Day 9: Goldman on Reliabilism
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Key Methodological Moves
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Goldman on Justification & Knowledge
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Justification
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Processes and Methods
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Goldman on Interpersonal and Intrapersonal Justification
Key
Methodological Moves
(with Respect to Knowledge &
Justification)
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Epistemic (normative or prescriptive) terms are defined in terms of
non-epistemic (non-normative or descriptive) terms
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The rules being sought are not guidance rules
Goldman on Justification &
Knowledge
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Justification (roughly): belief formed from a reliable process, and no
other reliable process exists that the agent could or should have used that
would have changed the agent’s belief
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Knowledge (roughly): reliable true belief where there are no relevant
alternatives that pose a problem
Goldman on Justification &
Knowledge
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In earlier work, Goldman stressed that we need an account of
justification to fill out the theory of knowledge
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Both the accounts of justification and knowledge were externalist &
reliabilist
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We will focus on his view of justification
Justification
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S’s believing p is justified at t iff
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(a) p is permitted by a right system of J-rules, &
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(b) the permission is not undermined by S’s cognitive state at t.
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What is the criterion of rightness for J-rules?
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reliability
Processes and
Methods
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What are processes and methods?
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Methods have to be justifiably (reliably) acquired: the Gertrude example
Goldman on Interpersonal &
Intrapersonal Justification
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Why is intrapersonal treated as more basic than interpersonal?
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(1) issue of theexistence of other people, minds
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(2) interpersonal reason giving depends on intrapersonal justification
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(3) can be justified (and know) without being able to state reasons
(either due to complexity or for historical/memory reasons)
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(4) someone could be justified even if no one else is bright enough to
understand the basis of their justification