The idea that perceptual experience is transparent is generally used by naïve realists and externalist representationalists to promote an externalist account of the metaphysics of perceptual experience. It is claimed that the phenomenal character of our perceptual experience can be explained solely with reference to the externally located objects and properties which (for the representationalist) we represent, or which (for the naïve realist) partly constitute our experience. Internalist qualia theorists deny this, and claim that the phenomenal character of our perceptual (...) experience is internally constituted. However, my concern in this paper is not with the metaphysical debate, but with transparency as a phenomenological feature of perceptual experience. Qualia theorists have presented a number of examples of perceptual experiences which, they claim, do not even seem to be transparent; these experiences involve objects or properties which seem to be internally realized. I argue, contrary to the qualia theorist’s claim, that the phenomenal character of perceptual experience can in fact be characterized solely with reference to externally located objects and properties, and the sense in which some features of our perceptual experiences do not seem external is due to cognitive, not perceptual, phenomenology. (shrink)

My first aim in this paper is to show that the transparency claim cannot serve the purpose to which it is assigned; that is, the idea that perceptual experience is transparent is no help whatsoever in motivating an externalist account of phenomenal character. My second aim is to show that the internalist qualia theorist's response to the transparency idea has been unnecessarily concessive to the externalist. Surprisingly, internalists seem to allow that much of the phenomenal character of perceptual experience depends (...) essentially (and not just causally) upon externally located properties. They argue that we can also be aware of internal, non-intentional qualia. I present an alternative response the internalist can make to the transparency claim: phenomenal character is wholly internal, and seeming to be aware of externally located properties just is being aware of internally constituted experiential features. (shrink)

Many of the arguments for and against robust moral realism parallel arguments for and against theism. In this article, I consider one of the shared challenges: the explanatory challenge. The article begins with a presentation of Harman's formulation of the explanatory challenge as applied to moral realism and theism. I then examine two responses offered by robust moral realists to the explanatory challenge, one by Russ Shafer-Landau and another by David Enoch. Shafer-Landau argues that the moral realist can plausibly respond (...) to the challenge in a way unavailable to theists. I argue that Shafer-Landau's response is implausible as it stands and that once revised, it will apply to theism just as well. I then argue that Enoch's response, to the extent that it is plausible, can be used to defend theism as well. (shrink)

According to Phenomenal Conservatism (PC), if it seems to a subject S that P, S thereby has some degree of (defeasible) justification for believing P. But what is it for P to seem true? Answering this question is vital for assessing what role (if any) such states can play. Many have appeared to adopt a kind of non-reductionism that construes seemings as intentional states which cannot be reduced to more familiar mental states like beliefs or sensations. In this paper I (...) aim to show that reductive accounts need to be taken more seriously by illustrating the plausibility of identifying seemings and conscious inclinations to form a belief. I briefly close the paper by considering the implications such an analysis might have for views such as PC. (shrink)

Perceptual dogmatism holds that if it perceptually seems to S that P, then S thereby has prima facie perceptual justification for P. But suppose Wishful Willy's desire for gold cognitively penetrates his perceptual experience and makes it seem to him that the yellow object is a gold nugget. Intuitively, his desire-penetrated seeming can't provide him with prima facie justification for thinking that the object is gold. If this intuitive response is correct, dogmatists have a problem. But if dogmatists have a (...) problem, you do too (well, most of you anyway). Reliabilists have denounced dogmatism's cognitive penetration problems, but they have problems with cognitive penetration that are even worse. (shrink)

I consider the ‘inferentialist’ thesis that whenever a mental state rationally justifies a belief it is in virtue of inferential relations holding between the contents of the two states. I suggest that no good argument has yet been given for the thesis. I focus in particular on Williamson (2000) and Ginsborg (2011) and show that neither provides us with a reason to deny the plausible idea that experience can provide non-inferential justification for belief. I finish by pointing out some theoretical (...) costs and tensions associated with endorsing inferentialism. (shrink)

According to a traditional Cartesian epistemology of perception, perception does not provide one with direct knowledge of the external world. Instead, when you look out to see a red wall, what you learn first is not a fact about the color of the wall—i.e., that it is red—but instead a fact about your own visual experience—i.e., that the wall looks red to you. If you are to justifiably believe that the wall is red, you must be in a position to (...) justifiably infer this conclusion about the external world from known premises about your own visual experience. Recent anti-Cartesian theorists have pushed back against this traditional model, claiming that the epistemic significance of having a perceptual experience is not exhausted by what can be inferred from the fact that you have the experience. After clarifying an underappreciated commitment of Cartesian accounts and some key motivations for resisting it, I argue that any anti-Cartesian account strong enough to take advantage of these motivations must license a way of updating one’s beliefs in response to anticipated experiences that seems diachronically irrational. To avoid this implausible result, the anti-Cartesian must choose between licensing an implausible kind of epistemic chauvinism, or else claiming that merely reflecting on one’s experiences can defeat the perceptual justification that they otherwise provide. This leaves us with a puzzle: Although there are powerful motivations for rejecting Cartesianism, any view that avails itself of them faces serious problems of its own. (shrink)

Despite the widespread use of the notion of moral intuition, its psychological features remain a matter of debate and it is unclear why the capacity to experience moral intuitions evolved in humans. We first survey standard accounts of moral intuition, pointing out their interesting and problematic aspects. Drawing lessons from this analysis, we propose a novel account of moral intuitions which captures their phenomenological, mechanistic, and evolutionary features. Moral intuitions are composed of two elements: an evaluative mental state and a (...) feeling of rightness (FOR). We illustrate the phenomenology of the FOR with examples of non-moral and moral cases, and provide a biological and mechanistic account: the emergence of human reasoning capacities created a need for the co-evolution of a psychological system producing the feeling of rightness (the FORs). This system is triggered when we experience conflicting evaluations. The FORs renders evaluations resulting from rational deliberation less compelling than the evaluations produced by simple evolved systems. It thus facilitates optimal decision-making, preventing excessive interference by rational deliberation. Our account sheds light on why moral intuitions are so frequently experienced and why they are so compelling and resistant to argument. In addition, the account fuels interesting speculations about common metaethical intuitions. (shrink)

We can know some things about each others' mental lives. The view that some of this knowledge is genuinely perceptual is getting traction. But the idea that we can see any of each others' mental states themselves - the Simple Perceptual Hypothesis - remains unpopular. Very often the view that we can perceptually know, for example, that James is angry, is thought to depend either on our awareness of James' expression or on the way James appears - versions of what (...) I call the Expressive Hypothesis. The Expressive Hypothesis is intuitive. But in this chapter I argue that it does not allow us to do away with the thought that we sometimes perceive people's mental states. I take my arguments to provide some tentative support for the Simple Perceptual Hypothesis. (shrink)

This paper explains what’s wrong with a Hume-inspired argument for skepticism about induction. Hume’s argument takes as a premise that inductive reasoning presupposes that the future will resemble the past. I explain why that claim is not plausible. The most plausible premise in the vicinity is that inductive reasoning from E to H presupposes that if E then H. I formulate and then refute a skeptical argument based on that premise. Central to my response is a psychological explanation for how (...) people judge that if E then H without realizing that they thereby settled the matter rationally. (shrink)

I review recent work on Phenomenal Conservatism, the position introduced by Michael Huemer according to which if it seems that P to a subject S, in the absence of defeaters S has thereby some degree of justification for believing P.

In recent epistemology many philosophers have adhered to a moderate foundationalism according to which some beliefs do not depend on other beliefs for their justification. Reliance on such ‘basic beliefs’ pervades both internalist and externalist theories of justification. In this article I argue that the phenomenon of perceptual learning – the fact that certain ‘expert’ observers are able to form more justified basic beliefs than novice observers – constitutes a challenge for moderate foundationalists. In order to accommodate perceptual learning cases, (...) the moderate foundationalist will have to characterize the ‘expertise’ of the expert observer in such a way that it cannot be had by novice observers and that it bestows justification on expert basic beliefs independently of any other justification had by the expert. I will argue that the accounts of expert basic beliefs currently present in the literature fail to meet this challenge, as they either result in a too liberal ascription of justification or fail to draw a clear distinction between expert basic beliefs and other spontaneously formed beliefs. Nevertheless, some guidelines for a future solution will be provided. (shrink)

A sensible epistemologist may not see how she could know that she is not a brain in a vat ; but she doesn’t panic. She sticks with her empirical beliefs, and as that requires, believes that she is not a BIV. (She does not inferentially base her belief that she is not a BIV on her empirical knowledge—she rejects that ‘Moorean’ response to skepticism.) Drawing on the psychological literature on metacognition, I describe a mechanism that’s plausibly responsible for a sensible (...) epistemologist coming to believe she is not a BIV. I propose she thereby knows that she is not a BIV. The particular belief-forming mechanism employed explains why she overlooks this account of how she knows she is not a BIV, making it seem that there is no way for her to know it. I argue this proposal satisfactorily resolves the skeptical puzzle. (shrink)

Phenomenal conservatism (PC) is the internalist view that non-inferential justification rests on appearances. PC’s advocates have recently argued that seemings are also required to explain inferential justification. The most general and developed view to this effect is Huemer (2016)’s theory of inferential seemings (ToIS). Moretti (2018) has shown that PC is affected by the problem of reflective awareness, which makes PC open to sceptical challenges. In this paper I argue that ToIS is afflicted by a version of the same problem (...) and it is thus hostage to inferential scepticism. I also suggest a possible response on behalf of ToIS’s advocates. (shrink)

_ Source: _Volume 94, Issue 4, pp 552 - 576 Two major arguments have been advanced for the claim that there is a transmission failure in G.E. Moore’s famous proof of an external world. The first argument, due to Crispin Wright, is based on an epistemological doctrine now known as ‘conservatism’. Proponents of the second argument, like Nicholas Silins, invoke probabilistic considerations, most important among them Bayes’ theorem. The aim of this essay is to defend Moore’s proof against these two (...) arguments. It is shown, first, that Wright’s argument founders because one of its premises, viz., conservatism, invites scepticism and must therefore be rejected. Then the probabilistic argument is challenged, not because its formal part is dubious, but rather on the grounds that it incorporates an unconvincing philosophical claim as an implicit premise. Finally, the two most promising objections to dogmatism—the negation of conservatism—are repudiated. (shrink)

In this paper we argue that Michael Huemer’s phenomenal conservatism—the internalist view according to which our beliefs are prima facie justified if based on how things seems or appears to us to be—doesn’t fall afoul of Michael Bergmann’s dilemma for epistemological internalism. We start by showing that the thought experiment that Bergmann adduces to conclude that is vulnerable to his dilemma misses its target. After that, we distinguish between two ways in which a mental state can contribute to the justification (...) of a belief: the direct way and the indirect way. We identify a straightforward reason for claiming that the justification contributed indirectly is subject to Bergmann’s dilemma. Then we show that the same reason doesn’t extend to the claim that the justification contributed directly is subject to Bergmann’s dilemma. As is the view that seemings or appearances contribute justification directly, we infer that Bergmann’s contention that his dilemma applies to is unmotivated. In the final part, we suggest that our line of response to Bergmann can be used to shield other types of internalist justification from Bergmann’s objection. We also propose that seeming-grounded justification can be combined with justification of one of these types to form the basis of a promising version of internalist foundationalism. (shrink)

_ Source: _Page Count 24 I defend the thesis that at least some moral properties can be part of the contents of experience. I argue for this claim using a contrast argument, a type of argument commonly found in the literature on the philosophy of perception. I first appeal to psychological research on what I call emotionally empathetic dysfunctional individuals to establish a phenomenal contrast between eedis and normal individuals in some moral situations. I then argue that the best explanation (...) for this contrast, assuming non-skeptical moral realism, is that badness is represented in the normal individual’s experience but not in the eedi’s experience. I consider and reject four alternative explanations of the contrast. (shrink)

ABSTRACTFor Husserl, noetics is the most fundamental science and the centrepiece of a phenomenological epistemology. Since in his major works Husserl does not develop noetics systematically but uses its main ideas and achievements often in apparent isolation without clarifying their systematic unity, the significance of noetics is often overlooked. Although Husserl has repeatedly stressed the importance of a phenomenological epistemology, what the concrete theses of such an undertaking are supposed to be often remains obscure. We shall see that the best (...) way to clarify this is by providing a detailed account of Husserl’s noetics as it is developed in Husserl’s lecture courses “Introduction to Logic and Theory of Knowledge” and “Logic and General Theory of Science”. This is the main aim of the present paper. We will shed light on the significance, systematic unity, and concrete theses of noetics. Furthermore, I shall show in what way the main theses of noetics are present in Husserl’s ot... (shrink)

I argue that if we allow that Moore’s Method, which involves taking an ordinary knowledge claim to support a substantive metaphysical conclusion, can be used to support Moore’s proof an external world, then we should accept that Moore’s Method can be used to support a variety of incompatible metaphysical conclusions. I shall refer to this as “the problem of many proofs”. The problem of many proofs, I claim, stems from the theory-ladenness of perception. I shall argue further that this plethora (...) of proofs for incompatible positions leads to a darker form of skepticism, one which maintains that each of the dogmatic views is probably false. We will conclude by considering various ways a Moorean might respond to these difficulties. (shrink)

In their most recent co-authored work, Conee and Feldman (2008) suggest that epistemic support should be understood in terms of best explanations. Although this suggestion is plausible, Conee and Feldman admit that they have not provided the necessary details for a complete account of epistemic support. This article offers an explanationist account of epistemic support of the kind that Conee and Feldman suggest. It is argued that this account of epistemic support yields the intuitively correct results in a wide variety (...) of cases. Further, this explanationist account of epistemic support is not susceptible to objections that Lehrer (1974) and Goldman (2011) have raised for similar accounts of epistemic support. (shrink)

Phenomenal conservatism is a popular theory of epistemic justification. Despite its popularity and the fact that some think that phenomenal conservatism can provide a complete account of justification, it faces several challenges. Among these challenges are the need to provide accounts of defeaters and inferential justification. Fortunately, there is hope for phenomenal conservatism. Explanationism, the view on which justification is a matter of explanatory considerations, can help phenomenal conservatism with both of these challenges. The resulting view is one that respects (...) the internalist character of phenomenal conservatism and its motivating intuitions while providing an intuitive and elegant account of both inferential justification and the justificatory impact of defeaters. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is twofold. The first is an interpretative one as I wish to provide a detailed account of Husserl’s conception of experiential justification. Here Ideas I and Introduction to Logic and Theory of Knowledge: Lectures 1906/07 will be my main resources. My second aim is to demonstrate the currency and relevance of Husserl’s conception. This means two things: Firstly, I will show that in current debates in analytic epistemology there is a movement sharing with Husserl the (...) basic idea that certain experiences gain their justificatory force simply from their distinctive phenomenal character. Secondly, I shall reveal the benefits of Husserl’s specific version of this view. Thus, one of my aims is to show that debates in current analytic epistemology could profit from adopting certain Husserlian elements. More precisely, I will defend Husserl’s claim that perceptual experiences are justifiers due to their self-giving phenomenal character as opposed to the currently popular view that it is the phenomenology of pushiness that makes them justifiers. To put it differently, what matters is what is originally given within experience and not how you feel about what is given. (shrink)

The epistemic value of seemings is increasingly debated. Such debates are hindered, however, by a lack of consensus about the nature of seemings. There are four prominent conceptions in the literature, and the plausibility of principles such as phenomenal conservatism, which assign a prominent epistemic role to seemings, varies greatly from one conception to another. It is therefore crucial that we identify the correct conception of seemings. I argue that seemings are best understood as sui generis mental states with propositional (...) content and a distinct phenomenal character. Rival conceptions are shown to succumb to numerous difficulties. (shrink)

This paper starts by distinguishing three views about the phenomenal character of perceptual experience. ‘Low-level theorists’ argue that perceptual experience is reducible to the experience of low-level properties, ‘high-level theorists’ argue that we have perceptual experiences of high-level properties, while ‘disunified view theorists’ argue that perceptual seemings can present high-level properties. The paper explores how cognitive states can penetrate perceptual experience and provides an interpretation of cognitive penetration that offers some support for the high-level view.