Fear of Knowledge: Against Relativism and Constructivism PDF
Preview Fear of Knowledge: Against Relativism and Constructivism
Fear of Knowledge This page intentionally left blank Fear of Knowledge Against Relativism and Constructivism Paul A. Boghossian CLARENDON PRESS (cid:1) OXFORD 3 GreatClarendonStreet,Oxfordox26dp OxfordUniversityPressisadepartmentoftheUniversityofOxford. ItfurtherstheUniversity’sobjectiveofexcellenceinresearch,scholarship, andeducationbypublishingworldwidein Oxford NewYork Auckland CapeTown DaresSalaam HongKong Karachi KualaLumpur Madrid Melbourne MexicoCity Nairobi NewDelhi Shanghai Taipei Toronto Withofficesin Argentina Austria Brazil Chile CzechRepublic France Greece Guatemala Hungary Italy Japan Poland Portugal Singapore SouthKorea Switzerland Thailand Turkey Ukraine Vietnam OxfordisaregisteredtrademarkofOxfordUniversityPress intheUKandincertainothercountries PublishedintheUnitedStates byOxfordUniversityPressInc.,NewYork (cid:1)PaulA.Boghossian2006 Themoralrightsoftheauthorhavebeenasserted DatabaserightOxfordUniversityPress(maker) Firstpublished2006 Allrightsreserved.Nopartofthispublicationmaybereproduced, storedinaretrievalsystem,ortransmitted,inanyformorbyanymeans, withoutthepriorpermissioninwritingofOxfordUniversityPress, orasexpresslypermittedbylaw,orundertermsagreedwiththeappropriate reprographicsrightsorganization.Enquiriesconcerningreproduction outsidethescopeoftheaboveshouldbesenttotheRightsDepartment, OxfordUniversityPress,attheaddressabove Youmustnotcirculatethisbookinanyotherbindingorcover andyoumustimposethesameconditiononanyacquirer BritishLibraryCataloguinginPublicationData Dataavailable LibraryofCongressCataloginginPublicationData Dataavailable TypesetbySPIPublisherServices,Pondicherry,India PrintedinGreatBritain onacid-freepaperby BiddlesLtd.,King’sLynn,Norfolk ISBN0–19–928718–x 978–0–19–928718–5 1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2 For my mother, Me´line´ Yalenezian Boghossian PREFACE It is rare for a philosophical idea to command widespread acceptance in the broader intellectual community of the acad- emy; philosophy, by its nature, tends towards claims of a scope and generality that invite controversy. Over thepasttwentyyearsorso,however,aremarkablecon- sensushasformed—inthehumanandsocialsciences,evenifnotin thenaturalsciences—aroundathesisaboutthenatureofhuman knowledge.Itisthethesisthatknowledgeissociallyconstructed. Although the terminology of social construction is relatively recent, the underlying ideas, aswe shall see, engage long-stand- ingissuesabouttherelationbetweenmindandreality,issuesthat first attracted me to philosophy itself. If this book appears to pay disproportionate attention to the work of Richard Rorty that is not only because of Rorty’s huge influence on contemporary constructivist views, but also be- cause, as a first-year graduate student at Princeton in 1979, I firstcametoappreciatethepoweroftheseviewsinaseminarof his. Although theyclashed with the strongly objectivist tenden- cies I had brought to graduate school from my undergraduate education in physics, I found the arguments for at least some constructivist theses—the ones concerning rational belief—dis- quieting, and thought that academic philosophy had been too quick to dismiss them. I have always been grateful to Rorty for having made me see the need to engage these ideas. Because the issues it addresses have come to attract a wide audience, I have tried to make this book accessible not only to professional philosophers but to anyone who values serious argument. While I don’t know how well I have succeeded, I do know that I radically underestimated how difficult a task that would be. As a result, this book has taken longer to write than I ever expected.Alongtheway,Ihavebenefitedfromthecommentsof alargenumberoffriends,colleaguesandstudents,amongwhom Ishouldespeciallymention:NedBlock,JenniferChurch,Stewart Cohen, Annalisa Coliva, Paolo Faria, Abouali Farmanfarmaian, Kit Fine, Allan Gibbard, Anthony Gottlieb, Elizabeth Harman, Paul Horwich, Paolo Leonardi, Michael Lynch, Anna Sara Malmgren, Thomas Nagel, Ram Neta, Derek Parfit, James Pryor,StephenSchiffer,NishitenShah,AlanSokal,DanSperber, David Velleman, Roger White and an anonymous referee for Oxford University Press. Thanks to Michael Steinberg for aes- thetic advice, David James Barnett for preparing the index and JoshuaSchechterforcloselyvettingthemanuscriptandformany hoursofenjoyable conversations aboutthese andother topics.I owe a special debt of gratitude to Dean Richard Foley, Provost David McLanghlin and President John Sexton for their support notonlyofmyresearchbutofthewonderfulphilosophydepart- ment at NYU. Finally, I am grateful to Tamsin Shaw for her encouragement and advice. Preface (cid:2) 7 This page intentionally left blank CONTENTS 1. Introduction 1 2. The Social Construction of Knowledge 10 3. Constructing the Facts 25 4. Relativizing the Facts 42 5. Epistemic Relativism Defended 58 6. Epistemic Relativism Rejected 81 7. The Paradox Resolved 95 8. Epistemic Reasons and the Explanation of Belief 111 9. Epilogue 129 Bibliography 132 Index 137
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