Abstract
In his seminal paper, “Content Preservation,” Tyler Burge defends an original account of testimonial knowledge. The originality of the account is due, in part, to the fact that it is cast within a novel epistemic framework. The central feature of that framework is the introduction of the concept of entitlement, which is alleged to be a distinctive type of positive epistemic support or warrant. Entitlement and justification, according to Burge, are sub-species of warrant. Justification is the internalist form of warrant, but entitlement is epistemically externalist. My focus in this paper is Burge’s conception of entitlement, and there are three primary issues that I wish to address. What is the relationship between entitlement and the more traditional concept of justification? In what sense is entitlement epistemically externalist? Has Burge introduced a new epistemic concept or merely coined a new term for a familiar epistemic concept?
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Notes
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(E1)
is also ambiguous since it does not distinguish between:
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(E1a)
The ground of an entitlement need not be understood;
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(E1b)
The adequacy of the ground of an entitlement need not be understood; and
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(E1c)
The epistemic principle governing the entitlement need not be understood.
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(E1)
Burge (1993, 530) exploits this point to argue against the position of neo-Sellarsians who maintain that perception is propositional and provides reasons for perceptual beliefs: “Moreover, there is no plausible basis for thinking that perceptual states, even if they were propositional, provide reasons for perceptual beliefs.”
There is a conceptual innovation in Burge’s epistemology: his strong conception of reasons and the resulting strong conception of justification that is tied to it. The significance of these concepts is not clear since (a) they are not necessary for knowledge and (b) they don’t play a role in the ordinary knowledge of most mature adults.
References
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BonJour, L. (1985). The structure of empirical knowledge. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
Burge, T. (1993). Content preservation. Philosophical Review 102: 457–488.
Burge, T. (2003). Perceptual entitlement. Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 67: 503–548.
Peacocke, C. (2004). The realm of reason. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Pollock, J. (1986). Contemporary theories of knowledge. Totowa: Rowman & Littlefield.
Sosa, E. (1991). The raft and the pyramid. In his Knowledge in Perspective: Selected Essays in Epistemology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Acknowledgements
Thanks to Sarah Sawyer for stimulating my interest in the questions addressed in this paper and for a number of conversations that helped to clarify my responses to them, and to the participants in the Bled Epistemology Conference for their comments on an earlier version of this paper.
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Casullo, A. What Is Entitlement?. Acta Anal 22, 267–279 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12136-007-0012-y
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12136-007-0012-y