Matthias Steup

Epistemic justification : essays in the theory of knowledge

Epistemic Justification collects twelve distinguished and influential essays in epistemology by William P. Alston taken from a body of work spanning almost two decades. They represent the gradual development of Alstons thought in epistemology.He concentrates on topics that are central to contemporary epistemology and provides a much-needed and useful map to these issues be explicitly distinguishing and interrelating concepts of justification used in epistemology. More important, he develops and defends his own distinctive epistemic view throughout the volume. Notably, he argues for an account of justification that combines both internalist and externalist features. In addition, he discusses various forms of foundationalism and supports a moderate form. Finally, Alston demonstrates that the epistemic circularity that often plagues our attempts to validate our basic sources of belief does not prevent our showing that they are reliable sources of knowledge.

Belief control and intentionality

In this paper, I argue that the rejection of doxastic voluntarism is not as straightforward as its opponents take it to be. I begin with a critical examination of William Alston’s defense of involuntarism and then focus on the question of whether belief is intentional.

Empiricism, metaphysics, and voluntarism

This paper makes three points: First, empiricism as a stance is problematic unless criteria for evaluating the stance are provided. Second, Van Fraassen conceives of the empiricist stance as receiving its content, at least in part, from the rejection of metaphysics. But the rejection of metaphysics seems to presuppose for its justification the very empiricist doctrine Van Fraassen intends to replace with the empiricist stance. Third, while I agree with Van Fraassen’s endorsement of voluntarism, I raise doubts about the possibility of defending voluntarism without engaging in the kind of metaphysics Van Fraassen rejects.

The regress of metajustification

A defense of coherentism involves two things: direct support by developing a detailed account of coherentism and indirect support by giving a strong argument against the competing theory, foundationalism. In this paper, I will critically examine a way of doing the latter. Coherentists typically argue for what I shall call the requirement of metajustification: Ss belief that p is justified only if S is justified in having a metajustificatory belief about the reasonableness of her belief that p. From the requirement of metajustification, a strong anti-foundationalist argument can be derived. Suppose first level justification requires metajustification. If so, for a belief to be justified, a further belief must be justified as well, namely a metajustificatory belief. Therefore, the coherentist can argue, foundationalists are mistaken in maintaining that there are basic beliefs, for a basic belief is supposed not to depend for its justification on the justification of any further belief. There is a strong and a weak version of the requirement of metajustification, depending on how it is construed. I shall argue that either of these versions leads to skepticism. As a result, the coherentist faces the following dilemma. Endorsing the requirement of metajustification allows the coherentist to reject foundationalism on the grounds that there are no basic beliefs, but leads him into skepticism. Rejecting the requirement of metajustification avoids the consequence of skepticism, but deprives the coherentist of the strong anti-foundationalist argument he would have were he to endorse it.

Destructive defeat and justificational force: the dialectic of dogmatism, conservatism, and meta-evidentialism

Defeaters can prevent a perceptual belief from being justified. For example, when you know that red light is shining at the table before you, you would typically not be justified in believing that the table is red. However, can defeaters also destroy a perceptual experience as a source of justification? If the answer is ‘no’, the red light defeater blocks doxastic justification without destroying propositional justification. You have some-things-considered, but not all-things-considered, justification for believing that the table is red. If the answer is ‘yes’, the red light defeater blocks doxastic justification by destroying propositional justification. You have neither all-things-considered nor some-things-considered justification for believing that the table is red. According to dogmatism, the justificational force of perceptual experiences is indestructible. According to conservatism about sense experience, a perceptual experience ceases to have justificational force if there is evidence against its reliability. Finally, according to meta-evidentialism, a perceptual experience is blocked from being a source of justification is there is no evidence of its reliability. I argue that, of these three theories, meta-evidentialism is the most plausible.

Doxastic Voluntarism and Up-To-Me-Ness

Rik Peels and I agree on the importance of the concept of epistemic responsibility. We disagree on whether responsibility for our beliefs requires the kind of control needed for responsibility for ...

BonJour’s Anti-Foundationalist Argument

Philosophers who reject foundationalism affirm either that there is not, or that there cannot be, a foundation of knowledge. A typical argument in support of the former claim runs as follows. For there to be a foundation of knowledge, there would have to be a sufficient number of beliefs that enjoy an evidential privilege such as infallibility, indubitability, or incorrigibility. For only by virtue of possessing such an evidential privilege could a belief be an instance of direct knowledge and then serve as a foundation forindirect knowledge. However, as a matter of psychological fact, far too few beliefs meet this condition for there to be a sufficient number of foundational beliefs. Hence indirect knowledge does not rest on any foundation.1