquement, mais sans statut ontologique privilégié) et la conception de la connaissance comme activité (l'interprétation comme interaction, contre la théorie copiste), faillible, mais capable d'assurer la vérité nécessaire pour la vie pratique, constituent un sujet d'étude passionant aujourd'hui. (shrink)

Daniel Greco (forthcoming) argues that there cannot be epistemic dilemmas. I argue that he is wrong.

In this paper, we set out to inquire into how exactly testimony is and should be placed within the framework of virtue epistemology, and more specifically within Ernest Sosa’s exposition and defense thereof. We begin this inquiry (in Sect. 3.2) by formulating conditions of adequacy that can be extracted from recent criticisms of virtue epistemological approaches more generally. In Sect. 3.3, we reconstruct two branches of Sosa’s treatment of testimony, with respect to which we point out problems of inner coherence (...) and compatibility. We won’t stop there but then go on to see first (in Sect. 3.4) whether and, if so, how the two branches can be balanced out within the architecture of Sosa’s theory of knowledge. And second (in Sect. 3.5), we offer and outline a more comprehensive account that solves not just the problems formulated at the outset, but also a number of problems identified along the way. (shrink)

An affective approach to culture and cognition may hold the key to uniting findings across experimental psychology and, eventually, the human sciences. Many accounts of the human mind concentrate on the brain’s computational power, yet for nearly 200 million years before humans developed a capacity to reason the emotional centers of the brain were running the show. To attain a clearer picture of the evolution of mind, we challenge the cognitivist and behaviorist paradigms in psychology by exploring how the emotional (...) capacities that we share with other animals saturate every thought and perception. Many of the distinctive social and cultural behaviors of our species, including, bonding, social learning, hierarchy, decision-making, self-identity, can be integrated if we use an affective approach. (shrink)

Epistemic absolutism is an orthodox view that propositional knowledge is an ungradable concept. Absolutism is primarily grounded in our ungradable uses of “knows” in ordinary language. This paper advances a thorough objection to the linguistic argument for absolutism. My objection consists of two parts. Firstly, arguments for absolutism provided by Jason Stanley and Julien Dutant will be refuted respectively. After that, two more general refutation-strategies will be proposed: counterevidence against absolutism can be found in both English and non-English languages; the (...) linguistic argument for absolutism is subject to a methodological mistake as the linguistic usages of “knows” cannot accurately reflect its conceptual nature. Therefore, we should give epistemic gradualism, as opposed to absolutism, a more serious consideration. (shrink)

Der Beitrag beleuchtet die Struktur und Funktion forschender Laborpraxis vor dem Hintergrund verschiedener erkenntnis- und wissenschaftstheoretischer Positionen. Das Labor kann in seiner Relevanz unterschätzt werden – mit Blick auf die darin verrichteten praktischen Tätigkeiten, auf dabei erforderliche Urteilsbildungen und nicht zuletzt auf unverzichtbare Impulse für die Wissenschaft. Die abstrakte Gegenüberstellung von Theorie und Praxis ist aufzugeben. Zugleich sollte Wissenschaft weder allein über das Labor noch über die Theoriebildung bestimmt werden. Abschließend plädiert der Beitrag dafür, die skizzierten Fragestellungen in die Labordidaktik (...) sowie in die Planung und Durchführung von Lernlaboren einzubeziehen. (shrink)

Epistemological disjunctivism argues that one can have perceptual knowledge that p in virtue of being in possession of factive and reflectively accessible rational support, e.g., one’s ‘seeing that p’. A well-known challenge to this view is the so-called basis problem of epistemological disjunctivism, which argues that one’s ‘seeing that p’ cannot constitute the rational support for one’s knowledge that p, as ‘seeing that p’ is just a way of ‘knowing that p’. The basis problem is taken to be based on (...) the entailment thesis, viz, ‘seeing that p’ entails ‘knowing that p’. Mainstream solutions to the basis problem take an approach rejecting the entailment thesis. This paper purports to reveal a common defect of those extant solutions. That is, they all fail to address the basis problem in the central domain of discussion of epistemological disjunctivism, i.e., what Pritchard refers to as ‘paradigmatic cases’. Moreover, even if they succeed in rejecting the entailment thesis in paradigmatic cases, they would also backfire on epistemological disjunctivism. (shrink)

Essential for the concept of the law of nature is not only spatio-temporal universality, but also functionality in the sense of the dependency on physical conditions of natural entities. In the following it is explained in detail that just the neglect of this functional property is to be understood as the real reason for the occurrence of the Goodman paradox. As a consequence, the behavior of things seems to be completely at the mercy of the temporal change of unique absolute (...) temporal points. It is exactly this (mis-)understanding that also generated the induction problem. From the intrinsic connection between universality and functionality, however, - that is my claim - the ontological consequence of a nature results, for which the potentiality of lawfulness is coupled to essentially functionally defined time sequences. (shrink)

Tracking theories see knowledge as a relation between a subject’s belief and the truth, where the former is responsive to the latter. This relationship involves causation in virtue of a sensitivity condition, which is constrained by an adherence condition. The result is what I call a stable causal relationship between a fact and a subject’s belief in that fact. I argue that when we apprehend the precise role of causation in the theory, previously obscured problems pour out. This paper presents (...) thirteen distinct and original counterexamples to Nozick’s tracking theory—many of which also constitute problems for more recent tracking theories. I begin by discussing how tracking relates to causation: Nozick invokes causation through conditions similar to those of Lewisian causal dependence. As a result, when causal dependence is not necessary for causation, Nozick fails to identify knowledge. I then address the inability of causation to capture epistemically important concepts, such as justification and truth. I conclude by discussing the underlying asymmetries between causation and knowledge that undermine any attempt to reduce knowledge to a purely metaphysical relation. (shrink)

This book discusses the evolution of three philosophical foundations from the twelfth through the eighteenth centuries that converged to form the basis of liberal democracy’s approach to the place and role of religion in society and politics. Identified as a “religious axis,” the period of convergence promoted rational and empirical investigation, enabled the development of diverse religious beliefs, and affirmed religious liberty and expressions amidst pluralist politics. The religious axis’ three philosophical foundations―epistemic, axiological, and political―undergird the political architecture of American (...) liberal democracy that designed a containment structure to protect a vast array of religious expressions and encourage their presence in the public square. Moreover, the structure embodied a democratic ethos that drives religious and political pluralism―but within limits. This containment structure has paradoxically ignited frenzied fires of faith that politically threaten the structure’s own limits. (shrink)

Modalists think that knowledge requires forming your belief in a “modally stable” way: using a method that wouldn't easily go wrong (i.e. safety), or using a method that wouldn't have given you this belief had it been false (i.e. sensitivity). Recent Modalist projects from Justin Clarke-Doane and Dan Baras defend a principle they call “Modal Security,” roughly: if evidence undermines your belief, then it must give you a reason to doubt the safety or sensitivity of your belief. Another recent Modalist (...) project from Carlotta Pavese and Bob Beddor defends “Modal Virtue Epistemology”: knowledge is a belief that is maximally modally robust across “normal” worlds. We'll offer new objections to these recent Modalist projects. We will then argue for a rival view, Explanationism: knowing something is believing it because it's true. We will show how Explanationism offers a better account of undermining defeaters than Modalism, and a better account of knowledge. (shrink)

This paper compares epistemic virtue from the viewpoints of Zagzebski and Mulla Sadra, aiming to determine the extent to which their viewpoints on epistemic virtue are similar. Zagzebski, the contemporary philosopher, considers epistemic virtue as the basis on which knowledge is interpreted. She sees epistemic virtue as a requirement for achieving knowledge. Mulla Sadra, the founder of Transcendent Philosophy, considers knowledge as an outcome of intellectual virtues without which there would be no knowledge. The role these two philosophers ascribe to (...) moral and intellectual virtues and vices in forming the identity makes it possible to compare their interpretation of epistemic virtues. As a virtue responsibilist, Zagzebski sees epistemic virtue as a character trait and explains its nature by its different components. Sadra as well, sees epistemic virtue as a character trait. Evidence shows that Sadra’s definition of intellectual virtues is similar to that given by Zagzebski in many respects. Examining Zagzebski’s viewpoint on epistemic virtue, this paper will discuss Sadra’s viewpoint on epistemic virtue as well as its contribution to knowledge. In conclusion the similarities of the two viewpoints will be delineated. (shrink)

Sensitivity is a modal epistemic principle. Modal knowledge accounts are externalist in nature and claim that the knowledge yielding connection between a true belief and the truthmaker must be spelled out in modal terms. The sensitivity condition was introduced by Robert Nozick. He suggests that if S knows that p, then S’s belief that p tracks truth. Nozick argues that this truth-tracking relation can be captured by subjunctive conditionals. As a first approximation, he provides the following modal analysis of knowledge: (...) S knows that p iff (1) p is true; (2) S believes that p; (3) if p were false, S wouldn’t believe that p and (4) if p were true, S would believe that p. The dominant terminology in the literature, also adopted here, is to call condition (3) the sensitivity condition and condition (4) the adherence condition. The sensitivity condition is intuitively appealing since it states that a subject does not know that p if she would believe that p even if p were false. Nozick used the sensitivity condition to accomplish two major tasks. First, he provided a solution to the Gettier problem by arguing that in Gettier cases subjects do not know since the sensitivity condition is violated. Second, he presented a controversial solution to the skeptical problem according to which we have external world knowledge but do not know that the skeptical hypothesis is false. This solution is available because sensitivity is not closed under known entailment. Quickly, criticism of the sensitivity condition emerged. First, most epistemologists regarded the price of abandoning knowledge closure as a price too high to pay. Second, it was noted that sensitivity leads to the counterintuitive consequence of precluding us from inductive knowledge since induction typically yields insensitive beliefs. The most dominant reaction to these problems was to replace sensitivity by the modal principle of safety, nowadays the most popular modal principle. However, sensitivity is not only important as a starting point of modal epistemology. Because of its intuitive attractiveness, many authors aimed at refining the original sensitivity account in order to avoid well-known problems. This has led to a second wave of sensitivity accounts. As of today, various sensitivity-based theories are on the market, including accounts that avoid closure failure, probabilistic interpretations of sensitivity and adherence, and contextualist approaches. There is thus a vivid and ongoing debate about the sensitivity principle in epistemology. (shrink)

Author’s Preface in English: My Two Discoveries and Their Philosophical Significance As long as a person opens his eyes to face this world, he will meet the problems discussed in this book. Is the red color of flowers and the green color of grass displayed in front of our eyes only sensations in our minds or objective existence as the same as we see? Is a color perception similar to or different from a natural light that objectively exists? The further (...) question is: Are red flowers and green grass just our sensations in minds or what objectively exists in the way as we see, or what exists differently from our sensations? As early as ancient ages of Greece, atomists gave us a rather scientific answer. It is said that what objectively exists is only the material world made of atomics. The motion of atomics causes human sensations. Color, sound, smell… are all human sensations, and related to human sense organs’ conformations, and different from those atoms that cause sensations (I will explain why the answer is not entirely correct later). The answer from modern natural science is very similar. However, this answer brings a series of philosophical problems that puzzle us. If red and green colors are only sensations in human minds, why red flower and green grass are not? If a sensation is totally different from the external object or its property that causes a sensation, how can we know the appearance of the outside object itself? The problems brought by atomists are just revealed by the philosophically fundamental questions proposed by Engels, i.e., the question about the relationship between thinking and existence, which includes two questions: the question about the original existence of the world and the question about whether the world is knowable. I know there is a fashionable opinion: the fundamental question in philosophy, or the question about the original existence of the world, is a false question, and the argument between materialism and idealism is meaningless because there are no different sensations or experiences deduced from the affirmations about whether the world is made of matter or spirit. But, I still persist in discussing the fundamental questions in philosophy. This is not because I have some faith and fight for the faith, neither because I have encyclopedical knowledge so that I can provide better summing-up. This is only because I happened to have two discoveries, which force me and also force academe，to review the fundamental questions in philosophy from a new visual angle to get conclusions that accord with natural science better. My first discovery is that idealism, positivism，and materialism (mainly native materialism) all wrongly understand the relationship between language, sensations, and outside objects. In daily life, we define words “red”, “green”, “acid”, “salt”, “soft”, “hard”, “cold”, “hot” and son on actually according to outside objects instead of sensations. The conformability of people’s speaking language cannot ensure the conformability of their sensations (for example, it is possible that two persons conformably say “flower is red and the grass is green” and have opposite color perceptions ). It is unfeasible to reduce the world with red, green, acid, salt, cold, hot, and other material properties into sensations as idealism does, into world-elements as Machism does, or into sense-data as logical empiricism does. It is also unfeasible to affirm that a sensation is similar to a material property as inornate materialism does. This discovery forces me to believe that 1) The world described by daily language is not the natural world, phenomenological world, or presentational world proposed by Kant, neither neutral world or a world made of elements or sense data, but the material world that objectively exists as affirmed by materialism. 2) Atomists in ancient Greece and symbolists, such as Kant and Helmholtz of Germany, are correct in affirming the dissimilarity between a sensation and a material property that causes the sensation. Atomism and mechanical materialism represented by John Locke’s theory affirm that the motion of Atoms or matter causes human sensations; yet, a consciousness and a material property are totally dissimilar. However, symbolists represented by Kant and Helmholtz further affirm that the sensations in organs are only symbols, they are discretional, and there is no certain one-to-one relation between a sensation and a material property. This point of view is called agnosticism. So far, my above conclusion is probably also thought of as agnosticism. However, I happened to have a second discovery. My second discovery is that there exists a skillful mathematical model of color vision——the decoding model 【8～10】, whose principle is similar to the principle of 3-8 decoder in numeric circuits. The model can explain various phenomena of color vision, especially the evolution of color vision, better. We can conclude from the decoding model that 1) A color perception is only a symbol that can continuously vary. 2) A series of color perceptions contain information from external objects since different color perceptions reflect different natural lights, even if a color perception is dissimilar to a material property. 3) The mechanism of color vision was continuously evolving for the requirement of discerning outside objects. The presentational or phenomenological world was involving with the mechanism of color vision involving, by which the objectify theory developed by Feuerbach and Marx can be explained in the way of natural science. The generalized information theory I set up is tightly related to my second discovery. For measuring the information conveyed by color vision, I extended Shannon’s information theory to general information theory, which can measure and optimize sensitive information, as well as the information conveyed by language and forecasts. The results from the generalized information theory are consistent not only with common sense but also with Popper’s philosophical theory. For example, according to this theory, the more necessary an occasional event is predicted as, and the prediction can be proved correct by facts, the more information the prediction conveys; a proposition that is true in any case provides no information; a lie or bad prediction conveys negative information; it will decrease the information we have had to believe a fortune teller is running off at the mouth. There are mainly two kinds of agnosticism. One is Kant’s agnosticism, which affirms thing-in-itself (or objective thing) is unknowable. Another is Hume’s agnosticism, which affirms the relationship between a cause and a result (or objective rule) is unknowable. Marx’s practice-testing theory and Popper’s knowledge-evolving theory can resolve the problem with Hume’s agnosticism. But, about whether the problem with Kant’s agnosticism has been resolved, there are still arguments. Kant would have said that what you have resolved is only the problem about whether the phenomenological world is knowable; however, you still cannot resolve the problem about whether the thing-in-itself, which is totally different from sensations, is knowable. Now, with the help of my two discoveries and new information theory, we can have two ways to prove the thing-in-itself is knowable. 1) We know that the objects described by daily language are knowable. Yet, the objects pointed by daily language are just material objects themselves. So, material objects themselves are knowable, or say, the thing-in-itself is knowable. 2) Although sensations are dissimilar to material objects or their properties, they contain information about material objects. This information can be measured by the generalized information formula similar to Shannon’s information formula. So, the material object or the thing-in-itself is knowable from the point of view of natural science. Moreover, my research concerning lingual information also supports Mark’s practice-testing theory and Popper’s knowledge-evolving theory. So, agnosticism does not fit my standpoint at all. For explaining the relationship between sensations and outside objects and summarizing up my research, I proposed analog-symbolic theory or analog-symbolism, which is based on Darwin’s theory of evolution, the theories of color and color vision developed by Young and many later researchers, and also my theories on color vision and information. The analog-symbolism is also the extension of the relativistic principle from physics to philosophy. It accepts atomists and mechanical materialists’ viewpoint about the relation between the sensation and the outside object (the motion of matter results in the sensation, however a sensation and a material property are dissimilar), affirms and extends Kant and Helmholtz’s symbolism, carries on the relativity thought in Feuerbach and Marx’s objectify theory (for resolving the problem with Kant’s dualism), inherits Lenin and many materialists’ viewpoint that color, sound, smell… objectively exist（against idealism and positivism）. This book has both scientific explorations and philosophical analyses. However, what it provides is very different from a popular scientific philosophy. The popular scientific philosophy is supposed to sum up, and guide science. But my effort is the opposite. I always try to base my philosophy on science. For example, I use a mathematical model of color vision to explain that the sensations are analog symbols, use the information theory to resolve the problems with agnosticism, and extend relativity principle from physics to philosophy. I have unified many very extreme standpoints together in my theory. These standpoints look mutually repulsive to other people, yet from my viewpoint, they are not contradictive with each other but very compatible. The primary purpose of this book is to eliminate the people’s bepuzzlement about the fundamental questions in philosophy. Before writing this book, I wrote another book: “Mystery of Beauty-feeling and Evolution of Demand,” whose primary purpose is to eliminate the people’s bepuzzlement about problems with beauty-feeling and demand. It is also based on some discoveries — about the arising rule of pleasant feelings and avian esthetic interest. These two books respectively discuss the cognitive relationship and motivational relationship between humans and outside would. They are comprehensive summing-up of my many years’ researches. If my effort is not ineffectual, I will be incomparably gratified. Lu, Chenguang . (shrink)

Based on the analysis of the short treatise De divinatione daemonum and some others references in Augustinian texts, this article aims to retrace Augustine of Hyppo’s position about the nature of demons and their capacity to foretell future events. In particular, the research will explore some epistemological topics as the role of imagination and his phantasmata in the cognitive processes, the semiotic nature of demonic foreknowledge, the difference between angelic, divine, demonic and human knowledge. Finally, we’ll draw a summary map (...) of the historical transformations of the demonic cognition’s theme, from time to time auctoritas, source and philosophical argument. (shrink)

This article compares and contrasts the reception of Comte’s positivism in the works of William Whewell, John Stuart Mill and Franz Brentano. It is argued that Whewell’s rejection of positivism derives from his endorsement of a constructivist account of the inductive sciences, while Mill and Brentano’s sympathies for positivism are connected to their endorsement of an empiricist account. The mandate of the article is to spell out the chief differences between these two rival accounts. In the last, conclusive section, Whewell’s (...) anti-positivist argument is briefly assessed, and rebutted. (shrink)

According to a common conception of legal proof, satisfying a legal burden requires establishing a claim to a numerical threshold. Beyond reasonable doubt, for example, is often glossed as 90% or 95% likelihood given the evidence. Preponderance of evidence is interpreted as meaning at least 50% likelihood given the evidence. In light of problems with the common conception, I propose a new ‘relevant alternatives’ framework for legal standards of proof. Relevant alternative accounts of knowledge state that a person knows a (...) proposition when their evidence rules out all relevant error possibilities. I adapt this framework to model three legal standards of proof—the preponderance of evidence, clear and convincing evidence, and beyond reasonable doubt standards. I describe virtues of this framework. I argue that, by eschewing numerical thresholds, the relevant alternatives framework avoids problems inherent to rival models. I conclude by articulating aspects of legal normativity and practice illuminated by the relevant alternatives framework. (shrink)

Language research is currently in a state of flux. The phenomenon of language is not merely the topic of investigation in linguistics, it is examined by a multitude of scholars with different scientific backgrounds. In order to examine how these various disciplines approach language, a think-tank was founded in 2002, called DITO, Dynamisch Inter(-en trans)disciplinair onderzoek, or Dynamic Inter- (and trans)disciplinary Research. The think-tank is located at the Belgian Vrije Universiteit Brussel (Free University of Brussels). This book provides short introductory (...) articles to the language research conducted by some of the think-tank’s most important members, from within the point of view of the following 5 disciplines: philosophy of evolutionary biology, cognitive science, neuroscience, sign language research and artificial intelligence. (shrink)

This work has as its main goal to discuss two different epistemic proposals, both under the reliabilist handle. The first one, developed by Alvin Goldman, has as its central goal to offer an adequate characterization of the justificational element present in the standard account of knowledge. Goldman's proposal has the initial challenge of properly explaining Gettier's demand presented some years earlier, but also to correct some more central problems that affect his own causal theory of knowledge. However, the externalist proposal (...) within Goldman's reliabilism faced some serious attacks directed to its notion of justification. Three of these attacks became well known in the recent literature: the generality problem, the meta-incoherence problem and the new evil genius problem. Each one in its own way has established challenges to the his reliabilist account. The second reliabilist theory we will discuss consists in a reformulation of Goldman's account, defended mainly by Ernest Sosa in a series of very important works in contemporary epistemology. In these works, Sosa was able to insert the notion of intellectual virtues in the epistemological debate, bringing to the center of the externalist debate an idea of a responsible belief formation, and at the same time trying to give a proper answer to the more central challenges faced by original reliabilism. In the first part of the paper I present the first of these theories, and after that I offer a treatment of Sosa's reformulation of reliabilism and a defense of this proposal as a more adequate theory to deal with some basic demands of a proper theory of justification. (shrink)

On an evidentialist position, it is epistemically rational for us to believe propositions that are (stably) supported by our total evidence. We are epistemically permitted to believe such propositions, and perhaps even ought to do so. Epistemic rationality is normative. One popular way to explain the normativity appeals to epistemic teleology. The primary aim of this paper is to argue that appeals to epistemic teleology do not support that we ought to believe what is rational to believe, only that we (...) are permitted to do so. In arguing for that, I defend an epistemic teleological position that is radical in nature. It involves no commitment to aiming at the truth. I conclude by dispelling some worries that have been raised about my position. (shrink)

The following is a paper presented for the Course Rahner and Lonergan at the University of Toronto (Winter, 2014), revised and edited Winter, 2018. Our purpose is to defend the possibility of “perceptualism,” that is to say, the position maintaining that the intelligible content of consciousness is given in perception and not posited by the activity of the subject. Assisted by the insights of Cornelio Fabro, this defense contrasts perceptualism with Bernard Lonergan’s “critical realism”. This paper focuses on the notion (...) of experience, seemingly the basis of the opposition between perceptualism and critical realism. (shrink)

An introduction to the theory of knowledge in a 24-lecture audio/video series with accompanying book.

... belief that every creature is a manifestation of God pantheism – belief that everything is divine phenomena – (Kantian) reality-as-it-appears polytheism ...

Despite playing an important role in epistemology, philosophy of science, and more recently in moral philosophy and aesthetics, the nature of understanding is still much contested. One attractive framework attempts to reduce understanding to other familiar epistemic states. This paper explores and develops a methodology for testing such reductionist theories before offering a counterexample to a recently defended variant on which understanding reduces to what an agent knows.

In this dissertation, I provide an interpretation and defense of Merleau-Ponty's thesis of the primacy of perception, namely, the thesis that all knowledge is founded in perceptual experience. I take as an interpretative and argumentative key Merleau-Ponty's phenomenological conception of motivation. Whereas epistemology has traditionally accepted a dichotomy between reason and natural causality, I show that this dichotomy is not exhaustive of the forms of epistemic grounding. There is a third type of grounding, the one characteristic of the grounding relations (...) found in perception: motivation. I argue that introducing motivation as a form of epistemic grounding allows us to see how Merleau-Ponty's thesis of the primacy of perception avoids both rationalism and empiricism. Whereas empiricism has argued that all the content of our knowledge is grounded in causal interactions between the world and our senses, and rationalism has held that experience does not suffice as a reason for knowledge, thinking of the relation between experience and knowledge in terms of motivation accommodates the best insights of rationalism and empiricism. Motivation allows us to see how knowledge can be grounded in experience without the content of knowledge being reducible to that of experience. (shrink)

This work aims to present and discuss recent developments in epistemology that seek for satisfactory formulations and responses to the problem of radical skepticism. Its main goal is to understand how the skeptical problem can be properly characterized, how it can be viewed as inserted in the traditional dispute in epistemology between externalism and internalism, and to which extent antiskeptical theories are situated within this dispute. After identifying their place in the dispute, another antiskeptical proposal is discussed, one that suggests (...) a conciliatory take on the internalist/externalist debate. The way Duncan Pritchard presents this conciliatory view, known as epistemological disjunctivism, intends to show that we can know the things that radical skepticism wants to preclude us to know. In order to do that, we just have to consider our structure of reasons as one that allows us to have factive reasons, reasons of externalist and internalist nature, that could put us in a privileged position to know the things we ordinarily believe. After the presentation and discussion of Pritchard's epistemological disjunctivism, and his general rejection of skepticism, it is suggested that its antiskeptical tools are also available to more traditional epistemic theories - but to access them, some epistemological assumptions need to be adjusted. In order to do that, an alternative take on the internalism/externalism dispute is offered, so it can allow for a different way of conceiving the conciliatory antiskeptical strategy, one that has epistemic reliabilism as its framework. The final propposal consists in an attempt to democratize the disjunctivist tool against radical skepticism. (shrink)

In this paper, I present two ways of conceiving a genealogical explanation of the concept of knowledge. The first one is through the epistemic state of nature hypothesis developed by Edward Craig, according to which knowledge is understood as a concept evolved from the concept of a good informant. After considering Craig’s project, I draw a parallel between this approach and Miranda Fricker’s value-laden account of the same concept. Then, I present and discuss Fricker’s social take on Craig’s genealogy, in (...) which she suggests that the notions of a good informant and of knowledge are necessarily dependent on the establishment of a credibility norm, and that this norm should be viewed as inherently political. Lastly, I defend an illustration, through Kristie Dotson’s work, of how both genealogical approaches could explain and offer solutions to failings in the normativity of our epistemic systems. (shrink)

In this article I challenge the positivist view that ethical statements are merely an expression of our emotions or preferences. I consider a moral statement, “Killing innocent civilians is wrong,” and argue that such a statement is a truthful moral norm. I show that what is fundamental to agreement in the realm of both facts and morals is a commonly shared attitude that determines human relatedness to the world. Scientific knowledge is a partial knowledge based on indifference, the state of (...) mind that constitutes scientific attitude. However, knowledge in morals does not presuppose indifference, but love. Once we accept that our thoughts and feelings are not incommunicable, we can arrive at inter-subjective and non-objective moral knowledge which results from our recognition of others as persons and our affective engagement with the world. (shrink)

According to epistemic deontologism, attributions of epistemic justification are deontic claims about what we ought to believe. One of the most prominent objections to this conception, due mainly to William P. Alston, is that the principle that ‘ought’ implies ‘can’ rules out deontologism because our beliefs are not under our voluntary control. In this paper, I offer a partial defense of Alston’s critique of deontologism. While Alston is right that OIC rules out epistemic deontologism, appealing to doxastic involuntarism is not (...) necessary for generating that tension. Deontologists would still have a problem with OIC if doxastic voluntarism turned out to be true or if deontologism did not require voluntarism. This is because, in short, epistemic justification does not imply ‘can’. If, as deontologists maintain, epistemic justification implies ‘oughts’, then epistemic justification must also imply ‘can’ given OIC. But since epistemic justification does not imply ‘can’, OIC dictates that we reject deontologism. I end by exploring the possible consequences of this incompatibility between OIC and deontologism. My conclusion is that at least one of the following claims must be true. Either ‘ought’ does not imply ‘can’, attributions of epistemic justification are not deontic claims, or epistemic claims lack necessary or categorical normative authority. (shrink)

Twenty philosophers offer new essays examining the form of reasoning known as inference to the best explanation - widely used in science and in our everyday lives, yet still controversial. Best Explanations represents the state of the art when it comes to understanding, criticizing, and defending this form of reasoning.

An invited High Table Address given before the students and faculty of Raymond College, University of the Pacific, Stockton, California, December 10, 1969. An impressionistic and idealistic paper from the author’s youth suggesting how his _de-projective approach to phenomenology_ could lead to an actual, lived, worldview.

In this paper, I attempt to sketch a dialectical approach on scientific representations and their role in scientific cognition. In my understanding, scientific representations can be construed as ‘tools’ mediating scientific cognition. These ‘tools’ are products of our cognitive activity, by which we signify which features of certain objects or states of affairs should be embodied in abstractive representations of them. In such a context, I explore the merits of bringing some ideas of thinkers whose work is underestimated in the (...) relevant discussion nowadays (such as K. Marx, E.V. Ilyenkov, L.S. Vygotsky, M. Wartofsky) in dialogue with currently discussed approaches. (shrink)

This article argues that justified true beliefs in Gettier cases often are not true due to luck. I offer two ‘unlucky’ Gettier cases, and it's easy enough to generate more. Hence even attaching a broad ‘anti‐luck’ codicil to the tripartite account of knowledge leaves the Gettier problem intact. Also, two related questions are addressed. First, if epistemic luck isn't distinctive of Gettier cases, what is? Second, what do Gettier cases reveal about knowledge?

In "the theory of epistemic rationality" (harvard university press, 1987), Richard foley presents a version of subjective foundationalism designed to avoid aristotle's famous regress problem. This paper explains why foley's theory does not provide an adequate account of the foundations of inferential epistemic justification. Foley's theory neglects the epistemic significance of 'non'belief perceptual states.

Although some of Helmholtz’s scientific suggestions are dated with the progress of science, his ontological statements as well as his epistemological studies are still an object of philosophical controversy. The selection of Helmholtz’s epistemological writings, edited as volume 79 in the Synthese Library, contains four papers originally published in German between 1868 and 1887. In these papers are considered among others the epistemological aspects of measuring and numbering, the issues of perceptual cognition, the theory of geometrical knowledge, and the relationship (...) between science and metaphysics. The present collection of the Helmholtz’s articles was previously edited in German, on the centenary of his birth, under the title Schriften zur Erkenntnistheorie. The editors, M. Schlick and P. Hertz, sharing the opinion that Helmholtz’s name is a symbol of a union between epistemologically oriented philosophy and science, had selected from his many epistemological writings only four—the most representative and the most complete. In order to make the papers intelligible not only to philosophers but also to general readers, Schlick and Hertz supplemented the primary texts with explanatory remarks and comments. Some of them have a general introductory character, explaining, for instance, the difference between induction and deduction or elucidating Locke’s conception of two kinds of properties; the others present useful syntheses of methodological solutions, comparing, e.g., Carnap’s or Reichenbach’s ideas with Helmholtz’s. (shrink)

Though I find the project significant and unprecedented in this way, I am not convinced that it is entirely successful, and I will try to explain here the grounds of my concern. We can begin with Greco’s list of requirements for an adequate theory of knowledge, and the relationship he sees between simple reliabilism and his own theory, agent reliabilism.

Laurence Bonjour's In Defense of Pure Reason is must reading for anyone interested in the empiricism/rationalism debate, especially for anyone convinced that empiricism has won the day. In the pellucid prose that is a signature of Bonjour's work, it presents a compelling case for the indispensability of genuine rationalistic a priori justification, while providing a sustained critique of the empiricist alternatives which either restrict a priori justification to analytic propositions or deny the existence of such justification outright. The book would (...) make an excellent addition to any upper-level undergraduate or graduate course on empiricism and rationalism. It would also be a useful addition to almost any epistemology seminar, since most recent books on epistemology have conspicuously little, if anything, to say about a priori justification and knowledge. (shrink)

I address Moti Mizrahi‟s objections to my use of the Self-Defeat Argument for Phenomenal Conservatism. Mizrahi contends that other epistemologicaltheories can be supported by parallel self-defeat arguments. I argue that the self-defeat arguments for other theories either are compatible with PC and thus present no problem, or have a false premise, unlike the self-defeat argument for PC.

Can we understand epistemic justification in terms of epistemic rights? In this paper, we consider two arguments for the claim that we cannot and in doing so, we provide two arguments for the claim that we can. First, if, as many think, William James is right that the epistemic aim is to believe all true propositions and not to believe any false propositions, then there are likely to be situations in which believing a proposition serves one of these goals, whereas (...) suspending judgement serves the other, equally important goal. Second, it is in principle always possible to have different epistemic standards for evaluating the evidence for the proposition in question, so that one can have a right to believe that proposition and a right to suspend judgement on it. Whereas the first consideration counts in favour of the idea that believing justifiedly is at least sometimes a matter of having an epistemic right, the latter consideration favours the view that believing justifiedly is always a matter of having an epistemic right. (shrink)