The Grounding of Reason

Abstract

T he search for justification for whatever beliefs we may happen to hold is not just the result of some philosophical whim. It very often appears to be a pressing necessity when faced with disagreements that can run very deep. The quest for a rational solution to such problems sometimes may seem to be the alternative to other forms of persuasion, including force. We all like others to agree with us, but the fact that we have to live alongside some with whom we may deeply disagree, just makes more pressing how such differences can be resolved. Pluralism is often celebrated in modem society, and some take an almost aesthetic pleasure in the variety of belief and practice that can be encountered. The notion of there being one right answer to any given problem, let alone one conceptual system that we all ought to share, may seem to involve the wish to impose a bland uniformity on us all. Yet the alternative is a fragmentation that has no easy stopping point. If divergence of belief becomes the mark of different groups of people which are each to be the arbiters of what is or is not acceptable to them, we are liable to find ourselves the members of a system of belief, a practice or whatever, with one member, ourselves. Shared belief is never so absolute that disagreement cannot and does not arise. If the reply is that we must distinguish between the overall structure of a system, or the shape of a form of life, and particular judgments within it, this merely pushes the issue back to how such systems are to be identified and distinguished from each other. If the criterion is to be deep disagreement we are faced again with the question of how far we agree. It has traditionally been conceived as the task of epistemology to look for a grounding of our beliefs in a way that can provide a justification for them that can provide a universal claim. The classical