PY1006 (2009-10)

REASONING AND KNOWLEDGE

LECTURE FIVE:

What is the Structure of Knowledge?

16/02/2010
Dr. Patrick Greenough

1
1. Recap.

• Last time we played the famous why-

game and found that, in the end, there
are only three ways to respond:

refuse to answer (be dogmatic), repeat

something already said (reason in a
circle), and try to say something new
(and so initiate an infinite regress).
2
1. Recap.

• But we also found that corresponding to

the three horns of Agrippa’s trilemma
there are in fact three respectable
theoretical positions: Foundationalism,
Coherentism, and Infinitism.

3
1. Recap.

• In this lecture, we shall take each of

these views in turn and argue that they
are all inadequate.

• Hence, we can run the following simple

argument and conclude that there is no
knowledge:

4
1. Recap.

(1) Knowledge that p requires that one is

justified in believing p on well-founded
grounds.

(2) There is no such thing as a well-

founded justification.

(3) Therefore, there is no knowledge.

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1. Recap.

• Recall that the Foundationalist posits a

distinction between basic and non-basic
beliefs in order to avoid the problem of
regress scepticism.

• In so doing, they hold that a belief can be

justified without it being justified by some
other belief: some beliefs (basic beliefs)
have a special foundational feature which
makes them somehow self-justified.
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1. Recap.

• But arguably, there are no such things as

basic beliefs.

• To see this, it is first useful to have a

certain distinction in place:

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2. Foreground beliefs and background beliefs.

• Foreground beliefs are ones which we are

attending to at the present time: they are
occurrent.

• Background beliefs are ones which we are

not attending to: they are non-occurrent.

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2. Foreground beliefs and background beliefs.

• Examples of my (current) foreground

beliefs:

There are people in this room.

I am speaking.
The lights are on.

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2. Foreground beliefs and background beliefs.

• Examples of my background beliefs:

My brother is in the UK.

I will die, you will die.
The crisis will last for two years.
Italians from Firenze are macho.
The moon is not made of cheese.
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3. Keystone beliefs (central beliefs).

• There is a whole range of background

beliefs which are central to one’s belief
system.

• Call these beliefs keystone beliefs.

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3. Keystone beliefs (central beliefs).

Examples:

I am not hallucinating.
I have been right in the past.
People are generally reliable witnesses.
My senses are functioning normally.
There are other minds.

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3. Keystone beliefs (central beliefs).

Examples:

My memory is generally reliable.

Lighting conditions are normal.
Conditions for perception are good.
Communication is possible.

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3. Keystone beliefs (central beliefs).

• …

14
4. Ordinary beliefs depend on keystone beliefs.

• Ask yourself: would you form beliefs about

the world if you did not have the following
background beliefs:

(a) ‘My faculties are generally reliable’.

(b) ‘Conditions for perception are good’.

Etc.
(surely not! …).
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4. Ordinary beliefs depend on keystone beliefs.

• So, it looks like certain background beliefs

(i.e. keystone beliefs) play an important
role in the formation of other beliefs.

• But does this mean that: in order for me to

have, say, an ordinary perceptual belief
then I must first hold a some keystone
beliefs?
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4. Ordinary beliefs depend on keystone beliefs.

• …

17
4. Ordinary beliefs depend on keystone beliefs.

• Even so, the following looks plausible:

Claim C: A subject is justified in believing P

only if they justified in believing that:

(a) their faculties/senses are working

properly.
(b) conditions for perception are favourable
or normal.
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4. Ordinary beliefs depend on keystone beliefs.

• So, given Claim C:

• I am justified in believing that the wall is

red only if I am justified in believing that:

(a) My vision is working properly.

(b) Lighting conditions are normal.

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4. Ordinary beliefs depend on keystone beliefs.

• Claim C is devastating for all forms of

Foundationalism. Why?

• It rules out the possibility of basic beliefs—

beliefs which are justified in virtue of their
Foundational properties alone.

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4. Ordinary beliefs depend on keystone beliefs.

• Effectively, since justification always relies

upon the justification one has for some
further belief then no justification is
foundational: all justification is indirect.

• …

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5. Further examples.

• My (allegedly basic) belief that I am in pain

is justified only if I am justified in believing
that my (internal) faculties are working
properly.

• Perhaps I have simply confused pain with

pleasure.

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5. Further examples.

• My (allegedly basic) belief that I am

experiencing a red blotch in my field of
vision is justified only if I am already
justified in believing that my faculties and
senses are working properly.

• But perhaps I have confused a red blotch

with a pink blotch.
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5. Further examples.

• My (allegedly basic) belief that I am

thinking is justified only if I am justified in
believing that my (reflective) faculties are
working properly.

• Perhaps I am not thinking, but having

some kind of illusion of thought.

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6. A Foundationalist reply.

• Perhaps we only need the weaker principle:

Claim C*: A subject is justified in believing
P only if:

(a) their faculties/senses are working

properly.
(b) conditions for perception are favourable.

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6. A Foundationalist reply.

• Here the thought is that it is one thing to

have some justification or evidence that my
faculties are working properly, quite
another that they simply be working
properly.

• They may be working properly without me

having any evidence that they are working
properly.
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6. A Foundationalist reply.

Further worry: To meet scepticism, don’t

we also need philosophical knowledge that
our ordinary beliefs are justified?

• To get that we would need to know that

our faculties are working properly.

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6. A Foundationalist reply.

• In other words, we may indeed have

beliefs which are basic and so justified
without relying on the justification we have
for other beliefs.

• BUT: Can we know when such beliefs are

justified.

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6. A Foundationalist reply.

• …

29
7. Coherentism.

• The above arguments are music to the

ears of the Coherentist.

• What, then, is the doctrine of

Coherentism?

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7. Coherentism.

• Two basic ways of cashing out simple

Coherentism (with respect to justification):

Way One: A belief is justified if and only it

coheres with all of one’s other beliefs.

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7. Coherentism.

Way Two: a belief is justified if and only if

it is a member of a coherent and
comprehensive set of beliefs.

(This is the formulation we shall use.)

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7. Coherentism.

Definition: A set of beliefs is coherent if

and only if one can consistently hold all
the beliefs contained in the set.

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7. Coherentism.

Definition: A set of beliefs is

comprehensive if and only if it contains the
maximum number of (relevant) beliefs.

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7. Coherentism.

• Ernest Sosa (1980) …

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7. Coherentism.

Coherentist Slogan: united they stand and

divided they fall.

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7. Coherentism.

• …

37
7. Coherentism.

• Justification need not even be linear: Audi

(1998) draws a distinction between:

Linear Coherentism: justification runs in a

circle such that when the circle is
sufficiently large then justification is
conferred on the members of the belief
circle.
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7. Coherentism.

Holistic Coherentism: justification is not

linear but is rather like a spider’s web
(here the stress is on absolute
interconnectedness).

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8. Coherentism and regress scepticism.

• The response to regress scepticism is

immediate: a circular justification is OK
just so long as we get a maximal amount
of coherence holding between the web of
beliefs.
• So, beliefs can have well-founded
justifications.

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8. Coherentism and regress scepticism.

• …

41
9. Three problems for Coherentism.

Problem 1: The Problem of Coherent

Fiction. If consistency is sufficient for
coherence then a fairy tale which is
internally consistent and indeed
comprehensive will cohere and thus will be
justified. But the fairy tale will be
absolutely false by definition, and
intuitively outside the scope of anything we
take to be justified!!

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9. Three problems for Coherentism.

Problem 2: The Isolation Objection (often

thought decisive). This is a related
objection, and is stated simply: if
justification is merely an internal matter
then justification is isolated from reality:
but we want justification to be the hallmark
of truth (or at least probable truth).

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9. Three problems for Coherentism.

Problem 3: The Conservativeness

Objection. If this test of justification is
coherence with a set of comprehensive
beliefs then how can we accommodate
novel scientific discoveries which
challenge our present belief system?
(Think of rejecting Aristotelian Physics in
favour of the Copernican world view.)

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10. Only Infinitism Remains.

• Roughly this view says that there is

nothing wrong with an infinite regress of
reasons—the mere fact that we can cite
novel and distinct beliefs as justifications
for other beliefs is itself strong evidence
that our belief system is well-founded.

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10. Only Infinitism Remains.

Problem One: Can we find any examples

of what the regress (begins to) look like?

Problem Two: Any actual instances of the

regress look highly ad hoc and typically
end in dogmatism.

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10. Only Infinitism Remains.

• So, it’s hard to make sense of Infinitism.

• So, none of the three views is particularly

compelling.

• The darkness remains….

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11. To sum up.

• We have:

• (i) Isolated a category of keystone beliefs.

• (ii) It looks like to have any kind of ordinary
knowledge one must be justified in
believing these keystone beliefs.
• (iii) But then there are no foundational
beliefs: Foundationalism is mistaken.

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11. To sum up.

• (iv) Coherentism suffers from at least three

problems: the isolation objection being the one
which seems to sink the view.
• (v) Infinitism just seems to be an obscure view.
• (vi) So, Regress Scepticism remains in place.
• (vii) There are two doormen on the door: even if
you can defeat the error sceptic, the regress
sceptic still blocks entry to the knowledge club.

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 12. Do you want to read more?
• Hetherington, S. (1996): Knowledge Puzzles, Ch. 22, 23, &
25.
• Morton, A. (2003); A Guide Through the Theory of
Knowledge, Ch. 5.
• Lehrer, K. (1990): The Theory of Knowledge, Ch.5-6.
• Pollock, J. (1999): Contemporary Theories of Knowledge,
Rowman and Littlefield
• Dancy, J. (1985): Introduction to Contemporary
Epistemology, Ch. 4.
• Peter Klein: (2006): ‘Infinitism is the Solution to the
Regress Problem?’, in Steup and Sosa, Contemporary
Debates in Epistemology, Oxford: Blackwells.
• Carl Ginet (2006): ‘Infinitism is not the Solution to the
Regress Problem?’ in Steup and Sosa, Contemporary
Debates in Epistemology, Oxford: Blackwells.

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