Contrastivism about knowledge is the view that one does not just know some proposition. It is more adequate to say that one knows something rather than something else: I know that I am looking at a tree rather than a bush but I do not know that I am looking at a tree rather than a cleverly done tree imitation. Knowledge is a three-place relation between a subject, a proposition and a contrast set of propositions. There are several advantages (...) of a contrastivist view but also certain problems with it. (shrink)

Epistemic contrastivism is the view that knowledge is a ternary relation between a person, a proposition and a set of contrast propositions. This view is in tension with widely shared accounts of practical reasoning: be it the claim that knowledge of the premises is necessary for acceptable practical reasoning based on them or sufficient for the acceptability of the use of the premises in practical reasoning, or be it the claim that there is a looser connection between knowledge (...) and practical reasoning. Given plausible assumptions, epistemic contrastivism implies that we should cut all links between knowledge and practical reasoning. However, the denial of any such link requires additional and independent arguments; if such arguments are lacking, then all the worse for epistemic contrastivism. (shrink)

One of the most recent trends in epistemology is contrastivism. It can be characterized as the thesis that knowledge is a ternary relation between a subject, a proposition known and a contrast proposition. According to contrastivism, knowledge attributions have the form “S knows that p, rather than q”. In this paper I raise several problems for contrastivism: it lacks plausibility for many cases of knowledge, is too relaxed concerning the third relatum, and overlooks a further relativity of (...) the knowledge relation. (shrink)

There’s something deeply right in the idea that knowledge requires an ability to discriminate truth from falsity. Failing to incorporate some version of the discrimination requirement into one’s epistemology generates cases of putative knowledge that are at best problematic. On the other hand, many theories that include a discrimination requirement thereby appear to entail violations of closure. This prima facie tension is resolved nicely in Jonathan Schaffer’s contrastivism, which I describe herein. The contrastivist take on relevant alternatives is implausible, (...) however, and this then threatens to undermine contrastivism’s anti-skeptical results. (shrink)

In this paper, I defend epistemological contrastivism—the view that propositional knowledge is a three-place, contrastive relation between an agent, a proposition and a contrast term—against two a priori arguments recently offered by Mikkel Gerken for the conclusion that intuitive judgements exhibiting a contrast effect on knowledge ascriptions are false positives. I show that the epistemic argument for false positives begs the question against contrastivism by assuming the independently implausible claim that knowledge of a contrastive proposition always presupposes (...) knowledge of a related ordinary proposition. This claim is apparently also presupposed by the doxastic argument for false positives, the conclusion of which, I argue, is not only perfectly compatible with epistemological contrastivism but also heavily dependent on a de dicto construal of the relevant knowledge ascriptions. (shrink)

Contextualism treats ‘knows’ as an indexical that denotes different epistemic properties in different contexts. Contrastivism treats ‘knows’ as denoting a ternary relation with a slot for a contrast proposition. I will argue that contrastivism resolves the main philosophical problems of contextualism, by employing a better linguistic model. Contextualist insights are best understood by contrastivist theory.

Peter Baumann develops and defends a distinctive version of epistemic contextualism, the view that the truth conditions or the meaning of knowledge attributions of the form "S knows that p" can vary with the context of the attributor. The first part of the book examines arguments for contextualism and develops Baumann's version. It begins by dealing with the argument from cases and ordinary usage, and then addresses "theoretical" arguments, from reliability and from luck. The second part of the book (...) discusses the problems contextualism faces, to which it must respond, and provides an extension of contextualism beyond epistemology. The third part of the book is focused on some major objections to contextualism and alternative views, namely subject-sensitive invariantism, contrastivism and relativism. (shrink)

This paper defends strict invariantism against some philosophical and empirical data that have been taken to compromise it. The defence involves a combination of a priori philosophical arguments and empirically informed theorizing. The positive account of the data is an epistemic focal bias account that draws on cognitive psychology. It involves the assumption that, owing to limitations of the involved cognitive resources, intuitive judgments about knowledge ascriptions are generated by processing only a limited part of the available information—the part (...) that is in focus. According to the epistemic focal bias account, the intuitive judgments about knowledge ascriptions that constitute contrast effects amount to false positives, whereas the intuitive judgments that constitute salient alternatives effects amount to false negatives. I conclude by considering how the basic epistemic focal bias account may be developed further by reference to relevant alternatives theory in epistemology, pragmatics in the philosophy of language, and dual process theory in cognitive psychology. (shrink)

Contrastive epistemologists say knowledge displays the ternary relation “S knows p rather than q”. I argue that “S knows p rather than q” is often equivalent to “S knows p rather than not-p” and hence equivalent to “S knows p”. The result is that contrastive knowledge is often binary knowledge disguised.

The standard contextualist solution to the skeptical paradox is intended to provide a way to retain epistemic closure while avoiding the excessive modesty of radical skepticism and the immodesty of Moorean dogmatism. However, contextualism’s opponents charge that its solution suffers from epistemic immodesty comparable to Moorean dogmatism. According to the standard contextualist solution, all contexts where an agent knows some ordinary proposition to be true are contexts where she also knows that the skeptical hypotheses are false. It has (...) been hoped that contrastivist theories of knowledge can mirror the contextualist solution while avoiding this epistemic immodesty. I review the main problems for contrastive closure and argue that none of the arguments currently in the literature pose an insurmountable problem for the contrastivist solution. However, I argue that contrastivist theories of knowledge, like their contextualist rivals, are indeed committed to epistemic immodesty. (shrink)

Single-premise epistemic closure is the principle that: if one is in an evidential position to know that P where P entails Q, then one is in an evidential position to know that Q. In this paper, I defend the viability of opposition to closure. A key task for such an opponent is to precisely formulate a restricted closure principle that remains true to the motivations for abandoning unrestricted closure but does not endorse particularly egregious instances of closure violation. I (...) focus on two brands of epistemic theory that naturally incorporate closure restrictions. The first type holds that the truth value of a knowledge ascription is relative to a relevant question. The second holds that the truth value of a knowledge ascription is relative to a relevant topic. For each approach, I offer a formalization of a leading theory from the literature and use this formalization to evaluate the theory’s adequacy in terms of a precise set of desiderata. I conclude that neither theory succeeds in meeting these desiderata, casting doubt on the viability of the underlying approaches. Finally, I offer a novel variant of the topic-sensitive approach that fares better. (shrink)

Contrastivism about interrogative understanding is the view that ‘S understands why p’ posits a three-place epistemic relation between a subject S, a fact p, and an alternative to p, q. This thesis stands in stark opposition to the natural idea that a subject S can be said to understand why psimpliciter. I argue that contrastivism offers the best explanation for the fact that evaluations of the form ‘S understands why p’ vary depending on the alternatives to p (...) under consideration. I also show that contrastivism offers valuable resources with which to explain the gradability of interrogative understanding attributions, as well as the sensitivity of these attributions to the perceived degree of epistemic demandingness of different contexts. (shrink)

According to one form of epistemic contrastivism, due to Jonathan Schaffer, knowledge is not a binary relation between an agent and a proposition, but a ternary relation between an agent, a proposition, and a context-basing question. In a slogan: to know is to know the answer to a question. I argue, first, that Schaffer-style epistemic contrastivism can be semantically represented in inquisitive dynamic epistemic logic, a recent implementation of inquisitive semantics in the framework of dynamic (...) epistemic logic; second, that within inquisitive dynamic epistemic logic, the contrastive ternary knowledge operator is reducible to the standard binary one. The reduction shows, I argue, that Schaffer’s argument in favor of contrastivism is compatible with a binary picture of knowledge. This undercuts the force of the argument in favor of contrastivism. (shrink)

We report and discuss the results of a series of experiments that address a contrast effect exhibited by folk judgments about knowledge ascriptions. The contrast effect, which was first reported by Schaffer and Knobe, is an important aspect of our folk epistemology. However, there are competing theoretical accounts of it. We shed light on the various accounts by providing novel empirical data and theoretical considerations. Our key findings are, firstly, that belief ascriptions exhibit a similar contrast effect and, secondly, that (...) the contrast effect is systematically sensitive to the content of what is in contrast. We argue that these data pose significant challenges to contrastivist accounts of the contrast effect. Furthermore, some of the data set provides, in conjunction with some non-empirical epistemological arguments, some limited evidence for what we call a focal bias account of the data. According to the focal bias account, the contrast effects arise at least in part because epistemically relevant facts are not always adequately processed when they are presented in certain ways. (shrink)

Baumann (2008a) raises three main concerns for epistemic contrastivism. These lead him to a more complicated re-conception of knowledge, involving varying numbers of argument places for varying sorts of arguments. I will argue that these complications are unneeded. The more elegant and uniform contrastive treatment can resolve all of Baumann’s concerns, in a straightforward way.

In this paper, I offer a novel account of knowledge ascriptions with concealed questions as complements. I begin by discussing various theories of knowledge-the proposed in the literature and raising some problems for each. I then present and explain my positive proposal, arguing that knowledge ascriptions with concealed questions as complements say that the subject stands in the knowledge relation to a question. I claim that this view avoids the problems facing other accounts and offers a unified account of knowledge-the, (...) knowledge-wh, and, importantly, other attitudes with interrogative complements. On this account, when we utter any attitude ascription that contains an explicit question, an indirect question, or a concealed question, we say that some subject stands in the relevant relation to a question. (shrink)

The Problem of Nearly Convergent Knowledge is an updated and stronger version of the Problem of Convergent Knowledge, which presents a problem for the traditional, binary view of knowledge in which knowledge is a two-place relation between a subject and the known proposition. The problem supports Knowledge Contrastivism, the view that knowledge is a three-place relation between a subject, the known proposition, and a proposition that disjoins the alternatives relevant to what the subject knows. For example, if knowledge is (...) contrastive, I do not simply know that the bird in front of me is a goldfinch; instead, I know that the bird in front of me is a goldfinch rather than a raven or eagle or falcon. There is, however, a binary view of knowledge that overcomes even the Problem of Nearly Convergent Knowledge. I will give this binary view, show that it is motivated by the same considerations that motivate Knowledge Contrastivism, and argue that it avoids problematic consequences for our epistemic lives that Knowledge Contrastivism cannot. (shrink)

Do you know who you are? If the question seems unclear, it might owe to the notion of ‘knowing-wh’ (knowing-who, knowing-what, knowing-when, etc.). Such knowledge contrasts with ‘knowing-that’, the more familiar topic of epistemologists. But these days, knowing-wh is receiving more attention than ever, and here we will survey three current debates on the nature of knowing-wh. These debates concern, respectively, (1) whether all knowing-wh is reducible to knowing-that (‘generalized intellectualism’), (2) whether all knowing-wh is relativized to a contrast proposition (...) (‘contrastivism about knowing-wh’), and (3) whether the context-sensitivity of knowing-wh is a semantic or purely pragmatic phenomenon (‘contextualism vs. invariantism about knowing-wh’). (shrink)

This work has four aims: (i) to provide an overview of the current debate about the semantics of knowledge attributions, i.e. sentences of the form ⌜S knows that Φ⌝; (ii) to ground the debate in a single semantic-pragmatic framework; (iii) to identify a methodology for describing the semantics of knowledge attributions; (iv) to go some way towards describing the semantics of knowledge attributions in light of this methodology, and in particular to defend moderate invariantist semantics against its main current rivals. (...) Aims (i) and (ii) are largely clarificatory; in §1 I set out a single semantic-pragmatic framework and over the course of this work show that it can be modified to explain and distinguish the various theories of the semantics of knowledge attributions currently on offer. Aim (iii) is also met in §1. I argue that a theory of the semantics of knowledge attributions T must be able to account for at least some ordinary speakers’ intuitions about the felicity or infelicity of utterances of the sentence ⌜S knows that Φ⌝ (felicity intuitions) purely in terms of its semantics. I also identify a number of theoretical considerations about knowledge and argue that if T conflicts with any one of these considerations, we should presume that T is false. Aim (iv) is met over the course of this work. According to moderate invariantism ⌜S knows that Φ⌝ is true if and only if S confidently believes the proposition expressed by Φ, this proposition is true and S’s epistemic position with respect to this proposition meets a moderately high epistemic standard. In §§2 – 5 I argue that the main current rivals to moderate invariantism – attributor contextualism, contrastivism, subject-sensitive invariantism and assessor relativism – conflict with at least one of the theoretical considerations identified in §1. In §6 I argue that moderate invariantism accounts for some ordinary speakers’ felicity intuitions purely in terms of the semantics of ⌜S knows that Φ⌝; I also argue that it is consistent with all of the theoretical considerations identified in §1. Moreover, in §§2 – 6 I argue that no theory is capable of accounting for all felicity intuitions purely in terms of the semantics of ⌜S knows that Φ⌝, and that only moderate invariantism can successfully explain why speakers have all of these intuitions. In §7 I conclude that moderate invariantism correctly describes of the semantics of knowledge attributions, or at least does so better than its main current rivals. (shrink)

Contrastivism is the idea that knowledge is question-relative: to know is to be able to answer a contextually salient question. Constrastivism's main selling point is that it promises to respect ordinary speakers' judgments about knowledge claims made in various contexts. I show that contrastivism fails to fulfill this promise, and argue that the view I call epistemic pluralism does much better in this respect.

Theoria, Volume 87, Issue 5, Page 1222-1249, October 2021.

This special volume of _Grazer Philosophische Studien_ features twelve original essays on the relationship between knowledge and questions, a topic of utmost importance to epistemology, philosophical logic, and the philosophy of language. It raises a great deal of issues in each of these fields and at their intersection, bearing, inter alia, on the theory of rational deliberation and inquiry, pragmatism and virtue epistemology, the problems of scepticism and epistemic justification, the theory of assertion, the possibility of deductive knowledge, the (...) semantics and pragmatics of knowledge ascriptions, the factivity of knowledge, the analysis of concealed questions and embedded interrogative clauses, propositional attitudes and two-dimensional semantics, contextualism and contrastivism, the distinction between knowledge-that and knowledge-how, the nature of philosophical knowledge, and the problem of epistemic value. Addressing these as well as many other importantly related issues, the papers in the volume jointly contribute to giving an overview of the current state of the debates on the topic, and a sense of the directions in which philosophical research on knowledge and questions is currently heading. (shrink)

The concept of causation is essential to ascribing moral and legal responsibility since the only way an agent can make a difference in the world is through her acts causing things to happen. Yet the extent and manner in which the complex features of causation bear on responsibility ascriptions remain unclear. I present an analysis of four aspects of causation which yields new insights into different properties of responsibility and offers increased plausibility to certain moral views. Chapter I examines the (...) realist assumption that causation is an objective and mind-independent relation between space-time located relata – a postulate meant to provide moral assessment with a naturalistic basis and make moral properties continuous with a scientific view of the world. I argue that such a realist stance is problematic, and by extension so are the views seeking to tie responsibility attributions to an objective relation. Chapter II combines the context sensitivity of causal claims with the plausible idea that responsibility ascriptions rest on the assessment of causal sequences relating agents and consequences. I argue that taking context sensitivity seriously compels us to face a choice between moral contrastivism and a mild version of scepticism, viz. responsibility is not impossible, but ultimately difficult to identify with confidence. I show why the latter view is preferable. Chapter III explores the concern that group agents would causally overdetermine the effects already caused by their constituent individuals. I argue that non-reductive views of agency and responsibility lack a coherent causal story about how group agents impact the world as relatively independent entities. I explain the practical importance of higher-order entities and suggest a fictionalist stance towards group agency talk. Chapter IV analyses the puzzle of effect selection – if causes have infinitely many effects, but only one or a few are mentioned in causal claims, what determines their selection from the complete set of consequents? I argue that the criteria governing the difference between effects and by-products lack clarity and stability. I use the concerns about appropriate effect selection to formulate an epistemic argument against consequentialism. (shrink)

I reply to comments by Gerry Hough, Peter Baumann and Martijn Blaauw on my book Moral Skepticisms. The main issues concern whether modest justifiedness is epistemic and how it is related to extreme justifiedness; how contrastivists can handle crazy contrast classes, indeterminacy and common language; whether Pyrrhonian scepticism leads to paralysis in decision-making or satisfies our desires to evaluate beliefs as justified or not; and how contextualists can respond to my arguments against relevance of contrast classes.

Skeptical theism is the view that God exists but, given our cognitive limitations, the fact that we cannot see a compensating good for some instance of evil is not a reason to think that there is no such good. Hence, we are not justified in concluding that any actual instance of evil is gratuitous, thus undercutting the evidential argument from evil for atheism. This paper focuses on the epistemic role of context and contrast classes to advance the debate over (...) skeptical theism in two ways. First, considerations of context and contrast can be invoked to offer a novel defense of skeptical theism. Second, considerations of context and contrast can be invoked to undermine the two most serious objections to skeptical theism: the global skepticism objection and the moral objection. The gist of the paper is to defend a connection between context and contrast-driven views in epistemology with skeptical views in philosophy of religion. (shrink)

Abstract: Some recent arguments against the classical invariantist account of knowledge exploit the idea that there is a ‘knowledge norm’ for assertion. It is claimed that, given the existence of this norm, certain intuitions about assertability support contextualism, or contrastivism, over classical invariantism. In this paper I show that, even if we accept the existence of a knowledge norm, these assertability-based arguments fail. The classical invariantist can accommodate and explain the relevant intuitions about assertability, in a way that retains (...) the idea that knowledge is the epistemic norm for assertion. When we consider the role of assertion as a conversational act, it becomes plausible that a subject's epistemic warrant to assert can be defeated even though she has knowledge. This defeasibility thesis is what allows the classical invariantist to accommodate and explain the kinds of intuitions on which assertability-based arguments depend. (shrink)

General contrastivism holds that all claims of reasons are relative to contrast classes. This approach applies to explanation (reasons why things happen), moral philosophy (reasons for action), and epistemology (reasons for belief), and it illuminates moral dilemmas, free will, and the grue paradox. In epistemology, contrast classes point toward an account of justified belief that is compatible with reliabilism and other externalisms. Contrast classes also provide a model for Pyrrhonian scepticism based on suspending belief about which contrast class is (...) relevant. This view contrasts with contextualism, invariantism, and Schaffer's contrastivism. (shrink)

Contrastivism can be applied to a variety of problems within philosophy, and as such, it can be coherently seen as a unified movement. This volume brings together state-of-the-art research on the contrastive treatment of philosophical concepts and questions, including knowledge, belief, free will, moral luck, Bayesian confirmation theory, causation, and explanation.

I offer a critical treatment of the contrastivist response to the problem of radical scepticism. In particular, I argue that if contrastivism is understood along externalist lines then it is unnecessary, while if it is understood along internalist lines then it is intellectually dissatisfying. Moreover, I claim that a closer examination of the conditions under which it is appropriate to claim knowledge reveals that we can accommodate many of the intuitions appealed to by contrastivists without having to opt for (...) this particular brand of epistemological revisionism. (shrink)

Snedegar offers a contrastivist solution to the puzzle about negative reason existentials, which he argues is preferable to Schroeder's own pragmatic solution. The proposed solution however raises a difficulty for contrastivism, as it suggests an alternative according to which the relevant contrast classes are determined not by the semantics of reason ascriptions but rather by pragmatic effects of contrastive stress. Nevertheless, I suggest there is a contrastivist-friendly solution to the puzzle. In what follows, I explain the problem for Snedegar's (...) account, and I offer an alternative solution to the problem of negative reason existentials. I argue that the solution is well-motivated by a feature of Snedegar's own account, and that it is also compatible with Schroeder's pragmatic account. (shrink)

Contextualists claim two important virtues for their view. First, contextualism is a non-skeptical epistemology, given the plausible idea that not all contexts invoke the high standards for knowledge needed to generate the skeptical conclusion that we know little or nothing. Second, contextualism is able to preserve closure concerning knowledge – the idea that knowledge is extendable on the basis of competent deduction from known premises. As long as one keeps the context fixed, it is plausible to think that some closure (...) principle can be articulated that will survive scrutiny. Opponents of contextualism often try to gain an advantage over it by claiming that their view mimics these virtues of contextualism as well as having other virtues. A recent example of the same is termed ‘contrastivism," as presented by Jonathan Schaffer. I will argue that the representation made is chimerical, that in fact contrastivism has no hope of mirroring these twin virtues of contextualism. (shrink)

Recently, Jonathan Schaffer has defended a contrastivist analysis of knowledge. By appealing to his account, he has attempted to steer a path between skepticism and Moore-style antiskepticism: much like sensitivity theorists and contextualists, he offers significant concessions to, but ultimately rejects, both. In this essay I suggest that in fact Schaffer ends up succumbing to skepticism.

Contrastivism is the view that knowledge is a ternary relation between an agent, a content proposition, and a contrast, and it explains that a binary knowledge ascription sentence appears to be context-sensitive because different contexts can implicitly fill the contrast with different values. This view is purportedly supported by certain linguistic evidence. An objective of this paper is to argue that contrastivism is not empirically adequate, as there are examples that favor its contextualist cousin. Thereafter, I shall develop (...) a contextualist account for the relevant linguistic data. The account consists of a contextualist semantics and some rules of pragmatics. The two parts combined show that contrastivism is neither sufficient nor necessary as a satisfactory theory of knowledge ascriptions. (shrink)

I will here sharply oppose all the phases of the story Schaffer & Knobe tell. In Part 1 we will look at the supposed empirical case against standard contextualism, and in Part 2 we will investigate Schaffer & Knobe’s supposed empirical case for the superiority of contrastivism over standard contextualism.

This paper argues for a solution to a problem that contrastivism faces. The problem is that contrastivism cannot preserve closure, in spite of claims to the contrary by its defenders. The problem is explained and a response developed.

A number of philosophers have recently defended “contrastivist” theories of knowledge, according to which knowledge is a relation between at least the following three relata: a knower, a proposition, and a contrast set. I examine six arguments that Jonathan Schaffer has given for this thesis, and show that those arguments do not favour contrastivism over a rival view that I call “evidentiary relativism”. I then argue that evidentiary relativism accounts for more data than does contrastivism.