epistemic justification
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2021 ◽  
pp. 1-25
Author(s):  
J. Adam Carter

Epistemic autonomy is necessary for knowledge in ways that epistemologists have not yet fully appreciated. This chapter uses a series of thought experiments featuring (radical) forms of cognitive enhancement in order to show why; in particular, and with reference to a series of tweaks on Lehrer’s ‘TrueTemp’ case, I motivate an autonomous belief condition on propositional knowledge, a condition the satisfaction of which—it will be shown—is neither entailed by, nor entails, the satisfaction of either a belief condition or, importantly, an epistemic justification condition. This transition from a ‘JTB+X’ to a ‘JTAB+X’ template marks an important and needed update to the received thinking about what knowing involves. (Of course, the question of whether knowledge is analysable is contentious; an appendix for knowledge-firsters explains the relevance of the necessity of epistemic autonomy for knowledge for knowledge-first projects).


2021 ◽  
pp. 115-136
Author(s):  
Kevin McCain ◽  
Luca Moretti

This chapter further elucidates PE by explaining how it applies to multiple domains. Though the preceding chapter already touches upon some of these, here it is cashed out how PE can account for perceptual justification, memorial justification, testimonial justification, introspective justification, and a priori justification. Exploring the contours of PE in this way reveals just how powerful and unified the theory is. Along the way, it is argued that Declan Smithies’ forceful objections to PC fail to impugn PE. Additionally, it is shown that PE has the resources to respond to each of the challenges that Smithies claims are faced by any internalist theory with “global ambitions”––any theory that purports to be a comprehensive account of epistemic justification. (These challenges for instance include the problem of forgotten evidence and the problem of stored beliefs.) The discussion in this chapter makes it clear that PE is a comprehensive account of epistemic justification that achieves its global ambitions.


Author(s):  
Kevin McCain ◽  
Luca Moretti

McCain and Moretti develop a new appearance/seemings-based theory of epistemic justification. This theory, Phenomenal Explanationism, takes as a reasonable starting point the idea that how things appear provides evidence about how the world is. However, unlike other appearance-based theories, Phenomenal Explanationism does not rely on an overly simplistic account of evidential support where things appearing a particular way is sufficient for rationally believing they are that way. Instead, Phenomenal Explanationism takes the insight that appearances are evidence and imbeds it into a broader explanationist framework. In this broader framework the world appearing a particular way provides sufficient justification for believing the world is that way just in case the world being the way it appears best explains the total evidence. Although Phenomenal Explanationism draws inspiration from Phenomenal Conservatism and explanationist theories, it is superior to both in that it offers a satisfying, complete theory of epistemic justification.


2021 ◽  
pp. 3-29
Author(s):  
Kevin McCain ◽  
Luca Moretti

This chapter discusses Phenomenal Conservatism (PC) and its promises as a theory of epistemic justification. It also explores common objections raised against PC including that it is too liberal, it conflicts with Bayesianism, and it runs afoul of cognitive penetration. It is argued that these common objections fail to pose a genuine threat to PC. Additionally, it is argued that there are a number of benefits provided by the appearance-based approach to epistemic justification championed by PC. As a result, this chapter shows that PC is a good starting point for theorizing about the nature of epistemic justification even though it cannot make good on all of its promises.


2021 ◽  
pp. 157-174
Author(s):  
Kevin McCain ◽  
Luca Moretti

This chapter articulates the anti-skeptical line of response afforded by PE. It is also shown that while the promised anti-skeptical bite of other appearance-based theories, such as PC, dissolves when one becomes reflectively aware of one’s own appearances, the same is not true of PE. This not only addresses a perennial concern for internalist theories but also completes the case for the superiority of PE over both PC and similar theories that do not take on board explanationist insights. This chapter shows that PE offers all that one might want from PC and much more. So, PE is an important theory of epistemic justification that is worthy of serious consideration.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nora Mills Boyd

This Element introduces major issues in the epistemology of experimental physics through discussion of canonical physics experiments and some that have not yet received much philosophical attention. The primary challenge is to make sense of how physicists justify crucial decisions made in the course of empirical research. Judging a result as epistemically significant or as calling for further technical scrutiny of the equipment is one important context of such decisions. Judging whether the instrument has been calibrated, and which data should be included in the analysis are others. To what extent is it possible to offer philosophical analysis, systematization, and prescriptions regarding such decisions? To what extent can there be explicit epistemic justification for them? The primary aim of this Element is to show how a nuanced understanding of science in practice informs an epistemology of experimental physics that avoids strong social constructivism.


2021 ◽  
pp. 1-28
Author(s):  
Ylwa Sjölin Wirling

Abstract Philosophers often make exotic-sounding modal claims, such as: “A timeless world is impossible”, “The laws of physics could have been different from what they are”, “There could have been an additional phenomenal colour”. Otherwise popular empiricist modal epistemologies in the contemporary literature cannot account for whatever epistemic justification we might have for making such modal claims. Those who do not, as a result of this, endorse scepticism with respect to their epistemic status typically suggest that they can be justified but have yet to develop some distinct, workable theory of how. That is, they endorse a form of non-uniformism about the epistemology of modality, according to which claims about philosophically interesting modal matters need to be justified differently from e.g. everyday or scientific modal claims, but they fail to provide any more detail. This article aims to fill this gap by outlining how such a non-uniformist view could be spelled out and what story about philosophically interesting modal justification it could contain.


2021 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. e337
Author(s):  
Gerda Hassler

Defined narrowly, evidentiality pertains to the sources of knowledge or evidence whereby the speaker feels entitled to make a factual claim. But evidentiality may also be conceived more broadly as both providing epistemic justification and reflecting speaker’s attitude towards the validity of the communicated information, and hearer’s potential acceptability of the information, derived from the degree of reliability of the source and mode of access to the information. Evidentiality and epistemic modality are subcategories of the same superordinate category, namely a category of epistemicity. Since the first seminal works on evidentiality (Chafe and Nichols 1986), studies have for the most part centred on languages where the grammatical marking of the information source is obligatory (for example Willett 1988; Aikhenvald 2004). Recent years have witnessed a growing interest in the study of the domain of evidentiality in European languages, which rely on strategies along the lexico‐grammatical continuum. Assuming a broad conception of evidentiality and defining it as a functional category, we study linguistic means that fulfil the function of indicating the source of information for the transmitted content of a certain proposition in Romance languages.


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