Reply to Duncan Pritchard and John Campbell

An epistemological how-possible question asks how knowledge, or knowledge of some specific kind, is possible. The main contention of Duncan Pritchard‟s stimulating comments is that what I call „explanatory minimalism‟ appears to offer us just what we are seeking when we ask such a question. This looks like a problem for me given that I defend a version of explanatory anti-minimalism. Pritchard outlines a version of minimalism inspired by the writings of John McDowell and does not find it obvious that this position is lacking in any relevant respect. Nor do I. My minimalism is moderate rather than extreme but Pritchard‟s objections to anti-minimalism are objections to extreme anti-minimalism. Indeed, his comments do not seem to me to have any direct bearing on what I take to be the fundamental disagreement between minimalism and anti-minimalism

Intellectual vice and self-awareness

To what extent are we able to recognise our own intellectual shortcomings, asks Quassim Cassa

What asymmetry? Knowledge of self, knowledge of others, and the inferentialist challenge

There is widely assumed to be a fundamental epistemological asymmetry between self-knowledge and knowledge of others. They are said to be ’categorically different in kind and manner’ (Moran), and the existence of such an asymmetry is taken to be a primitive datum in accounts of the two kinds of knowledge. I argue that standard accounts of the differences between self-knowledge and knowledge of others exaggerate and misstate the asymmetry. The inferentialist challenge to the asymmetry focuses on the extent to which both self-knowledge and knowledge of others are matters of inference and interpretation. In the case of self-knowledge I focus on the so-called ‘transparency method’ and on the extent to which use of this method delivers inferential self-knowledge. In the case of knowledge of others’ thoughts, I discuss the role of perception as a source of such knowledge and argue that even so-called ’perceptual’ knowledge of other minds is inferential. I contend that the difference between self-knowledge and knowledge of others is a difference in the kinds of evidence on which they are typically based

Diagnostic error, overconfidence and self-knowledge

According to the overconfidence hypothesis (OH), physician overconfidence is a major factor contributing to diagnostic error in medicine. This paper argues that (OH) can be read as offering a personal, a sub-personal or a systemic explanation of diagnostic error. It is argued that personal level overconfidence is an ‘epistemic vice’. The hypothesis that diagnostic errors due to overconfidence can be remedied by increasing physician self-knowledge is shown to be questionable. Some epistemic vices or cognitive biases, including overconfidence, are ‘stealthy’ in the sense that they obstruct their own detection. Even if the barriers to self-knowledge can be overcome, some problematic traits are so deeply entrenched that even well-informed and motivated individuals might be unable to correct them. One such trait is overconfidence. Alternative approaches to ‘debiasing’ are considered and it is argued that overconfidence is blameworthy only if it is understood as a personal level epistemic vice rather than a sub-personal cognitive bias

Epistemic insouciance

This paper identifies and elucidates a hitherto unnamed epistemic vice: epistemic insouciance. Epistemic insouciance consists in a casual lack of concern about whether one’s beliefs have any basis in reality or are adequately supported by the best available evidence. The primary intellectual product of epistemic insouciance is bullshit in Harry Frankfurt’s sense. This paper clarifies the notion of epistemic insouciance and argues that epistemic insouciance is both an epistemic posture and an epistemic vice. Epistemic postures are attitudes towards epistemic objects such as knowledge, evidence or inquiry. Epistemic vices are defined as character traits, attitudes or thinking styles that systematically obstruct the gaining, keeping or sharing of knowledge. Epistemic insouciance is not just a posture but an affective posture. Such postures are distinguished from epistemic stances, which are policies that one can adopt or reject. Epistemic malevolence, as Jason Baehr describes it, is an example of an epistemically vicious epistemic stance that issues in active attempts to undermine the knowledge possessed by a specified group of individuals. An example of epistemic malevolence in action is the so-called ‘tobacco strategy’. I argue that epistemic malevolence undermines knowledge by instilling doubts about respectable sources of evidence

Knowledge and its objects : revisiting the bounds of sense

The Kantian project of investigating the necessary structure of experience presupposes answers to three questions: what is the purpose of such an investigation, what is the source of necessary features of experience, and by what means is it possible to establish the necessary structure of experience? This paper is a critical examination of Strawson's answers to these questions in The Bounds of Sense and his later work. The realism that is implicit in The Bounds of Sense is much more explicit in Strawson's later work but relies on problematic assumptions about the relationship between epistemology and metaphysics

Vice epistemology

Vice epistemology is the philosophical study of the nature, identity, and epistemological significance of intellectual vices. Such vices include gullibility, dogmatism, prejudice, closed-mindedness, and negligence. These are intellectual character vices, that is, intellectual vices that are also character traits. I ask how the notion of an intellectual character vice should be understood, whether such vices exist, and how they might be epistemologically significant. The proposal is that intellectual character vices are intellectual character traits that impede effective and responsible inquiry. I argue that situationist critiques of virtue epistemology pose no significant threat to this proposal. Studies by social psychologists of belief in conspiracy theories suggest that it is sometimes appropriate to explain questionable beliefs by reference to intellectual character vices. Neither ‘regulative’ nor ‘analytic’ epistemology has any good reason to question the epistemological significance of such vices

What is knowledge?

What would a good answer to this question – call it (WK) – look like? What I’m going to call the standard analytic approach (SA) says that: (A) The way to answer WK is to analyse the concept of knowledge. (B) To analyse the concept of knowledge is to come up with noncircular necessary and sufficient conditions for someone to know that something is the case. Is the standard analytic approach to WK the right approach? If not, what would be a better way of doing things? These are the questions I’m going to tackle here. I want to look at some criticisms of SA and consider the prospects for a different, non-standard analytic approach (NA) to WK

Can terrorism ever be morally justified?

This paper provides a framework to make moral sense of terrorism. The framework consists in a test, referred to as the MODAL test, which is an acronym standing for five tests or principles for determining the moral defensibility or indefensibility of terrorism. The five principles concern the motives for terrorism, its objectives, destructiveness, availability of alternatives, and likelihood of success. This approach makes it conceivable but highly unlikely in practice that a terrorist act is morally justified. The MODAL test does not claim to be an exhaustive framework for analysing the moral legitimacy or illegitimacy of terrorism but rather a practical analytical tool aimed at securing a reliable grasp of the tricky question of the relation between morality and terrorism