Believing and Accepting

293 Pages·2000·11.31 MB·English

by  Pascal Engel

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INTRODUCTION:
THE VARIETIES OF BELIEF AND ACCEPTANCE
PascalEngel
University ofCaen, CREA and
InstitutUniversitaire de France
1. BELIEVING
The notion ofbeliefis ubiquitous in contemporaryphilosophy: it
occurs in epistemology, when one discusses questions about the
rationality ofbeliefand the difference betweenbeliefandknowledge,
inthe philosophy ofmindwhen one raises questions aboutthe nature
ofmental states and contents and about ourvarious ways ofascribing
themto people through a "folkpsychology", andinthe philosophy of
language, when one deals with "the semantics of propositional
attitudes" and with the logic of "belief sentences" of the fonn "X
believes that p". The ramifications of these questions and their
interconnections are numerous, andhere, as elsewhere inphilosophy,
it is not obvious that one field ofinquiry or one angle of approach
dominates the others and deserves to be taken as primary or basic.
Questions about what beliefs really are, metaphysically, cannot be
easily divorced from epistemological questions about what
differentiates belief from knowledge, nor from questions about the
meanings o(the sentences throughwhichwe attribute beliefs to other
people or to ourselves, and the latter cannot be separated from the
former. A good example of these interconnections is provided by
"Moore's paradox": "It rains, but I do not believe that itrains" (or "It
does notrain, butI believe thatitrains"). Accordingto Wittgenstein1
,
Moore made a point, through such sentences, about "the logic of
P.Engel(ed.),BelievingandAccepting, 1-30.
©2000KluwerAcademicPublishers.PrintedintheNetherlands.
2 PASCAL ENGEL
assertion", namely that itmakes no sense, in ordinarytalk, to say that
p, andto say, inthe same breath, that one does notbelievethatp. This
simple "logical" point, however, doesnotpertainonlyto the "logic" of
assertion and belief talk. For, if Wittgenstein is right to say that "I
believethatp "isnotadescription bythe speakerofone ofhermental
states, but the expression ofit, it is difficult to evade the question of
whatconstitutes a genuine descriptionofamental state, incontrastto
a mere expression ofit. Ifthere is a real contrastbetween suchforms
as "I believe thatp " and "He believes thatp " (for l'p, buthe does not
believe thatp " does not give rise to a paradox), then any theory of
belief which gives a uniform account of the meaning of "believes"
when used in the first person and in the third person is bound to be
false. For instance the functionalist account of belief according to
which"believes"meansinbothcases"isastateaptto causebehaviour"
is threatenedbythis contrast.2Hence this simple "logical" pointis not
innocuous with respect to what beliefactually is. It is not innocuous
eitherwithrespecttothe difference betweenbeliefandknowledge, for
a related simple "logical" point is that, unlike in the case ofbelief, a
genuine contradiction emerges when ones says, "I know that itrains,
butitdoesnotrain": forknowledgeimpliesthe truthoftheproposition
known, whichisthus incompatiblewiththe asserti<?nofitsfalsity. The
Moorean sentences invite us to reflect onthis difference, which is, at
bottom, an epistemological one. It also invites us to reflect on the
difference between ascribing a beliefcontentto oneselfand ascribing
a beliefcontent to others: when I ascribe a beliefto myself, I know
whatI believe, whereas there is, one theface ofit, no suchknowledge
when I ascribe a belief to someone else. This raises the question
whetherthere is a singlenotionofbeliefcontentaptto beusedinboth
cases. Moore's paradox is a good way of thinking about the
interconnections between the psychology, the epistemology, and the
semantics ofbelief. Butitis not the onlyway.
Another way, and a good point ofdeparture for dealing with the
issues raised in this collection ofessays, is to start from an intuitive
conception ofbelief, as a mental state whichhas the following set of
features. 3
INTRODUCTION 3
(1) Beliefs are involuntary, and not nonnally subject to direct
voluntarycontrol. ForinstanceIcannotbelieveatwillthatmytrousers
are onfIre, orthatthe DalalLama is a living God, evenifyoupayme
a large amount ofmoneyfor believing suchthings.
(2) Beliefs are nonnally shaped by evidence for whatis believed,
unlessthey are, insome sense, irrational. Ingeneralabeliefisrational
ifitisproportionedto the degree ofevidencethat onehas for its truth.
Inthis sense, one oftensaysthat "beliefs aimattruth".Thisiswhyitis,
onthe face ofit, irrationalto believe againstthe evidencethatonehas.
Asubjectwhosebeliefs arenot shapedbyaconcernfortheirtruth, but
by what she wants to be the case, is more or less a wishful thinker or
a self-deceiver.
(3) Beliefs are contextindependent, inthe sense thatatonetime a
subjectbelieves something or does notbelieveit; she does notbelieve
itrelative to one context andnot relative to another. Forinstance ifI
believe that Paris is a polluted city, I cannot believe that on Monday
andnot on Tuesday; that would be a change ofbelief: or a change of
mind, butnot a case ofbelieving one thing in one contextand another
thing in another context. IfI believe something, the beliefis more or
less pennanent across various contexts.4
(4) An individual's beliefs are subject to an ideal of coherence.
Other things being equal, one should be able to agglomerate one's
beliefsinto alarger, coherent, setofbeliefs. Thisiswhatonegenerally
means when one says that beliefs have a "nonnative" or "rational"
character: we try, ingeneralto have correct or, inthat sense, rational
beliefs, andthisfeature isrevealedbyourordinarybeliefs ascriptions:
onthewholewetendto ascribe to peoplebeliefswhichitis normal or
rational to have.
The overall familiar picture ofbeliefwhich emerges from these
four features is that beliefis a passive state ofmind, rather than an
active one. Whether one conceives ofbeliefs as inner feelings (in the
Humeanway), oras dispositionsto actinvariousways(inthePeircean
orthe Ryleanway), beliefs are states whichwe can'thelphaVing, and
which belong to the passive side ofour natures. The fact that beliefs
are, in general, shaped by evidence, means that they have, in Searle's
useful phrase, the "world to mind direction offit", rather than, like
4 PASCAL ENGEL
desires andwants, the "mindto world direction offit"; in otherwords
they are cognitive attitudes, aimed at being true or false to the facts,
and not conative attitudes, aimed at changing the way the world is in
order, to try to make it fit to our wants. An action is contextual in a
senseinwhichabeliefisnot: accordingto the context, Imaydecide to
act in such or such a way, and in another context in another way, but
I cannot decide to believe in such or such a way depending on the
context. Therationalityandthe coherence ofmybeliefs arepressedon
me by the way the world is, or by general rules ofrationality which
come, at least in part, from logic. I cannot change at will the rules
which provide inductive support for my beliefs, nor the logical rules
whichmake them coherent.
One may objecthere to this familiar picture ofbeliefs as passive
states that there do seem to be some beliefs which we may decide to
have, sometimesagainstcontraryevidence.Forinstancemaynotawife
decide to believe thatherhusband is faithful to her, in spite ofall the
lipstick she regularlyfmds onhis collars? Maynot the Pascalianwho
doesnotbelieveinGoddecide to believeinGodwhenheis shownthe
immense advantages ofthe eternal bliss provided by that belief? To
suchcases the defenderofthefamiliarpictureusuallyresponds thatin
so far as these are cases ofbelief, these are either cases ofirrational
-or in some sense abnonnal-beliefs, produced, as in the wife's
example, through some fonn of irrational belief-forming process,
whereas the above features are supposed to apply to what we call in
general rational beliefs, or cases ofrational actions , not ofrational
beliefs. Inthe lattersortofcase, itmay berationalforme to believe in
God, buttheveryfactthatIfmd the beliefuseful orbeneficialinsome
way is not enough to create in me the corresponding state, which
remains as passive and as shaped by evidence as it canbe inthe fIrst
place. This is whyPascal, after givinghis famous wager argumentfor
beliefinGod, advisesus to go to church, to taketheholywater, andto
getthe habits whichregularlygo with such abelief: This willdullyou
( "Cela vous abetira'') . Getting oneselfto getanhabit does not count
as stopping to have a belief as a matter of habit or of passive
disposition; quite the contrary. Gettingthe habit to have an habit may·
be voluntary, butthe habititselfisnot. SimilarlyImayinducemyself
INTRODUCTION 5
to have a beliefby, say, takinga certaindrug, orbybeing subjectedto
hypnosis, but the very fact that I need to acquire the beliefthrough
some sort of causal process does show that beliefs are in general
caused by some processes, even when the processes are, to a certain
extent, underourcontrol. Inotherwords, I mayhave some reasons to
acquire certain beliefs, just in the same way as I may have some
reasonstotakeanaction, butthefactthatI havethesereasons doesnot
implythatmybeliefs are shaped bymyreasons to have them.
Still, and evenifone grants this point, one maywantto argue that
itisnotobviousthathavingabeliefis apurelypassive andinvoluntary
state; the fact that I believe, for instance, that Pomerol is expensive,
maybe a dispositional statewhichleadsmeto certainactions, suchas,
say, refraining to order a bottle ofPamerol in a restaurant when I do
notwanttopayanexcessiveprice, or, alternatively, hasteningto order
this wine when my desire to drink good wine overrides my brief
awareness of the state of my fmances. The belief that Pomerol is
expensive mayevenbe what some philosophers call a "tacitbelief', a
beliefwhichisnotconsciousuntil itis directlypresenttomymind, or
which does not occur to me unless it "crosses" my mind. But I may
nevertheless holdthe beliefto be tnie, givemy assentto it, approve of
it, orevendefenditagainstsomebodywho wouldurgethe contrary. Is
not my assenting to the content of a belief, or myjudging that a
proposition is true a voluntary act? The StoIcs called such an assent
sunkatathesis, and they considered it to be voluntary and under our
control. Descartesheldthatbelief is amatterofthewillwhenthewill
S
assents to the ideas that are givento itby the understanding. Whether
one conceives ofbeliefs as inneracts ofassent, or as tiedinsolne way
to assertions, anassentis amentalact, andanassertionis a speechact.
So in that respect at least, belief seems to involve some voluntary
element.Inthissense,Imayfeelresponsibleformybeliefs, Imaywant
to hold them and to defend them, whichI would not do ifthey were
purelypassive and involuntary. Does not that aCcoilllt, partly, for the
fact that our beliefs are, in general, subject to an ideal ofintegration
andcoherence?Ourbeliefsarenotrationalsimplybecausetheyhappen
tobe so;theyarerationalbecausewewantthemtobeso, andirrational
6 PASCAL ENGEL
sometimes because we do not want them to be so..Not all of our
reasons for believing are evidentialinnature.
2. ACCEPTING
At this point, the partisan ofthe orthodox conception ofbeliefas
a passive state may want to reconcile the two conflicting
intuitions-that, onthe onehandbeliefs arenotunderdirectvoluntmy
control, andthat, onthe otherhand, theycanbe, to some extent, under
our control-by arguing that there are in fact two distinct kinds of
mentalstateswhichoneconflatesundertheordinmytenn"belief'. One
would be the notion ofbeliefas a passive, largely dispositional state,
whichmayormaynotbeconscious. Thiswouldbethe sense inwhich
Imaybelieve, for instance, thatoysters aretastywithouteverthinking
about it. Beliefin this sense would be, as Peirce and Ramsey have
argued, mainly a habit ofaction, or a disposition to act orto speakin
certainways, which canbe revealed, as the "Bayesian" picture has it,
through our being prepared to make certain bets, and which could be
assigned various degrees or "subjective probabilities" through such
bets. The other notion of "belief' would correspo!1d to the senses in
which we say that we give assent to certain ofour beliefs, and hold
them as true, while rejecting others. This othernotionwould be more
appropriate to the circumstances where we give adhesion to the
contents of our beliefs, and maintain them, or to the circumstances
where we refuse to believe certainthings, while we agree to believe
other things. "Belief' in this second sense would be at least partly
voluntmy, and under our control..These two kinds ofbelief-attitudes
are often, in ordinmytalk, putunderthe same name-belief. But one
may suggest that these are different mental states. They differ in
particular because the fITst is, in the philosopher's phrase, a
propositionalattitude, whichmaybeanattitudetowards aproposition,
a sentence, a representation, or a state of affairs-depending on the
kind of theory that philosophers may hold about this propositional
attitude-whereasthesecondisanattitudetowardsanattitude,namely
INTRODUCTION 7
a ("second-order") attitude towards one's beliefs in the fITst sense
("frrst-order" beliefs).
There are many ways of drawing this contrast, and here the
tenninologies vary. For instance, in a classic paper Ronald de Sousa
draws a distinctionbetweenbeliefproper, whichhe assimilatesmore
or less to a dispositional state, susceptible to vary in degrees
approximately in the Bayesian sense, and assent, as a reflexive,
voluntary act.6 Daniel Dennett makes a similar distinction, between
belief, whichhe takes to be largely dispositional, and opinion, which
is for him a "linguistically infected" state, in which we are when we
reflectupon ourbeliefs and shape their contents withwords.?Dennett
is fond ofquoting E.M. Foster's famous remark: "HowcanI tell what
I think until I see what I say?". There are, according to him, beliefs
whichwehaveandthecontentofwhichisnotdetenninedbyparticular
words orsentenceswhichweutter, silentlyorovertly;'butmanyofour
beliefstakeshape, soto say,throughthewordsweuseto expressthem;
thelatterarerathercalledopinions. Animals,maybe,havebeliefsinthe
fITst sense; man, being a talking animal, has not onlybeliefs, but also
opinions. Other writers prefer to draw a similar contrast by
distinguishing belief from judgment.8 This is not to say that these
distinctions are equivalent. Inorderto seewhethertheyare, oneneeds
to say a lotmore about the relationship betweenthinking a particular
thought and affmning it, orbetweenthinking, inPlato'sphrase, as "an
innerdialogue" ofthemindwithitself, andspeakingoutloudwhatone
thinks. Andoneneedsto sayalotmore aboutthepossessionofbeliefs,
betheypurelymental episodes or "linguisticallyinfected" ones onthe
onehand, andthe actofholdingabeliefas true, andofmaintainingit,
as a matter ofcognitive or ofpracticalpolicy onthe otherhand.
This is what the writers in this volume attempt to do. They all
consider the possibility of dividing the general class of believing
attitudes into atleasttwo subclasses: one wouldbe the class ofbeliefs
proper, andthe otherwouldbethe class ofacceptances. Thenotionof
acceptance has been used widely in the past in the context of
discussionsaboutwhatis called"rationalacceptance" ofhypothesesin
epistemologyandinthe philosophy ofscience, withoutmuchconcern
for the implications ofthese issues for the philosophy ofmind.9 But
8 PASCAL ENGEL
recent discussions have focused on a somewhatbroader set ofissues.
In the recent literature, the distinction betweenbeliefand acceptance
has been proposed by a number ofwriters: Keith Lehrer10 Bas Van
,
Fraassen11 Robert Stalnaker JohnPeny MichaelBratman and
, 12, 13, 14,
Jonathan Cohen, who develops it in his Essay on Belief and
Acceptance. These writers do not draw the belief/acceptance
IS
distinctioninthe sameway, andthereareinfactseveralnonequivalent
versions ofit. ButwemaystartfromCohen'sversion,becauseitserves
as a basis for a number ofthe essays ofthis collection.
3. COHEN ONBELIEF AND ACCEPTANCE
Jonathan Cohen reserves the term "belief' to designate a purely
passivepsychologicalstate,whichisforhimneitherfullydispositional
nor fully "occurrent": a beliefis "a disposition nonnally to feel that a
propositionistrue" Becausebeliefisadisposition, itisnotidentified
.16
to the conscious and reflective thinking ofa thought which would be
alwayspresentinthemind's eye. Becauseitis adispositiontofeel that
a proposition is true, it must a least be in principle or potentially
conscious. Acceptance, onthe contrary, is an active attitude, whichis
neither a feeling nor a disposition, and which involves some mental
actiontaken by a subject:
"To accept thatp is to have or to adopt a policy ofdeeming,
orpostulatingthatp-i.e ofincludingthatpropositionorrule
among one's premisses for deciding what to do or think in a
particular context, whether ornot one feels ittrue thatp
."17
Acceptance, according to Cohen, shares with beliefa number of
features.18 Like beliefit is, or at least involves, an attitude towards a
certain proposition or content. Like belief it involves a form of
epistemiccommitmentinthe sense (4) above thatitimplies anidealof
coherence andintegration, andsohas aninferentialrole inthemindof
a subject: acceptances, like beliefs, can be used for inferring other
acceptances from previous ones. But it is otherwise a completely
INTRODUCTION 9
different attitude. Unlike belief, acceptance is active and "occurs at
will, whetherbyanimmediate decisionorthroughagraduallyformed
intention".19 Itis not a feeling. So it does not share with belieffeature
(1) above. Unlike belief, whichis notnecessarilyverbal or linguistic,
acceptance is for Cohen closely linked to language, at least
potentially.20 The main contrast is that one can accept a proposition
withoutbelievingit, againstevidenceonehasforbelievingittobetrue.
So it does not share withbelieffeature (2). Acceptance thus does not
entailbelief. Cohengivestheexampleofanattorney,whobelievesthat
his client is guilty, but accepts that he is not guilty, for it is duty to
acceptthis, inspite ofthe evidencethathehas. Two sorts ofcases are
to be distinguishedhere. There are, inthe fITstplace, asinthe attorney
example, cases where one can accept a proposition against one's
evidencefor believingitto betrue. Andthere are, inthe secondplace,
cases where one accepts a proposition although one has insufficient
evidence for its truth, i.e although one believes it to a certain degree,
whichis insufficientto be carried over into full assent. Forinstance a
doctor may have some evidence, though not enough evidence, to
believe that the symptoms observed on a patient indicate that he has
tuberculosis, but he may nevertheless accept that it is a case of
tuberculosis, becauseitis saferto acceptthisforthe sake ofsavingthe
patient'slife. Inthisrespect, acceptance is more amatterofsupposing,
of assuming, or of hypothesizing that p is true, for prudential or
practical reasons, rather than a matter of believing in proportion to
evidencethatonehas. Inotherwords, acceptanceismore the outcome
of a practical, pragmatic decision than the outcome of a cognitive,
21
epistemic reason. This does not mean, however, that there are not
cases of acceptances for epistemic reasons. For instance, a scientist
may, inthe context ofhis inquiry, accept, ortake itfor granted, that a
giventheoryistrue, althoughthetheoryisinsufficientlyconfmned.He
maydo this because, like inthe other, prudential, cases, hehasfurther
reasons, otherthanthoseprovidedbyhisbeliefs,whichmayormaynot
bepurelyepistemic, toholdcertainpropositionsastrue. Soacceptance
does not share feature (3) with belief: although I cannot believe
something in one contextandnotin another context, I canacceptthat
p inone context, andfailto acceptthatp inanothercontext. Stalnaker