E. J. Coffman

Thinking about luck

Luck looms large in numerous different philosophical subfields. Unfortunately, work focused exclusively on the nature of luck is in short supply on the contemporary analytic scene. In his highly impressive recent book Epistemic Luck, Duncan Pritchard helps rectify this neglect by presenting a partial account of luck that he uses to illuminate various ways luck can figure in cognition. In this paper, I critically evaluate both Pritchard’s account of luck and another account to which Pritchard’s discussion draws our attention—viz., that due to Nicholas Rescher. I also assess some novel analyses of luck that incorporate plausible elements of Pritchard’s and Rescher’s accounts.

Does Luck Exclude Control

Many think that luck excludes control—roughly, that an event is lucky for you only if the event is beyond your control. Jennifer Lackey [2008] argues against such a requirement on luck. I show that Lackeys argument fails. I also consider a novel argument against such requirements that differs from—but ultimately fares no better than—Lackeys argument.

Conciliationism and Uniqueness

Two theses are central to recent work on the epistemology of disagreement: Conciliationism: In a revealed peer disagreement over P, each thinker should give at least some weight to her peers attitude. Uniqueness: For any given proposition and total body of evidence, the evidence fully justifies exactly one level of confidence in the proposition. 1This paper is the product of full and equal collaboration between its authors. Does Conciliationism commit one to Uniqueness? Thomas Kelly 2010 has argued that it does. After some scene-setting (§1), in §2 we explain and criticize Kellys argument, thereby defeating his larger argument that Conciliationism deserves no dialectical special treatment. But we argue further that Conciliationists are committed to a disjunction, one of whose disjuncts is Uniqueness, that amounts to an ‘extremely strong and unobvious position’ (§§3–4). If we are correct, theorists should not treat Conciliationism as a default position in debates about the epistemic significance of disagreement.

Warrant without truth

This paper advances the debate over the question whether false beliefs may nevertheless have warrant, the property that yields knowledge when conjoined with true belief. The paper’s first main part—which spans Sections 2–4—assesses the best argument for Warrant Infallibilism, the view that only true beliefs can have warrant. I show that this argument’s key premise conflicts with an extremely plausible claim about warrant. Sections 5–6 constitute the paper’s second main part. Section 5 presents an overlooked puzzle about warrant, and uses that puzzle to generate a new argument for Warrant Fallibilism, the view that false beliefs can have warrant. Section 6 evaluates this pro-Fallibilism argument, finding ultimately that it defeats itself in a surprising way. I conclude that neither Infallibilism nor Fallibilism should now constrain theorizing about warrant.

Three Arguments Against Foundationalism: Arbitrariness, Epistemic Regress, and Existential Support

A particular belief of a person is basic just in case it is epistemically justified and it owes its justification to something other than her other beliefs or the interrelations of their contents; a persons belief is nonbasic just in case it is epistemically justified but not basic. Traditional Foundationalism says that, first, if a human being has a nonbasic belief, then, at bottom, it owes its justification to at least one basic belief, and second, there are basic beliefs. Call the second thesis Minimal Foundationalism. In this essay, we assess three arguments against Minimal Foundationalism which we find in recent work of Peter Klein and Ernest Sosa.1

Two claims about epistemic propriety

This paper has two main parts. In the first part, I argue that prominent moves in two related current debates in epistemology—viz., the debates over classical invariantism and the knowledge first movement—depend on one or the other of two claims about epistemic propriety: (1) Impropriety due to lack of a particular epistemic feature suffices for epistemic impropriety; and (2) Having justification to believe P suffices for having warrant to assert P. In the second part, I present and defend novel arguments against both claims.

Defending Klein on Closure and Skepticism

In this paper, I consider some issues involving a certain closure principle for Structural Justification, a relation between a cognitive subject and a proposition that’s expressed by locutions like ‘S has a source of justification for p’ and ‘p is justifiable for S’. I begin by summarizing recent work by Peter Klein that advances the thesis that the indicated closure principle is plausible but lacks Skeptical utility. I then assess objections to Klein’s thesis based on work by Robert Audi and Anthony Brueckner. One finding is that the typical statement of the relevant closure principle can express a number of different closure principles, and that recognizing this helps to resolve certain disputes.

How (not) to attack the luck argument

The Luck Argument is among the most influential objections to the main brand of libertarianism about metaphysical freedom and moral responsibility. In his work, Alfred Mele [2006. Free will and luck. Oxford: Oxford University Press] develops – and then attempts to defeat – the literatures most promising version of the Luck Argument. After explaining Meles version of the Luck Argument, I present two objections to his novel reply to the argument. I argue for the following two claims: (1) Meles reply is either otiose or undermined by his own defense of the Luck Argument from a different objection and (2) Meles reply turns out to lack the form required to engage the step of the Luck Argument it targets. Having shown that the failure of Meles novel attack is overdetermined, I close by defending a different (and, I believe, decisive) objection to the Luck Argument – which, as it happens, lurks right under Meles nose.

ALFRED MELE'S METAPHYSICAL FREEDOM?

In this paper we raise three questions of clarification about Alfred Meles fine recent book, Free Will and Luck. Our questions concern the following topics: (i) Meles combination of ‘luck’ and ‘Frankfurt-style’ objections to libertarianism, (ii) Meles stipulations about ‘compatibilism’ and the relation between questions about free action and questions about moral responsibility, and (iii) Meles treatment of the Consequence Argument.

Knowing Full Well

Belief is a kind of performance, which attains one level of success if it is true (or accurate), a second level if it is competent (or adroit), and a third if its truth manifests the believers competence (i.e., if it is apt). Knowledge on one level (the animal level) is apt belief. The epistemic normativity constitutive of such knowledge is thus a kind of performance normativity. a problem is posed for this account, however, by the fact that suspension of belief admits the same epistemic normativ-ity as does belief itself, even though to suspend is of course precisely not to perform, at least not with the aim of truth. My solution distinguishes orders of performance normativity, including a first order where execution competence is in play, and a second order where the performer must assess the risks in first-order performance. This imports a level of reflective knowledge, above the animal level. Two of Platos best-known dialogues are inquiries about knowledge. The Theaetetus inquires into its nature, the Meno also into its value. each dialogue, i will suggest, involves the same more basic question: what sort of normativity is constitutive of our knowledge? a belief that falls short of knowledge is thereby inferior. it is better to know than to get it wrong, of course, and also better than to get it right just by luck. what is involved in such evaluation? an answer to this more basic question enables a solution for both Platonic problems. in this chapter