Same, same but different: the epistemic norms of assertion, action and practical reasoning

2013 ◽  
Vol 168 (3) ◽  
pp. 725-744 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mikkel Gerken
Keyword(s):  
Practical Reasoning ◽  
Epistemic Norms ◽  
Norms Of Assertion

Cognition and Communication

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mikkel Gerken
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Psychology ◽  
Recent Work ◽  
Epistemic Norms ◽  
Norms Of Assertion ◽  
Knowledge Ascriptions

Chapter 8 connects the discussion of epistemic norms of assertion to pragmatics more generally and to the pragmatics of knowledge ascriptions in particular. Some pragmatic theories and recent work in cognitive pragmatics and psycholinguistics are presented. By conjoining these accounts with the psychological considerations of Chapter 5, it is argued that knowledge ascriptions are often used as communicative heuristics, which are effective, albeit inaccurate, ways of getting complex epistemic points across. This conclusion is developed with regard to knowledge ascriptions which carry the directive force of recommending. Thus, Chapter 8 concludes Part II of the book by unifying some of its central discussions about cognitive psychology, epistemic norms, and pragmatics.

scholarly journals TESTIMONIAL ENTITLEMENT, NORMS OF ASSERTION AND PRIVACY

Episteme ◽  
2013 ◽  
Vol 10 (2) ◽  
pp. 207-217 ◽  
Author(s):  
Philip J. Nickel
Keyword(s):  
The Other ◽  
Epistemic Norms ◽  
Norms Of Assertion ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
Testimonial Belief ◽  
The Right ◽  
In Virtue Of ◽  
Normative Status

AbstractAccording to assurance views of testimonial justification, in virtue of the act of testifying a speaker provides an assurance of the truth of what she asserts to the addressee. This assurance provides a special justificatory force and a distinctive normative status to the addressee. It is thought to explain certain asymmetries between addressees and other unintended hearers (bystanders and eavesdroppers), such as the phenomenon that the addressee has a right to blame the speaker for conveying a falsehood but unintended hearers do not, and the phenomenon that the addressee may deflect challenges to his testimonial belief to the speaker but unintended hearers may not. Here I argue that we can do a better job explaining the normative statuses associated with testimony by reference to epistemic norms of assertion and privacy norms. Following Sanford Goldberg, I argue that epistemic norms of assertion, according to which sincere assertion is appropriate only when the asserter possesses certain epistemic goods, can be ‘put to work’ to explain the normative statuses associated with testimony. When these norms are violated, they give hearers the right to blame the speaker, and they also explain why the speaker takes responsibility for the justification of the statement asserted. Norms of privacy, on the other hand, directly exclude eavesdroppers and bystanders from an informational exchange, implying that they have no standing to do many of the things, such as issue challenges or questions to the speaker, that would be normal for conversational participants. This explains asymmetries of normative status associated with testimony in a way logically independent of speaker assurance.

scholarly journals Epistemic Norms of Assertion and Action

2019 ◽  
pp. 681-706
Author(s):  
Mikkel Gerken ◽  
Esben Nedenskov Petersen
Keyword(s):  
Epistemic Norms ◽  
Practical Deliberation ◽  
Norms Of Assertion

This chapter surveys the work on epistemic norms of action, practical deliberation, and assertion. In doing so, it is considered how these norms are interrelated. If there are important similarities between the epistemic norms of action and assertion, these may have important ramifications for how we should think about asserting. Thus, the chapter indicates how thinking about assertions as a speech act might benefit from a broader action theoretic setting. In consequence, we begin by considering the epistemic norms of action and practical deliberation on the market. On this basis we proceed to considering the epistemic norms of assertion. Finally, we consider their interrelation and wider ramifications.

The Epistemic Norms of Assertion

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mikkel Gerken
Keyword(s):  
Speech Acts ◽  
Speech Act ◽  
Epistemic Norm ◽  
Epistemic Norms ◽  
Norms Of Assertion ◽  
Knowledge Norm ◽  
Conversational Context

Chapter 7 extends the discussion of epistemic norms to the linguistic realm. Again, it is argued that a Knowledge Norm of Assertion (KNAS) is inadequate and should be replaced with a Warrant-Assertive Speech Act norm (WASA). According to WASA, S must be adequately warranted in believing that p relative to her conversational context in order to meet the epistemic requirements for asserting that p. This epistemic norm is developed and extended to assertive speech acts that carry implicatures or illocutionary forces. Particular attention is given to the development of a species of WASA that accounts for assertive speech acts having a directive force, such as a recommendation. Thus, Chapter 7 contributes to the debates concerning epistemic norms of assertions.

scholarly journals Knowledge and reasoning

Synthese ◽  
2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mona Simion
Keyword(s):  
Practical Reasoning ◽  
Drop Out ◽  
Epistemic Norm ◽  
Epistemic Normativity ◽  
Epistemic Norms ◽  
Theoretical Reasoning ◽  
Epistemic Function ◽  
In Virtue Of

AbstractThis paper develops a novel, functionalist, unified account of the epistemic normativity of reasoning. On this view, epistemic norms drop out of epistemic functions. I argue that practical reasoning serves a prudential function of generating prudentially permissible action, and the epistemic function of generating knowledge of what one ought to do. This picture, if right, goes a long way towards normatively divorcing action and practical reasoning. At the same time, it unifies reasoning epistemically: practical and theoretical reasoning will turn out to be governed by the same epistemic norm—knowledge—in virtue of serving the same epistemic function: generating knowledge of the conclusion.

Seeing, Knowing, and Doing

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert Audi
Keyword(s):  
Practical Reasoning ◽  
Practical Knowledge ◽  
A Priori ◽  
Human Action ◽  
A Priori Knowledge ◽  
Rational Action ◽  
Reasons For Action ◽  
Discriminative Response ◽  
Rich Information ◽  
Priori Knowledge

This book provides an overall theory of perception and an account of knowledge and justification concerning the physical, the abstract, and the normative. It has the rigor appropriate for professionals but explains its main points using concrete examples. It accounts for two important aspects of perception on which philosophers have said too little: its relevance to a priori knowledge—traditionally conceived as independent of perception—and its role in human action. Overall, the book provides a full-scale account of perception, presents a theory of the a priori, and explains how perception guides action. It also clarifies the relation between action and practical reasoning; the notion of rational action; and the relation between propositional and practical knowledge. Part One develops a theory of perception as experiential, representational, and causally connected with its objects: as a discriminative response to those objects, embodying phenomenally distinctive elements; and as yielding rich information that underlies human knowledge. Part Two presents a theory of self-evidence and the a priori. The theory is perceptualist in explicating the apprehension of a priori truths by articulating its parallels to perception. The theory unifies empirical and a priori knowledge by clarifying their reliable connections with their objects—connections many have thought impossible for a priori knowledge as about the abstract. Part Three explores how perception guides action; the relation between knowing how and knowing that; the nature of reasons for action; the role of inference in determining action; and the overall conditions for rational action.

Testimony and Assertion

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Owens
Keyword(s):  
Speech Acts ◽  
Epistemic Norms ◽  
Testimonial Knowledge ◽  
Epistemology Of Testimony ◽  
Ethical Norms

Two models of assertion are described and their epistemological implications considered. The assurance model draws a parallel between the ethical norms surrounding speech acts like promising and the epistemic norms that govern the transmission of testimonial knowledge. This model is rejected in favour of the view that assertion transmits knowledge by (intentionally) expressing belief. The expression of belief is distinguished from the communication of belief. The chapter goes on to compare the epistemology of testimony with the epistemology of memory, arguing that memory and testimony are mechanisms that can preserve the rationality of the belief they transmit without preserving the evidence on which the belief was originally based.

Acting on Knowledge

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Timothy Williamson
Keyword(s):  
Practical Reasoning ◽  
Philosophy Of Action ◽  
Plausible Account ◽  
Direction Of Fit ◽  
General Schema ◽  
Action Intention ◽  
Knowledge Norms

This chapter develops and refines the analogy between knowledge and action in Knowledge and its Limits. The general schema is: knowledge is to belief as action is to intention. The analogy reverses direction of fit between mind and world. The knowledge/belief side corresponds to the inputs to practical reasoning, the action/intention side to its outputs. Since desires are inputs to practical reasoning, the desire-as-belief thesis is considered sympathetically. When all goes well with practical reasoning, one acts on what one knows. Belief plays the same local role as knowledge, and intention as action, in practical reasoning. This is the appropriate setting to understand knowledge norms for belief and practical reasoning. Marginalizing knowledge in epistemology is as perverse as marginalizing action in the philosophy of action. Opponents of knowledge-first epistemology are challenged to produce an equally systematic and plausible account of the relation between the cognitive and the practical.

The Epistemic Norms of Action

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mikkel Gerken
Keyword(s):  
Explanatory Power ◽  
Epistemic Norm ◽  
Epistemic Normativity ◽  
Epistemic Norms ◽  
Knowledge Norm ◽  
Knowledge Ascriptions ◽  
Epistemological Principle ◽  
Knowledge Norms

Chapter 6 concerns the normative relationship between action and knowledge ascriptions. Arguments are provided against a Knowledge Norm of Action (KNAC) and in favor of the Warrant-Action norm (WA). According to WA, S must be adequately warranted in believing that p relative to her deliberative context to meet the epistemic requirements for acting on p. WA is developed by specifying the deliberative context and by arguing that its explanatory power exceeds that of knowledge norms. A general conclusion is that the knowledge norm is an important example of a folk epistemological principle that does not pass muster as an epistemological principle. More generally, Chapter 6 introduces the debates about epistemic normativity and develops a specific epistemic norm of action.

Taking Stock

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jonathan Dancy
Keyword(s):  
Moral Reasoning ◽  
Practical Reasoning ◽  
Practical Reasons ◽  
A Value ◽  
Theoretical Reasoning ◽  
Similar Explanation

This chapter considers some general issues about the nature of the account that is emerging. It asks whether moral reasoning should have been treated as it was in Chapter 5. It also askes whether an explanation of practical reasons by appeal to value could be mirrored by a similar explanation of theoretical reasoning if one thinks of truth as a value. One might also think of the probability of a belief as a respect in which it is of value. The chapter ends by introducing the idea of a focalist account, and maintains that the account offered of practical reasoning is focalist.

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