Peter D. Klein
Rutgers University
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Archive | 1990
Peter D. Klein
Sceptics believe that knowledge is not possible, because knowledge entails certainty, and certainty is not possible. Most nousists1 believe that knowledge is possible precisely because they believe, in part, that knowledge does not entail certainty. For they, too, believe that certainty is not possible.2 Thus, sceptics and most nousists agree that certainty is not possible.
Archive | 2003
Peter D. Klein
About twenty years ago Keith Lehrer wrote this about how he does philosophy: … In philosophy, we do not have experiments, only the light of reason to guide us… Anyone who obscures that light is defeating the enterprise… Should I ever reach the point at which I am disinclined to seek criticism and amend my views in light of it, I shall take to writing fiction… and give up writing philosophy altogether. Criticism is the touchstone of philosophical inquiry, and those who shunt it aside… are phonies and beguilers.1
Archive | 2012
Peter D. Klein
The argument in “chapter XV” of Book I of the Outlines of Pyrrhonism presenting Agrippa’s five modes leading to suspension of judgment is puzzling. First, it seems to use premises that only a dogmatist should use because they are far from evident, and, second, it relies heavily on the Aristotelian account of epistemic justification. I argue that the two puzzles can be solved by recognizing that the skeptic is dialectically entitled to premises and views that the dogmatist would accept. In particular, the dogmatist that Sextus (or Agrippa) has in mind is Aristotle, and, thus, the Pyrrhonian is entitled to and did, in fact, employ some important features of the Aristotelian account of what, today, we call epistemic justification. But this solution to the puzzle brings with it a price, namely that the generality of the epistemic regress argument is compromised. At best, it is effective only against accounts of epistemic justification that employ the relevant features of the Aristotelian account of epistemic justification. In particular, Aristotle holds that demonstration cannot produce epistemic warrant, it can only transmit it from first principles. If one holds that epistemic justification or at least some aspects of epistemic justification arise or emerge through reasoning, then foundational propositions are not necessary to provide the basis for the origin of warrant (or at least some aspects of it). Thus, infinitism (and contemporary forms of coherentism) can avoid the problems posed by the regress argument.
Archive | 2011
Peter D. Klein; Stefan Tolksdorf
The purpose of this paper is to show that infinitism is the correct solution to the epistemic regress problem. The paper has four steps. First, I will make some preliminary comments about the nature of the regress problem in order to make clear what exactly the perceived problem is. Second, I will discuss a seemingly natural presumption underlying the way in which the regress problem was originally understood by the Pyrrhonians and Aristoteleans. The result of that discussion is that the Pyrrhonian skeptical response to the regress problem is the appropriate one given that presumption. More specifically, if a belief must, itself, be fully justified in order for it to confer full justification on another belief for which it is the offered reason, then no belief is fully justified. By “fully justified” I mean to be referring to the justification condition in the traditional analysis of knowledge. More about that later. Third, I will discuss two ways in which the presumption can and has been challenged. The first challenge arises from various forms of the reliabilist account of justification including what I call ‘austere reliabilism’
Noûs | 1999
Peter D. Klein
The Journal of Philosophy | 1971
Peter D. Klein
Philosophical Studies | 2007
Peter D. Klein
Analysis | 1994
Peter D. Klein; Ted A. Warfield
Philosophical Topics | 1995
Peter D. Klein
Archive | 2008
Peter D. Klein