Abstract
This essay extends my side of a discussion begun earlier with Duncan Pritchard, the recent author of Epistemic Luck.Pritchard’s work contributes significantly to improving the “diagnostic appeal” of a neo-Moorean philosophical response to radical scepticism. While agreeing with Pritchard in many respects, the paper questions the need for his concession to the sceptic that the neo-Moorean is capable at best of recovering “‘brute’ externalist knowledge”. The paper discusses and directly responds to a dilemma that Pritchard poses for virtue epistemologies (VE). It also takes issue with Pritchard’s “merely safety-based” alternative. Ultimately, however, the criticisms made here of Pritchard’s dilemma and its underlying contrast of “anti-luck” and “virtue” epistemologies are intended to help realize his own aspirations for a better diagnosis of radical scepticism to inform a still better neo-Moorean response.
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Axtell, G. Two for the show: Anti-luck and virtue epistemologies in consonance. Synthese 158, 363–383 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-006-9045-9
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-006-9045-9