Hostname: page-component-7bb8b95d7b-l4ctd Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-10-07T04:35:15.599Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Epistemic Existentialism

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 August 2019

Laura Frances Callahan*
Affiliation:
University of Notre Dame, Indiana, USA
*
*Corresponding author. Email: laura.callahan24@gmail.com

Abstract

Subjectivist permissivism is a prima facie attractive view. That is, it's plausible to think that what's rational for people to believe on the basis of their evidence can vary if they have different frameworks or sets of epistemic standards. In this paper, I introduce an epistemic existentialist form of subjectivist permissivism, which I argue can better address “the arbitrariness objection” to subjectivist permissivism in general. According to the epistemic existentialist, it's not just that what's rational to believe on the basis of evidence can vary according to agents’ frameworks, understood as passive aspects of individuals’ psychologies. Rather, what's rational to believe on the basis of evidence is sensitive to agents’ choices and active commitments (as are frameworks themselves). Here I draw on Chang's work on commitment and voluntarist reasons. The epistemic existentialist maintains that what's rational for us to believe on the basis of evidence is, at least in part, up to us. It can vary not only across individuals but for a single individual, over time, as she makes differing epistemic commitments.

Type
Article
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2019

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Aristotle, (1939). De Caelo. trans. Guthrie, W.K.C.. Loeb Classical Library series. London: Heinemann.Google Scholar
Basu, R. (2018). ‘Can Beliefs Wrong?Philosophical Topics 46(1), 117.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Berker, S. (2018). ‘A Combinatorial Argument against Practical Reasons for Belief.’ Analytic Philosophy 59, 427–70.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Boghossian, P.A. (2006). Fear of Knowledge: Against Relativism and Constructivism. Oxford: Clarendon Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brueckner, A. and Bundy, A. (2012). ‘On ‘Epistemic Permissiveness’.’ Synthese 188(2), 165–77.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Callahan, L.F. (Ms a). ‘Grounding the Normativity of Epistemic Rationality: Responsivism.’Google Scholar
Callahan, L.F. (Ms b). ‘Epistemic Underdetermination.’Google Scholar
Chang, R. (2002). ‘The Possibility of Parity.’ Ethics 112, 659–88.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chang, R. (2013 a). ‘Grounding Practical Normativity: Going Hybrid.Philosophical Studies 164(1), 163–87.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chang, R. (2013 b). ‘Commitments, Reasons, and the Will.’ In Shafer-Landau, R. (ed.), Oxford Studies in Metaethics 8, pp. 74113. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chang, R. (2015). ‘Transformative Choices.’ Res Philosophica 92(2), 237–82.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Christensen, D. (2010). ‘Higher-Order Evidence.’ Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 81(1), 185215.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Christensen, D. (2016). ‘Conciliation, Uniqueness and Rational Toxicity.’ Noûs 50(3), 584603.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Decker, J. (2012). ‘Disagreement, Evidence, and Agnosticism.’ Synthese 187(2), 753–83.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Douven, I. (2009). ‘Uniqueness Revisited.’ American Philosophical Quarterly 46(4), 347–61.Google Scholar
Feldman, R. (2007). ‘Reasonable Religious Disagreements.’ In Antony, L. (ed.), Philosophers Without Gods, pp. 194214. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Fleisher, W. (2018). ‘Rational Endorsement.’ Philosophical Studies 175(10), 2649–75.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Foley, R. (1987) [1947]. The Theory of Epistemic Rationality. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Greco, D. and Hedden, B. (2016). ‘Uniqueness and Metaepistemology.Journal of Philosophy 113(8), 365–95.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Horowitz, S. (2014). ‘Immoderately Rational.’ Philosophical Studies 167(1), 4156.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Joyce, J. (2005). ‘How Probabilities Reflect Evidence.’ Philosophical Perspectives 19(1), 153–78.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kelly, T. (2014). ‘Evidence can be Permissive.’ In Steup, M., Turri, J. and Sosa, E. (eds), Contemporary Debates in Epistemology, 2nd edn, pp. 298311. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell.Google Scholar
Kierkegaard, S. (1971) [1813–1855]. Either/Or (1st Princeton paperback edn). Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Kopec, M. and Titelbaum, M.G. (2016). ‘The Uniqueness Thesis.’ Philosophy Compass 11(4), 189200.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Korsgaard, C. (1996). The Sources of Normativity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Levinstein, B.A. (2017). ‘Permissive Rationality and Sensitivity.’ Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 94(2), 342–70.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lewis, D. (1971). ‘Immodest Inductive Methods.’ Philosophy of Science 38(1), 5463.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Meacham, C.J.G. (2014). ‘Impermissive Bayesianism.’ Erkenntnis 79(6), 1185–217.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Moss, S. (2015). ‘Credal Dilemmas.’ Noûs 49(4), 665–83.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Neta, R. (2007). ‘In Defense of Epistemic Relativism.’ Episteme 4(1), 3048.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pritchard, D. (2009). ‘Defusing Epistemic Relativism.’ Synthese 166(2), 397412.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rinard, S. (2017). ‘No Exception for Belief.’ Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 94(1), 121–43.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rosen, G. (2001). ‘Nominalism, Naturalism, Epistemic Relativism.Noûs 35(s15), 6991.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rosen, G. (2007). ‘The Case Against Epistemic Relativism.’ Episteme 4(1), 1029.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schoenfield, M. (2014). ‘Permission to Believe: Why Permissivism is True and What it Tells us About Irrelevant Influences on Belief.’ Noûs 48(2), 193218.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Simpson, R.M. (2016). ‘Permissivism and the Arbitrariness Objection.’ Episteme 14(4), 519–38.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sosa, E. (2007). A Virtue Epistemology. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sosa, E. (2015). Judgment and Agency. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Titelbaum, M. (2010). ‘Not Enough There There.’ Philosophical Perspectives 24(1), 477528.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
White, R. (2005). ‘Epistemic Permissiveness.’ Philosophical Perspectives 19, 445–59.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
White, R. (2007). ‘Epistemic Subjectivism.’ Episteme 4(1), 115–29.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
White, R. (2014). ‘Evidence Cannot be Permissive.’ In Steup, M., Turri, J. and Sosa, E. (eds), Contemporary Debates in Epistemology, 2nd edn, pp. 312–23. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell.Google Scholar
Willard-Kyle, C. (2017). ‘Do Great Minds Really Think Alike?Synthese 194(3), 9891026.CrossRefGoogle Scholar