Abstract
The generality problem is perhaps the most notorious problem for process reliabilism. Several recent responses to the generality problem have claimed that the problem has been unfairly leveled against reliabilists. In particular, these responses have claimed that the generality problem is either (i) just as much of a problem for evidentialists, or (ii) if it is not, then a parallel solution is available to reliabilists. Along these lines, Juan Comesaña has recently proposed solution to the generality problem—well-founded reliabilism. According to Comesaña, the solution to the generality problem lies in solving the basing problem, such that any solution to the basing problem will give a solution to the generality problem. Comesaña utilizes Conee and Feldman’s evidentialist account of basing (Conee and Feldman’s well-foundedness principle) in forming his version of reliabilism. In this paper I show that Comesaña’s proposed solution to the generality problem is inadequate. Well-founded reliabilism both fails to solve the generality problem and subjects reliabilism to new damning verdicts. In addition, I show that evidentialism does not face any parallel problems, so the generality problem remains a reason to prefer evidentialism to reliabilism.
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Notes
More sophisticated versions also distinguish between belief-dependent and belief-independent processes. For instance, see Goldman (1979). Since these extra details do not affect the argument here, I will be ignoring them.
See Conee and Feldman (1998) for a more in depth presentation of the problem.
Notice, the claim here is not that an individual must know that her belief-forming process is reliable in order for it to confer justification on the resulting belief. According to reliabilism, the reliability of the belief-forming process is sufficient for justifying the belief. However, if we want to know whether a given belief is reliable, we will need to know whether the process that brought it about was reliable.
To solve the generality problem, the reliabilist needn’t pick out one particular belief-forming process as relevant. It may be that several belief-forming processes are relevant. That said, for ease of expression, I will set aside the possibility that there are more than one belief-forming process types that are relevant to the justificatory status of any one belief. My argument will not hinge on this liberty.
See Comesaña (2006).
Further, if the degree of justification a belief enjoys in proportional to the reliability of the process that brought it about, such a view will also have the consequence that every true belief is equally justified, and every false belief is equally unjustified, since there is no room for the process tokens to differ in their reliability.
In other words, so long as the token belief-forming processes are not modally fragile (i.e. having every property essentially), the token belief-forming process can exist in other possible worlds, and so long as the token belief-forming process can exist in other possible worlds, it makes sense to claim that it can be less than fully reliable or fully unreliable even if its deployment in the actual world only yields a truth or only yields a falsehood.
Whether the problem I will discuss below is identical to the generality problem or is simply an equally problematic, and similar, problem is not germane. Comesaña claims that the resultant problem is the generality problem (even if under a different guise), and in what follows I will be following Comesaña. While the focus of this paper is whether the generality problem has been solved, I take it that it is no solution to the generality problem to replace it with a similar and equally troubling problem even if ‘the generality problem’ does not properly refer to this new problem.
Comesaña (2006, p. 30).
Conee and Feldman (2004, p. 83).
For instance, Steve might have on balance excellent reasons to think that Harry is a criminal (and so be propositionally justified in believing this), yet if Steve believes that Harry is a criminal on the basis of wishful-thinking alone, Steve’s belief is not justified (his belief is not doxastically justified). An adequate epistemology will need to explain why Steve’s belief has this status—it must give an account of doxastic justification as well as propositional justification.
Conee and Feldman (2004, p. 93).
Comesaña (2006, p. 37).
or well-foundedness.
Comesaña’s target here is Conee and Feldman’s evidentialism in particular, but the point extends. Any account of doxastic justification must make use of the basing relation and must thereby identify one particular belief-forming process type that is relevant to doxastic justification. Once this is done, the reliabilist can then utilize that belief-forming process type in her own reliabilist account, and in particular utilize it to solve the generality problem.
Comesaña (2006, p. 38).
Comesaña (2006, p. 38).
This charge is made by Conee and Feldman (1998) in advancing the generality problem and endorsed by Comesaña (2006) in offering his response. This is not to say that a solution to the generality problem must eliminate all problem cases for reliabilism. The generality problem is but one problem for reliabilism, and we should distinguish between distinct problems for the theory. Nonetheless, a successful answer to the generality problem should not show reliabilism to be false—it should not avoid the generality problem at the cost of the theory. Earl Conee makes this point as well claiming that any solution must give reliabilism a ‘credible extension’, meaning that it cannot itself ruin the theory. See Conee (2013).
I leave it open for debate whether all propositions are stable propositions. All that matters for my point here is that at least some propositions are stable propositions.
This much is clear, since Comesaña’s account of ‘good evidence’ just is in terms of its reliability. Here is Comesaña,
My proposed solution does not consist in saying that a belief is justified if and only if it is based on good evidence. My proposal, instead, suggests a way of characterizing what it is for a piece of evidence to be good evidence that a proposition p is true! It is for it to be the case that, if you base your belief that p on that evidence, then your belief would tend to be true. (2006, p. 29)
Matters are even worse if the justification of an output belief is proportional to the reliability of the relevant belief-forming process type. Since the process type that leads from E to the belief that O is fully reliable, there is no belief-forming process that is more reliable than it is. So, if justification is proportional to the reliability of the belief-forming process type, no belief would be more justified than one’s belief that Obama was the President of the United States in 2013. In fact, since this particular belief-forming process type is fully reliable, it wouldn’t even be possible for a belief to be more justified than anyone’s belief that Obama was the President of the United States in 2013. This is surely not the case. While I am justified in believing that Obama was the President of the United States in 2013, I am still more justified in believing that I exist, that I have hands, that 1 + 1 = 2, that some triangles have three sides, and so forth. Parallel problems emerge for beliefs in false stable.
Comesaña (2002) gives us good reason to believe that Comesaña opts for a modally enhanced notion of reliability.
Recall that stable propositions are contingent propositions, so for any stable proposition there will be some possible world where it differs in truth value from the actual world.
Here again, it is not crucial whether the problem of delineating the relevant possible worlds is the very same problem as the generality problem, or whether it is simply a very similar, equally problematic challenge for the reliabilist. At best, WFR swaps out one problem for an equally bad problem.
References
Bishop, M. (2010). Why the generality problem is everybody’s problem. Philosophical Studies, 151, 285–298.
Comesaña, J. (2002). The diagonal and the demon. Philosophical Studies, 110, 249–266.
Comesaña, J. (2006). A well-founded solution to the generality problem. Philosophical Studies, 129, 27–47.
Comesaña, J. (2010). Evidentialist reliabilism. Noûs, 44(4), 571–600.
Conee, E. (2013). The specificity of the generality problem. Philosophical Studies, 163, 751–762.
Conee, E., & Feldman, R. (1998). The generality problem for reliabilism. Philosophical Studies, 89, 1–29.
Conee, E. & Feldman, R. (Eds.). (2004). Evidentialism. In Evidentialism: Essays in epistemology. New York: Oxford University Press.
Goldman, A. (1979). What is justified belief? In G. Pappas (Ed.), Justification and knowledge. Dordrecht: D. Reidel.
Acknowledgments
With thanks to audiences at the Eastern Division of the American Philosophical Association and the Southeastern Epistemology Conference, where previous versions of this paper were presented. I am particularly grateful to Jon Altschul, Michael Bishop, Eli Chudnoff, Jack Lyons, Kevin McCain, Ted Poston, Chase Wrenn, and Sarah Wright. Special thanks also to Earl Conee, Ted Locke, Jason Rodgers, and an anonymous referee for very helpful comments on earlier drafts.
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Matheson, J.D. Is there a well-founded solution to the generality problem?. Philos Stud 172, 459–468 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11098-014-0312-1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11098-014-0312-1