Ad Infinitum: New Essays on Epistemological Infinitism

291 Pages·2014·2.15 MB·English

by  John Turri, Peter D. Klein

Title Pages
University Press Scholarship Online
Oxford Scholarship Online
Ad Infinitum: New Essays on Epistemological Infinitism
John Turri and Peter D. Klein
Print publication date: 2014
Print ISBN-13: 9780199609598
Published to Oxford Scholarship Online: August 2014
DOI: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199609598.001.0001
Title Pages
Ad Infinitum Ad Infinitum
(p.iv)
Great Clarendon Street, Oxford, OX2 6DP,
United Kingdom
Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford.
It furthers the University's objective of excellence in research,
scholarship,
and education by publishing worldwide. Oxford is a registered trade
mark of
Oxford University Press in the UK and in certain other countries
© The several contributors 2014
Page 1 of 3
Title Pages
The moral rights of the authors have been asserted
First Edition published in 2014
Impression: 1
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced,
stored in
a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means,
without the
prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly
permitted
by law, by licence or under terms agreed with the appropriate
reprographics
rights organization. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside the
scope of the
above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University
Press, at the
address above
You must not circulate this work in any other form
and you must impose this same condition on any acquirer
Published in the United States of America by Oxford University Press
198 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016, United States of America
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
Data available
Library of Congress Control Number: 2013950538
ISBN 978–0–19–960959–8
As printed and bound by
CPI Group (UK) Ltd, Croydon, CR0 4YY
Links to third party websites are provided by Oxford in good faith and
for information only. Oxford disclaims any responsibility for the
materials
contained in any third party website referenced in this work.
Page 2 of 3
Contents
Go to page:
Front Matter
Title Pages
Preface
List of Contributors
Introduction
John Turri, and Peter D. Klein
1 Knowing Better, Cognitive Command, and Epistemic Infinitism
Scott F. Aikin
2 Klein and the Regress Argument
Michael Bergmann
3 Reasons Require Reasons
Andrew D. Cling
4 Infinitism
Richard Fumerton
5 Virtue and Vice Among the Infinite
Michael Huemer
6 Reasons, Reasoning, and Knowledge: A Proposed Rapprochement between Infinitism and
Foundationalism1
Peter D. Klein
7 Infinitist Justification and Proper Basing
Jonathan L. Kvanvig
8 Klein’s Case for Infinitism
Ram Neta
9 Can an Infinite Regress Justify Everything?
Jeanne Peijnenburg and David Atkinson
10 Can Perception Halt the Regress of Justifications?
Michael Rescorla
11 Infinitism
Ernest Sosa
12 Creative Reasoning
John Turri
13 Avoiding the Regress
Michael Williams
14 First Person and Third Person Reasons and the Regress Problem
Linda Zagzebski
End Matter
Index
Preface
University Press Scholarship Online
Oxford Scholarship Online
Ad Infinitum: New Essays on Epistemological Infinitism
John Turri and Peter D. Klein
Print publication date: 2014
Print ISBN-13: 9780199609598
Published to Oxford Scholarship Online: August 2014
DOI: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199609598.001.0001
(p.v) Preface
Infinitism is a family of views in epistemology about the structure of knowledge and
epistemic justification. It contrasts naturally with coherentism and foundationalism. All
three views agree that knowledge or justification requires an appropriately structured
chain of reasons. What form may such a chain take? Foundationalists opt for non-
repeating finite chains. Coherentists (at least linear coherentists) opt for repeating finite
chains. Infinitists opt for non-repeating infinite chains. Appreciable interest in infinitism as a
genuine competitor to coherentism and foundationalism has developed only recently.
This volume comprises fourteen papers at the cutting edge of research on infinitism. We
reckon that this volume is the most sustained, careful, and serious treatment of infinitism
ever. It covers topics in the epistemology, metaphysics, and ethics of regresses and
reasons. Our hope is that the volume will promote greater understanding of infinitism and
inspire further excellent work on this rewarding and, at times, enigmatic topic.
In addition to the fourteen papers, we also include an introduction. The introduction
provides an overview of infinitism in epistemology, in three parts. First we introduce
infinitism by explaining its intuitive motivations and the context they arise in. Next we
discuss the history of infinitism, which is mostly one of neglect, punctuated by brief
moments of hostile dismissal. Then we survey contemporary arguments for and against
Page 1 of 3
Preface
infinitism.
The introduction provides a robust frame of reference for understanding and evaluating
the papers that follow. The introduction does not summarize the papers. Each chapter
includes an abstract of its contents and we don’t presume that we can do any better than
our excellent team of contributors has done in summarizing their own work. But, in
closing this Preface, it might be helpful for us to provide a one-sentence synopsis of each
chapter.
1. Aikin: Infinitism is an important part of understanding comparative and ideal
epistemic assessments.
2. Bergmann: Leading versions of infinitism are actually disguised versions of
inferior forms of foundationalism, and standard forms of foundationalism are
superior.
3. Cling: Infinitism is correct about a certain form of epistemic responsibility, but
we should be skeptical that we’re capable of responsibility in that sense.
4. Fumerton: Infinitism is correct about dialectically defensible belief but
incorrect about justified belief.
(p.vi) 5. Huemer: A refutation of three common views about when an infinite
series is impossible, along with a new account of when it is impossible.
6. Klein: A rapprochement between foundationalism and infinitism is desirable and
possible.
7. Kvanvig: Infinitist accounts of epistemic justification face serious problems.
8. Neta: Standard objections to infinitism fail, but infinitism faces a deeper,
previously unrecognized problem.
9. Peijnenburg and Atkinson: An infinite regress of probabilistic justifications
overcomes familiar problems facing an infinite regress of deductive justifications.
10. Rescorla: Dogmatism is better than infinitism as a theory of perceptual
justification.
11. Sosa: The most plausible form of infinitism (about one epistemic status) is
compatible with the most plausible form of foundationalism (about another
epistemic status).
12. Turri: One main objection to infinitism is that it implies that reasoning can
create justification, but this objection fails because reasoning obviously can create
justification.
13. Williams: Infinitism is primarily motivated as the best response to the regress
problem’s skeptical potential, but this motivation is deeply flawed.
14. Zagzebski: The structure of theoretical reasons is infinite, and the ultimate
solution for this is neither infinitism nor foundationalism, but rather an
epistemology of self-trust.
Page 2 of 3
List of Contributors
University Press Scholarship Online
Oxford Scholarship Online
Ad Infinitum: New Essays on Epistemological Infinitism
John Turri and Peter D. Klein
Print publication date: 2014
Print ISBN-13: 9780199609598
Published to Oxford Scholarship Online: August 2014
DOI: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199609598.001.0001
(p.viii) List of Contributors
SCOTT F. AIKIN,
Vanderbilt University
DAVID ATKINSON,
University of Groningen
MICHAEL BERGMANN,
Purdue University
ANDREW D. CLING,
University of Alabama, Huntsville
RICHARD FUMERTON,
University of Iowa
MICHAEL HUEMER,
University of Colorado
PETER D. KLEIN,
Rutgers University
JONATHAN L. KVANVIG,
Baylor University
RAM NETA,
University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
Page 1 of 2
List of Contributors
JEANNE PEIJNENBURG,
University of Groningen
MICHAEL RESCORLA,
University of California, Santa Barbara
ERNEST SOSA,
Rutgers University
JOHN TURRI,
University of Waterloo
MICHAEL WILLIAMS,
Johns Hopkins University
LINDA ZAGZEBSKI,
University of Oklahoma
Page 2 of 2
Introduction
University Press Scholarship Online
Oxford Scholarship Online
Ad Infinitum: New Essays on Epistemological Infinitism
John Turri and Peter D. Klein
Print publication date: 2014
Print ISBN-13: 9780199609598
Published to Oxford Scholarship Online: August 2014
DOI: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199609598.001.0001
Introduction
John Turri
Peter D. Klein
We often provide reasons for the things we believe in order to justify holding the beliefs.
But what about the reasons? Do we need reasons for holding those reasons? And if so,
do we need reasons for holding those reasons that were offered as reasons for our
beliefs? We’re left to wonder:
Does this regress ever end?
Infinitism is designed to answer that question. Given that one of the goals of reasoning is
to enhance the justification of a belief, Q, infinitism holds that there are two necessary
(but not jointly sufficient) conditions for a reason in a chain to be capable of enhancing the
justification of Q:
(1) No reason can be Q itself, or equivalent to a conjunction containing Q as a
conjunct. That is, circular reasoning is excluded.
(2) No reason is sufficiently justified in the absence of a further reason. That is,
there are no foundational reasons.
Page 1 of 19
Introduction
If both (1) and (2) are true, then the chain of reasons for any belief is potentially
unlimited.
The reason for accepting (1), and thereby rejecting circular reasoning as probative, is
that reasoning ought to be able to improve the justificatory status of a belief. But if the
propositional content of a belief is offered as a reason for holding the belief, then no
additional justification could arise. Put more bluntly, circular reasoning begs the question
by positing the very propositional content of the belief whose justificatory status the
reasoning is designed to enhance.
Condition (1) is generally accepted, although some coherentists seem to condone the
sort of circular reasoning that it proscribes (e.g. Lehrer 1997). However, these
coherentists might not actually be denying (1). Rather, they might instead be claiming that
it is epistemically permissible to offer a deliverance of a cognitive faculty as a reason for
believing that the faculty produces justified beliefs. On this alternative reading, these
coherentists don’t deny (1), because (1) concerns the structure, not the source, of
probative reasons. For example, suppose you employ beliefs produced by perception as
reasons for believing that perception is reliable. This need not involve employing the
proposition “perception is reliable” as one of the reasons.
(p.2) Condition (2) is much more controversial. Indeed, denying (2) is a component of
the dominant view in epistemology: foundationalism. Many foundationalists claim that
there are beliefs, so-called “basic beliefs” or “foundational beliefs,” which do not require
further reasons in order to function effectively as reasons for “non-basic” or “non-
foundational” beliefs. Basic beliefs are taken to be sufficiently justified to serve as, at least,
prima facie reasons for further beliefs in virtue of possessing some property that doesn’t
arise from, or depend on, being supported by further reasons. For example, the
relevant foundationalist property could be that the belief merely reports the contents of
sensations or memories; or it could be that the belief is produced by a reliable cognitive
faculty. The general foundationalist picture of epistemic justification is that foundational
beliefs are justified to such an extent that they can be used as reasons for further beliefs,
and that no reasons for the foundational beliefs are needed in order for the foundational
beliefs to be justified.
Infinitists accept (2) and so deny that there are foundational beliefs of the sort that
foundationalists champion. The motivation for accepting (2) is the specter of arbitrariness.
Infinitists, of course, grant that in fact every actually cited chain of reasons ends; but
infinitists deny that there is any reason which is immune to further legitimate challenge.
And once a reason is challenged, then on pain of arbitrariness, a further reason must be
produced in order for the challenged reason to serve as a good reason for a belief.
In addition to denying the existence of so-called basic beliefs, infinitism takes reasoning to
be a process that generates an important type of justification—call it “reason-enhanced
justification.” In opposition to foundationalism, reasoning is not depicted as merely a tool
for transferring justification from the reasons to the beliefs. Instead, a belief’s justification
is enhanced when sufficiently good reasons are offered on its behalf. Such enhancement
Page 2 of 19