What Is "Naturalized Epistemology?"

Abstract

In this section, Kim argues that “Epistemology is a normative discipline as much as, and in the same sense as, normative ethics.” In particular, he argues that epistemology is dominated by the concept of justification, and that justification is a strongly normative notion, i.e. a justified belief is good or right in some way. “But justification manifestly is normative. If a belief is justified for us, then it is permissible and reasonable, from the epistemic point of view, for us to hold it, and it would be epistemically irresponsible to hold beliefs that contradict it. ... It probably is only an historical accident that we standardly speak of “normative ethics” but not of “normative epistemology”.