Dogmatism and Easy Knowledge: Avoiding the Dialectic?

Closure principles loom large in recent internalist critiques of epistemic externalism. Cohen (Philos Phenomenol Res 65:309–329, 2002, Philos Phenomenol Res 70:417–430, 2005), Vogel (J Philos 97:602–623, 2000), and Fumerton (Meta-Epistemology and skepticism. Rowman and Littlefield, Lanham, 1995) argue that, given closure, epistemic externalism is committed to the possibility of implausibly easy knowledge. By contrast, Zalabardo (Philos Rev 114:33–61, 2005) proposes that epistemic closure actually precludes the possibility of easy knowledge, and appeals to closure principles to solve the problem of easy knowledge. In my view, disagreement over closure’s bearing on externalism and the problem of easy knowledge is rooted in a failure to bear in mind the familiar distinction between ex ante and ex post forms of epistemic justification and warrant. When this distinction is kept in focus, the result is clear: epistemic closure provides no relief from the problem of easy knowledge.

This paper discusses a particular epistemological puzzle that is a version of what has sometimes been called “the problem of easy knowledge.” It begins by spelling out what the problem is. It is then argued that recent attempts to address the problem (from Jonathan Weisberg, Michael Titelbaum, and Chris Tucker) all fail. Finally, a principle (very similar to one that Crispin Wright has recently defended) that solves the problem is articulated. The common objection to this principle—an objection that Wright, for instance, accepts—is that it is inconsistent with a plausible empiricism. It is argued that this objection fails: in fact, the principle is fully consistent with any plausible empiricism.

Reviewed by: Appearance and Explanation: Phenomenal Explanationism in Epistemology by Kevin McCain and Luca Moretti Caleb Estep McCAIN, Kevin and Luca Moretti. Appearance and Explanation: Phenomenal Explanationism in Epistemology. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2021. iv + 195 pp. Cloth, $70.00 Since its beginning, phenomenal conservatism (PC) has grown rapidly in popularity as a theory of epistemic justification. In Appearance and Explanation, McCain and Moretti develop out of PC a new theory of justification that they call phenomenal explanationism (PE). Their goal is to integrate PC with explanationism—the view that epistemic justification comes from the best explanation—thereby creating PE as a hybrid theory. They ambitiously contend that PE captures the same basic intuitions as PC but is better equipped to handle epistemic phenomena as a whole, troubling objections to PC (and foundationalism in general), and skeptical [End Page 354] arguments. The book is comprised of seven chapters. This review will emphasize the first four. In chapter 1, the authors discuss what PC is and its merits. PC is the idea that "we should grant things to be the way they appear [or seem] to be, unless we have reason to doubt" our seemings. They point out some of the benefits of PC as perceived by its followers: It "provide[s] widespread epistemic practices with a rationale," "it offers a unified account of non-inferential justification for beliefs of very different types," "it constitutes the basis of fallible foundationalism," and has a strong "antiskeptical bite." In chapter 2, McCain and Moretti argue that PC is not sufficient to account even for noninferential justification. First, they argue, PC gives an insufficient explanation of the no-defeater condition. The no-defeater condition is the "unless we have reason to doubt" clause built into PC. PC does not explain why or how S's reason to doubt "interacts with S's seeming that e in such a way as to diminish S's non-inferential justification for believing p." Second, if the power of seemings to justify comes from the seemings themselves, then the seemings become unstable once the subject becomes aware of them. The upshot of this is that if seemings are sufficient for justification, then some beliefs that should not be justified would have justification. In chapter 3, the authors begin to elaborate on their view. The authors distinguish between mere seemings, paired appearances, and presentational appearances to show how appearances can have varying degrees of justificatory power. Seemings and appearances are used in a roughly synonymous way. Mere seemings are lacking in both sensations and presentational phenomenology, hence they provide a very weak form of justification. Paired appearances have sensations but not presentational phenomenology. They have greater justificatory strength than mere seemings but less strength than presentational appearances. Presentational appearances produce the strongest justification and include both sensations and presentational phenomenology. The big payoff from these distinctions is that they show how different appearances can produce varying strengths of justification. In chapter 4, Moretti and McCain first outline their version of explanationism, which is evidentialist in character. It is as follows: "Believing p is justified for S at t if and only if at t: (1). S has total evidence, E; (2). either (i) p is the best (sufficiently good) explanation of e (where e is a subset of E), or (ii) p is an explanatory consequence of the best (sufficiently good) explanation of e (where p is such an explanatory consequence if and only if the relevant explanation of e would provide an explanation of p's truth that is significantly better than the explanation it would provide of ~ p's truth); (3). it is not the case that p fails to satisfy (i) and (ii) with respect to e because of the additional evidence included in E." [End Page 355] Next, the authors merge explanationism with PC as understood through the threefold division of appearances given in chapter 3. The result is that appearances or seemings are necessary and sufficient for a subject to have evidence, but the subject is justified in believing some proposition p only because p is the best explanation of the evidence. Appearances contribute to epistemic justification because as evidence they regulate the capacity...

How should epistemologists respond to skepticism about knowledge of the external world? Michael Bergmann advocates noninferential antiskepticism. The thought is that, to reply to a skeptical argument, we should start with premises that do not require inference. I argue that Bergmann’s reasoning runs into the problem of easy knowledge and propose an alternative inferential antiskepticism. This view faces the problem of vicious circularity. I agree that, if we go down the inferential path, a certain type of circularity is unavoidable. I deny, however, that this type of circularity is vicious.

Consider the following epistemological principle: KR: A knowledge source K can yield knowledge for subject S only if S knows K is reliable. Traditional epistemologists face a dilemma: either reject KR and confront what Stewart Cohen calls “the Problem of Easy Knowledge” or embrace KR and deny that unreflective beings can possess knowledge. In order to avoid this dilemma, an epistemological theory must allow for knowledge on the part of unreflective beings without falling prey to the problem of easy knowledge. I argue that the epistemology of the dying Wittgenstein, presented posthumously in On Certainty, avoids the dilemma.

Stewart Cohen argues that several epistemological theories fall victim to the problem of easy knowledge: they allow us to know far too easily that certain sceptical hypotheses are false and that how things seem is a reliable indicator of how they are. This problem is a result of the theories' interaction with an epistemic closure principle. Cohen suggests that the theories should be modified. I argue that attempts to solve the problem should focus on closure instead; a new and plausible epistemic closure principle can solve the problem of easy knowledge. My solution offers a uniform and more successful response to different versions of the problem of easy knowledge.

If we affirm KR, we face the problem of vicious circularity. How can we attain the required knowledge that our epistemic sources are reliable? Must we not have that knowledge already before the sources can deliver it to us? How can we know perception to be reliable, for example, without basing our belief on our empirical knowledge derived ultimately from perception? And the same goes for memory and other sources. If we deny KR, that apparently enables us to bootstrap our way from the deliverances of a source on some occasion (or upon a series of them) to conclusions about the safety of its operation on that occasion (or about its general reliability). But this is clearly unacceptable. Since Stewart Cohen’s landmark formulation, the phrase, ‘‘The Problem of Easy Knowledge’’, has most often been associated with the reasoning of the second horn, and has been conceived as a difficulty specifically afflicting a spectrum of

This chapter argues that the sort of normativity that is at the heart of epistemology is the sort of normativity involved in assessments of whether a subject’s belief satisfies the distinctly epistemic standards on knowledge. It introduces the term ‘epistemically proper’ to designate the status a belief has when it satisfies these standards. The author argues against the view that nothing short of knowledge itself can provide the standards, and proceeds to argue for the view that the theory of epistemic justification is in the business of articulating the relevant standards. Appealing to his construal of the internalism/externalism dispute in the theory of justification, the author concludes by motivating a desideratum on any such account: it should regard epistemic propriety as involving both a reliability dimension and a responsibilist dimension.

O problema do conhecimento fácil tem sido definido na literatura epistemológica contemporânea com um problema que nasce de duas formas distintas. O propósito deste ensaio é mostrar que essas supostas maneiras diferentes de gerar o mesmo problema em verdade originam dois problemas distintos, que requerem respostas distintas. Um deles está relacionado à aquisição fácil (inaceitável) de conhecimento de primeira-ordem e o outro à aquisição fácil (inaceitável) de conhecimento de segunda-ordem. Além disso, é apresentada a maneira como o infinitismo, a teoria epistêmica segundo a qual as razões que justificam uma opinião devem ser infinitas em número e não-repetidas, pode lidar com cada um desses problemas.

The effort to understand Peter D. Klein’s work on (so-called) Cartesian skepticism is simply not optional to anyone wishing to become familiar with state-of-the-art scholarship on the problem. Nearly four decades ago, Klein developed the invariantist pro-closure response to Fred Dretske’s counterexamples to epistemic closure principles, thus stealing some of the thunder from the nascent, Dretske-inspired contextualist views in epistemology. Since then, he’s added important theoretical elements to his analysis of the central problem of our debate about skepticism and closure: the problem of how a closure defender might refute the Cartesian skeptic without turning into a purveyor of ‘easy knowledge.’ According to Klein, “a proper understanding of closure shows that the [Cartesian] skeptic cannot provide a good argument for her view and helps to show that there is no genuine problem of easy knowledge” (see “Closure Matters: Academic Skepticism and Easy Knowledge” 2004). Indeed, inattention to Klein’s work accounts for some of the most important fallacies perpetrated in the recent literature on epistemic principles that may be of use to the skeptic. Still, on close inspection, Klein’s case against Cartesian skepticism proves optimistic. The chapter briefly reviews the main features of 34 years of Klein’s work on the problem in 15 publications, from his 1981 book on Certainty to his 2015 Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy entry “Skepticism”. It finds that his case against the skeptic is a distinctive mixture of Mooreanism and Russellianism and concludes that none of his main objections to Cartesian skepticism is tenable.

Reliabilism furnishes an account of basic knowledge that circumvents the problem of the given. However, reliabilism and other epistemological theories that countenance basic knowledge have been criticized for permitting all-too-easy higher-level knowledge. In this paper, I describe the problem of easy knowledge, look briefly at proposed solutions, and then develop my own. I argue that the easy knowledge problem, as it applies to reliabilism, hinges on a false and too crude understanding of ‘reliable’. With a more plausible conception of ‘reliable’, a simple and elegant solution emerges.

This chapter discusses Phenomenal Conservatism (PC) and its promises as a theory of epistemic justification. It also explores common objections raised against PC including that it is too liberal, it conflicts with Bayesianism, and it runs afoul of cognitive penetration. It is argued that these common objections fail to pose a genuine threat to PC. Additionally, it is argued that there are a number of benefits provided by the appearance-based approach to epistemic justification championed by PC. As a result, this chapter shows that PC is a good starting point for theorizing about the nature of epistemic justification even though it cannot make good on all of its promises.

I explore the relevance of reflective equilibrium to aesthetic experience, judgement, and appreciation, framing this project in both descriptive and normative terms. I begin with an exposition of reflective equilibrium, construed as a theory of epistemic justification, and of aesthetic appreciation, characterised as an activity with an epistemic goal—namely, achieving an optimal understanding of an artwork or aesthetic object. I stress the broad purview of reflective equilibrium, as well as Rawls’ arguments on the importance of aesthetic activity in human experience, and thus its place in a theory of justice. These preliminary considerations set up a more detailed exploration of reflective equilibrium in action in the aesthetic domain. I develop the argument with reference to a range of cases, from mainstream filmmaking to twelve-tone composition, considering the place of reflective equilibrium in aesthetic appreciation in both its individual and collective guises, as well as its “wide” and “narrow” forms. I demonstrate how the application of reflective equilibrium in the context of the critical appreciation of art relates to a range of significant issues in aesthetics, via the examination of arguments from Sontag, Sibley, Walton, Carroll, and Gaut (among others). Finally I assess various objections to, and extensions of, the main argument, including the objection that aesthetic appreciation does not aim at understanding, and the proposal that the embodied, emotional dimension of aesthetic experience, which must be accommodated by reflective equilibrium in the context of aesthetics, may shed light on its nature and operation in other domains.

2. First Reflections on the Problem of Easy Knowledge

We think that some of our belief sources can furnish us with knowledge of the world-that I can come to know, for example, that the bottle is empty, by looking at it; that I had eggs for breakfast, by remembering it; that the Tory leader has resigned, by reading the newspaper; that my son has a temperature, by using a thermometer; or that 12 times 21 is 252, by mental arithmetic. Some of the most prominent debates in contemporary epistemology concern the conditions under which a belief source can be said to have this power. One question that has attracted considerable attention in these debates is the status of the principle that in order for a belief source to have the power to produce knowledge, the subject needs to know that it is reliable. It will help matters to have a precise formulation of the principle. For this purpose we need to introduce a couple of concepts. On the standard tripartite conception of knowledge, which I shall assume in what follows, knowledge is a species of true belief: in order for a subject S to know that p, p has to be true, S has to believe that p, and S has to satisfy with respect to p an additional condition that turns her true belief into knowledge. I shall refer to this third condition as warrant.1 Thus, when p is true and S believes that p, S will know that p just in case p has warrant for S. But if p is false or S doesn't believe that p, S will not know that p, even if p has warrant for S.2 We can now use the notion of warrant to introduce the other concept that we need. Let's say that a belief source is a knowledge source (in circumstances C) just in case the fact that a belief has been formed as a result of its operation (in circumstances C) confers warrant on the belief.3 Now we can formulate our principle as a necessary condition for a belief source to be a knowledge source. For reasons that will become apparent later on, instead of discussing the principle that accords this status to the subject's knowledge of the reliability of the source, I shall concentrate on the weaker principle that substitutes warrant for knowledge: