The Fixation of Belief and its Undoing: Changing Beliefs through Inquiry

205 Pages·1991·5.465 MB·English

by  Isaac Levi

Isaac Levi's new book is concerned with how one can justify changing one's
beliefs. The discussion is deeply informed by the belief-doubt model advo-
cated by C. S. Peirce and John Dewey, of which the book provides a substan-
tial analysis. Professor Levi then addresses the conceptual framework of
potential changes available to an inquirer. A structural approach to proposi-
tional attitudes is proposed that rejects the conventional view that a proposi-
tional attitude involves a relation between an agent and either a linguistic
entity or some other intentional object such as a proposition or set of possible
worlds. The last two chapters offer an account of change in states of full
belief understood as changes in commitments rather than changes in perfor-
mance; one chapter deals with adding new information to a belief state, the
other with giving up information.

THE FIXATION OF BELIEF AND ITS UNDOING

THE FIXATION OF BELIEF
AND ITS UNDOING
Changing beliefs through inquiry
ISAAC LEVI
Columbia University
The right of the
University of Cambridge
to print and sell
all manner of books
was granted by
Henry VIII in 1534.
The University has printed
and published continuously
since 1584.
CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS
Cambridge
New York Port Chester Melbourne Sydney
Published by the Press Syndicate of the University of Cambridge
The Pitt Building, Trumpington Street, Cambridge CB2 IRP
40 West 20th Street, New York, NY 10011, USA
10 Stamford Road, Oakleigh, Melbourne 3166, Australia
www.cambridge.org
Information on this title: www.cambridge.org/9780521412667
© Cambridge University Press 1991
First published 1991
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Levi, Isaac, 1930-
The fixation of belief and its undoing : changing beliefs through
inquiry / Isaac Levi.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-521-41266-8
1. Belief and doubt. 2. Probabilities. 3. Epistemics.
4. Knowledge, Theory of. I. Title.
BD215.L45 1991
I2i'.6-dc2o 91-14207
CIP
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
Levi, Isaac 1930-
The fixation of belief and its undoing : changing beliefs
through inquiry.
1. Beliefs
I. Title
121.6
ISBN-13 978-0-521-41266-7 hardback
ISBN-10 0-521-41266-8 hardback
Transferred to digital printing 2005
FOR
REBECCA, GABRIEL, AND AMELIA

Contents
Preface page ix
i INTRODUCTION
2 FULL BELIEF 6
2.1 Commitment and performance 6
2.2 Conceptual frameworks 9
2-3 Abilities and entitlements 18
2.4 Propositions 21
2-5 Sentential representations 30
2.6 Comparative statics 42
2-7 Rationality unbound 45
2.8 Commitment to the truth 55
2.9 Types of belief change 64
EXPANSION 71
3.1 Routine and deliberate expansion 71
3.2 Informational value 79
3.3 Avoidance of error in deliberate expansion 88
3.4 Avoidance of error in routine expansion 94
3.5 Duhem's thesis 103
3.6 The "comparative statics" of expansion 106
3.7 Modality, monotonicity, and expansion 111
3.8 Choosing true 115
CONTRACTION 117
4.1 Two kinds of contraction 117
4.2 How to contract: The available strategies 120
4.3 How to contract: Probability-based informational value 122
4.4 How to contract: Damped informational value 127
4.5 How to contract: The Recovery Postulate 131
4.6 How to contract: Contraction and replacement 135
4.7 How to contract: Corrigibility and entrenchment 141