In this chapter I wish to develop the idea of a belief-policy as the chief vehicle for choice in belief, and argue that belief-policies are inevitable – we all have them – and that replacement and modification of belief-policies in the interests of greater rationality is one of the chief focusses of the will in belief. Belief-policies are what epistemologists typically argue about in discussing epistemic rationality (as we shall see in more detail in the next chapter). As a consequence belief-policies are of far more significance than is the question of whether or not we can choose to believe, just like that, or choose to believe by more round about routes. We choose to believe by choosing, or choosing to retain, belief-policies for acquiring, retaining, or discarding our beliefs.

The idea of a belief-policy has been briefly foreshadowed in chapter two. As I shall use the expression a belief-policy is a strategy or project or programme for accepting, rejecting or suspending judgement as to the truth of propositions in accordance with a set of evidential norms. An evidential norm may include reference to both the presence and absence of evidence. Such a policy may be dispositional and tacit, or the result of an overt choice. The policy (or policies) each of us grows up with is an example of a tacitly held policy, though it may become explicit. The deliberate adoption of a belief-policy on the grounds that an earlier belief-policy was unsatisfactory in some respect, is an example of the second.