The Consciousness of Being Alive as a Source of Knowledge

This chapter addresses the question whether our consciousness of being alive can be a source of knowledge, and if so, of what kind of knowledge. It examines this question as it is discussed by a sequence of early modern philosophers who all implicitly consider the issue. The chapter begins with a discussion of the early modern idea of consciousness, viewed as an epistemic relation. It goes on to show that interest in the notion that we are immediately aware of being alive arose in reaction to Descartes’ dualism. For example, the Cartesian Louis de La Forge attempted, but failed, to accommodate the feeling of being alive within a dualist framework. Against this background, the chapter turns to discuss Spinoza’s early attempts to appeal to our consciousness of being alive in order to refute Cartesian scepticism. It concludes that our consciousness of being alive can be considered a source of knowledge, and that, however simple this lesson appears, it may be of moral importance.

Why understanding-why is contrastive

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.

Seinsbegegnung

The contemporary realist turn in philosophy can be seen as a reaction to a merely constructivist understanding of being. The formulation of a realist ontology was already the central concern of Nicolai Hartmann’s philosophy. Hartmann argues that in order to pose the ontological question critically, a realist analysis of the cognitive relation must precede posing the question of being. From the critical analysis, it follows that the cognitive relation is embedded in the relationship of being. Thus, the epistemic relation becomes understandable in the sense of beings encountering and touching one another. In this respect, some proponents of the contemporary realist turn emphasize that there is a philosophically relevant experience of being that can be understood as resistance. Beyond this statement, Hartmann’s analysis of the encounter with being is able to take into account the fact that different kinds of being touch us differently.

Sexual Orientation, Ideology, and Philosophical Method

Here, I examine the epistemic relation between beliefs about the nature of sexual orientation (e.g. beliefs concerning whether orientation is dispositional) and beliefs about the taxonomy of orientation categories (e.g. beliefs concerning whether polyamorous is an orientation category). Current philosophical research gives epistemic priority to the former class of beliefs, such that beliefs about the taxonomy of orientation categories tend to be jettisoned or revised in cases of conflict with beliefs about the nature of sexual orientation. Yet, considering the influence of ideology on beliefs about socially significant phenomena, I argue for an epistemic reversal.

Making Our Thoughts Clear

We often get clear on our thoughts in the process of putting them into words. I investigate the nature of this process by posing the question, “Do you know which thought you are trying to articulate, before successfully articulating it?” and rejecting two answers to the dilemma it yields. The first is that the answer is yes, and that articulation is either the recollection of prior knowledge or the mere acquisition of a skill or ability rather than of propositional knowledge. The second is that the answer is no, and that your thought is unknown in that it is not yet fully realized. Clarity, according to this response, is a metaphysical property of the thought rather than the thinker’s epistemic relation to it. I offer a third solution: you start out with implicit knowledge of your thought but lack explicit knowledge of it. The process of articulation moves you from implicit to explicit knowledge.

Revelation and Phenomenal Relations

Revelation, or the view that the essence of phenomenal properties is presented to us, is as intuitively attractive as it is controversial. It is notably at the core of defences of anti-physicalism. I propose in this paper a new argument against Revelation. It is usually accepted that low-level sensory phenomenal properties, like phenomenal red, loudness or brightness, stand in (phenomenal) relation of similarity and quantity. Furthermore, these similarity and quantitative relations are taken to be internal, that is, to be fixed by what their relata are. I argue that, under some plausible additional premises, no account of what grounds these relations in the essence of their relata is consistent with Revelation, at least if we take common phenomenological descriptions for granted. As a result, the plausibility of Revelation is undermined. One might however resist this conclusion by weakening the epistemic relation postulated between subjects and their phenomenal properties.

Keeoukaywin: The Visiting Way - Fostering an Indigenous Research Methodology

Decolonizing research methodologies are increasingly becoming the forefront of research with, for and/or by Indigenous peoples. This paper aims to highlight an Indigenous research methodology that emerged from a Metis researcher’s relation with Omushkego people from Moose Cree First Nation (Moose Factory, Ontario, Canada) during my doctoral research from 2012 to 2016. The contents of the article represent a decolonizing process of doing research with a broader research aim to make links between land-based pedagogy and milo pimatisiwin (good life). It is with the Omushkego people of Moose Cree First Nation and how the community itself led me to remember, to reclaim and to regenerate what I came to identity as Keeoukaywin meaning the Visiting Way. With relationality at its core, the Visiting Way - Keeoukaywin - re-centers Metis and Cree ways of being as a practical and meaningful methodology to foster milo pimatisiwin, living and being well in relation. The study shows how an Indigenous research methodology promotes self-recognition in relation to the land, history, community and values and demystifies our own epistemic relation to historical truths.

Content Particularism

Chapter 3 distinguishes four ways one might account for perceptual particular. We can take an epistemic approach and understand perceptual particularity in terms of a special epistemic relation to the particulars perceived. We can take an ontological approach and understand perceptual particularity in terms of the ontological dependence of the perceptual state on the particulars perceived. We can take a psychologistic approach and understand perceptual particularity in terms of the phenomenal character of perceptual states by arguing that phenomenal character is constituted by the particulars perceived. Finally, we can take a representational approach and understand perceptual particularity in terms of features of perceptual content. The chapter argues that perceptual particularity is best accounted for in terms of perceptual content rather than in terms of epistemic, psychologistic, or ontological dependency properties.

Deep disagreement and hinge epistemology

This paper explores the application of hinge epistemology to deep disagreement. Hinge epistemology holds that there is a class of commitments—hinge commitments—which play a fundamental role in the structure of belief and rational evaluation: they are the most basic general ‘presuppositions’ of our world views which make it possible for us to evaluate certain beliefs or doubts as rational. Deep disagreements seem to crucially involve disagreements over such fundamental commitments. In this paper, I consider pessimism about deep disagreement, the thesis that such disagreements are rationally irresolvable, and ask whether the Wittgensteinian account of deep disagreement—according to which such disagreements are disagreements over hinge commitments—provides adequate support for pessimism. I argue that the answer to this question depends on what hinge commitments are and what our epistemic relation to them is supposed to be. I argue for two core claims. First, that non-epistemic theories of hinge commitments provide adequate support for pessimism. Nevertheless, such theories have highly implausible consequences in the context of deep disagreement. Secondly, at least one epistemic theory of hinge commitments, the entitlement theory, permits optimism about such disagreements. As such, while hinge epistemology is mainly pessimistic about deep disagreement, it doesn’t have to be.