On the Coherence of Higher-order Beliefs
Författare
Summary, in English
Abstract in Undetermined
Let us by first-order beliefs mean beliefs about the world, such as the belief that it will rain tomorrow, and by second-order beliefs let us mean beliefs about the reliability of first-order, belief-forming processes. In formal epistemology, coherence has been studied, with much ingenuity and precision, for sets of first-order beliefs. However, to the best of our knowledge, sets including second-order beliefs have not yet received serious attention in that literature. In informal epistemology, by contrast, sets of the latter kind play an important role in some respectable coherence theories of knowledge and justification. In this paper, we extend the formal treatment of coherence to second-order beliefs. Our main conclusion is that while extending the framework to second-order beliefs sheds doubt on the generality of the notorious impossibility results for coherentism, another problem crops up that might be no less damaging to the coherentist project: facts of coherence turn out to be epistemically accessible only to agents who have a good deal of insight into matters external to their own belief states.
Let us by first-order beliefs mean beliefs about the world, such as the belief that it will rain tomorrow, and by second-order beliefs let us mean beliefs about the reliability of first-order, belief-forming processes. In formal epistemology, coherence has been studied, with much ingenuity and precision, for sets of first-order beliefs. However, to the best of our knowledge, sets including second-order beliefs have not yet received serious attention in that literature. In informal epistemology, by contrast, sets of the latter kind play an important role in some respectable coherence theories of knowledge and justification. In this paper, we extend the formal treatment of coherence to second-order beliefs. Our main conclusion is that while extending the framework to second-order beliefs sheds doubt on the generality of the notorious impossibility results for coherentism, another problem crops up that might be no less damaging to the coherentist project: facts of coherence turn out to be epistemically accessible only to agents who have a good deal of insight into matters external to their own belief states.
Avdelning/ar
- Teoretisk filosofi
- Lund University Information Quality Research Group (LUIQ)
Publiceringsår
2012
Språk
Engelska
Sidor
112-135
Publikation/Tidskrift/Serie
The Southern Journal of Philosophy
Volym
50
Issue
1
Fulltext
- Available as PDF - 470 kB
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Länkar
Dokumenttyp
Artikel i tidskrift
Förlag
Wiley-Blackwell
Ämne
- Philosophy
Status
Published
Forskningsgrupp
- Lund University Information Quality Research Group (LUIQ)
ISBN/ISSN/Övrigt
- ISSN: 2041-6962